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Project Gutenberg's Celtic Fairy Tales, by Joseph Jacobs (coll. & ed.)

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Title: Celtic Fairy Tales

Author: Joseph Jacobs (coll. & ed.)

Posting Date: February 4, 2010 [EBook #7885]

Release Date: April, 2005
First Posted: May 30, 2003

Language: English

*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK CELTIC FAIRY TALES ***

Produced by Delphine Lettau, Charles Franks, and the people

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CELTIC FAIRY TALES

_SELECTED AND EDITED BY_

JOSEPH JACOBS

_SAY THIS
Three times, with your eyes shut_

Mothuighim boladh an �ireannaigh bhinn bhreugaigh faoi m'fh�id�n

d�thaigh.

_And you will see

What you will see_

_TO ALFRED NUTT_

PREFACE

Last year, in giving the young ones a volume of English Fairy Tales, my
difficulty was one of collection. This time, in offering them specimens
of the rich folk-fancy of the Celts of these islands, my trouble has
rather been one of selection. Ireland began to collect her folk-tales
almost as early as any country in Europe, and Croker has found a whole
school of successors in Carleton, Griffin, Kennedy, Curtin, and Douglas
Hyde. Scotland had the great name of Campbell, and has still efficient
followers in MacDougall, MacInnes, Carmichael, Macleod, and Campbell of
Tiree. Gallant little Wales has no name to rank alongside these; in
this department the Cymru have shown less vigour than the Gaedhel.
Perhaps the Eisteddfod, by offering prizes for the collection of Welsh
folk-tales, may remove this inferiority. Meanwhile Wales must be
content to be somewhat scantily represented among the Fairy Tales of
the Celts, while the extinct Cornish tongue has only contributed one
tale.

In making my selection I have chiefly tried to make the stories

characteristic. It would have been easy, especially from Kennedy, to
have made up a volume entirely filled with "Grimm's Goblins" _� la
Celtique_. But one can have too much even of that very good thing, and
I have therefore avoided as far as possible the more familiar
"formulae" of folk-tale literature. To do this I had to withdraw from
the English-speaking Pale both in Scotland and Ireland, and I laid down
the rule to include only tales that have been taken down from Celtic
peasants ignorant of English.

Having laid down the rule, I immediately proceeded to break it. The
success of a fairy book, I am convinced, depends on the due admixture
of the comic and the romantic: Grimm and Asbj�rnsen knew this secret,
and they alone. But the Celtic peasant who speaks Gaelic takes the
pleasure of telling tales somewhat sadly: so far as he has been printed
and translated, I found him, to my surprise, conspicuously lacking in
humour. For the comic relief of this volume I have therefore had to
turn mainly to the Irish peasant of the Pale; and what richer source
could I draw from?

For the more romantic tales I have depended on the Gaelic, and, as I
know about as much of Gaelic as an Irish Nationalist M. P., I have had
to depend on translators. But I have felt myself more at liberty than
the translators themselves, who have generally been over-literal, in
changing, excising, or modifying the original. I have even gone
further. In order that the tales should be characteristically Celtic, I
have paid more particular attention to tales that are to be found on
both sides of the North Channel.

In re-telling them I have had no scruple in interpolating now and then

a Scotch incident into an Irish variant of the same story, or _vice
versa_. Where the translators appealed to English folklorists and
scholars, I am trying to attract English children. They translated; I
endeavoured to transfer. In short, I have tried to put myself into the
position of an _ollamh_ or _sheenachie_ familiar with both forms of
Gaelic, and anxious to put his stories in the best way to attract
English children. I trust I shall be forgiven by Celtic scholars for
the changes I have had to make to effect this end.

The stories collected in this volume are longer and more detailed than
the English ones I brought together last Christmas. The romantic ones
are certainly more romantic, and the comic ones perhaps more comic,
though there may be room for a difference of opinion on this latter
point. This superiority of the Celtic folk-tales is due as much to the
conditions under which they have been collected, as to any innate
superiority of the folk-imagination. The folk-tale in England is in the
last stages of exhaustion. The Celtic folk-tales have been collected
while the practice of story-telling is still in full vigour, though
there are every signs that its term of life is already numbered. The
more the reason why they should be collected and put on record while
there is yet time. On the whole, the industry of the collectors of
Celtic folk-lore is to be commended, as may be seen from the survey of
it I have prefixed to the Notes and References at the end of the
volume. Among these, I would call attention to the study of the legend
of Beth Gellert, the origin of which, I believe, I have settled.

While I have endeavoured to render the language of the tales simple and
free from bookish artifice, I have not felt at liberty to retell the
tales in the English way. I have not scrupled to retain a Celtic turn
of speech, and here and there a Celtic word, which I have _not_
explained within brackets--a practice to be abhorred of all good men. A
few words unknown to the reader only add effectiveness and local colour
to a narrative, as Mr. Kipling well knows.

One characteristic of the Celtic folk-lore I have endeavoured to

represent in my selection, because it is nearly unique at the present
day in Europe. Nowhere else is there so large and consistent a body of
oral tradition about the national and mythical heroes as amongst the
Gaels. Only the _byline_, or hero-songs of Russia, equal in extent the
amount of knowledge about the heroes of the past that still exists
among the Gaelic-speaking peasantry of Scotland and Ireland. And the
Irish tales and ballads have this peculiarity, that some of them have
been extant, and can be traced, for well nigh a thousand years. I have
selected as a specimen of this class the Story of Deirdre, collected
among the Scotch peasantry a few years ago, into which I have been able
to insert a passage taken from an Irish vellum of the twelfth century.
I could have more than filled this volume with similar oral traditions
about Finn (the Fingal of Macpherson's "Ossian"). But the story of
Finn, as told by the Gaelic peasantry of to-day, deserves a volume by
itself, while the adventures of the Ultonian hero, Cuchulain, could
easily fill another.

I have endeavoured to include in this volume the best and most typical
stories told by the chief masters of the Celtic folk-tale, Campbell,
Kennedy, Hyde, and Curtin, and to these I have added the best tales
scattered elsewhere. By this means I hope I have put together a volume,
containing both the best, and the best known folk-tales of the Celts. I
have only been enabled to do this by the courtesy of those who owned
the copyright of these stories. Lady Wilde has kindly granted me the
use of her effective version of "The Horned Women;" and I have
specially to thank Messrs. Macmillan for right to use Kennedy's
"Legendary Fictions," and Messrs. Sampson Low & Co., for the use of Mr.
Curtin's Tales.

In making my selection, and in all doubtful points of treatment, I have

had resource to the wide knowledge of my friend Mr. Alfred Nutt in all
branches of Celtic folk-lore. If this volume does anything to represent
to English children the vision and colour, the magic and charm, of the
Celtic folk-imagination, this is due in large measure to the care with
which Mr. Nutt has watched its inception and progress. With him by my
side I could venture into regions where the non-Celt wanders at his own
risk.

Lastly, I have again to rejoice in the co-operation of my friend, Mr.

J. D. Batten, in giving form to the creations of the folk-fancy. He has
endeavoured in his illustrations to retain as much as possible of
Celtic ornamentation; for all details of Celtic archaeology he has
authority. Yet both he and I have striven to give Celtic things as they
appear to, and attract, the English mind, rather than attempt the
hopeless task of representing them as they are to Celts. The fate of
the Celt in the British Empire bids fair to resemble that of the Greeks
among the Romans. "They went forth to battle, but they always fell,"
yet the captive Celt has enslaved his captor in the realm of
imagination. The present volume attempts to begin the pleasant
captivity from the earliest years. If it could succeed in giving a
common fund of imaginative wealth to the Celtic and the Saxon children
of these isles, it might do more for a true union of hearts than all
your politics.

JOSEPH JACOBS.

CONTENTS

I. CONNLA AND THE FAIRY MAIDEN

II. GULEESH
III. THE FIELD OF BOLIAUNS
IV. THE HORNED WOMEN
V. CONAL YELLOWCLAW
VI. HUDDEN AND DUDDEN AND DONALD O'NEARY
VII. THE SHEPHERD OF MYDDVAI
VIII. THE SPRIGHTLY TAILOR
IX. THE STORY OF DEIRDRE
X. MUNACHAR AND MANACHAR
XI. GOLD-TREE AND SILVER-TREE
XII. KING O'TOOLE AND HIS GOOSE
XIII. THE WOOING OF OLWEN
XIV. JACK AND HIS COMRADES
XV. THE SHEE AN GANNON AND THE GRUAGACH GAIRE
XVI. THE STORY-TELLER AT FAULT
XVII. THE SEA-MAIDEN
XVIII. A LEGEND OF KNOCKMANY
 XIX. FAIR, BROWN, AND TREMBLING
XX. JACK AND HIS MASTER
XXI. BETH GELLERT
XXII. THE TALE OF IVAN
XXIII. ANDREW COFFEY
XXIV. THE BATTLE OF THE BIRDS
XXV. BREWERY OF EGGSHELLS
XXVI. THE LAD WITH THE GOAT-SKIN

NOTES AND REFERENCES

CONNLA AND THE FAIRY MAIDEN

Connla of the Fiery Hair was son of Conn of the Hundred Fights. One day
as he stood by the side of his father on the height of Usna, he saw a
maiden clad in strange attire coming towards him.

"Whence comest thou, maiden?" said Connla.

"I come from the Plains of the Ever Living," she said, "there where
there is neither death nor sin. There we keep holiday alway, nor need
we help from any in our joy. And in all our pleasure we have no strife.
And because we have our homes in the round green hills, men call us the
Hill Folk."

The king and all with him wondered much to hear a voice when they saw
no one. For save Connla alone, none saw the Fairy Maiden.

"To whom art thou talking, my son?" said Conn the king.

Then the maiden answered, "Connla speaks to a young, fair maid, whom
neither death nor old age awaits. I love Connla, and now I call him
away to the Plain of Pleasure, Moy Mell, where Boadag is king for aye,
nor has there been complaint or sorrow in that land since he has held
the kingship. Oh, come with me, Connla of the Fiery Hair, ruddy as the
dawn with thy tawny skin. A fairy crown awaits thee to grace thy comely
face and royal form. Come, and never shall thy comeliness fade, nor thy
youth, till the last awful day of judgment."

The king in fear at what the maiden said, which he heard though he
could not see her, called aloud to his Druid, Coran by name.

"Oh, Coran of the many spells," he said, "and of the cunning magic, I
call upon thy aid. A task is upon me too great for all my skill and
wit, greater than any laid upon me since I seized the kingship. A
maiden unseen has met us, and by her power would take from me my dear,
my comely son. If thou help not, he will be taken from thy king by
woman's wiles and witchery."

Then Coran the Druid stood forth and chanted his spells towards the
spot where the maiden's voice had been heard. And none heard her voice
again, nor could Connla see her longer. Only as she vanished before the
Druid's mighty spell, she threw an apple to Connla.

For a whole month from that day Connla would take nothing, either to
eat or to drink, save only from that apple. But as he ate it grew again
and always kept whole. And all the while there grew within him a mighty
yearning and longing after the maiden he had seen.

But when the last day of the month of waiting came, Connla stood by the
side of the king his father on the Plain of Arcomin, and again he saw
the maiden come towards him, and again she spoke to him.

"'Tis a glorious place, forsooth, that Connla holds among short-lived

mortals awaiting the day of death. But now the folk of life, the
ever-living ones, beg and bid thee come to Moy Mell, the Plain of
Pleasure, for they have learnt to know thee, seeing thee in thy home
among thy dear ones."

When Conn the king heard the maiden's voice he called to his men aloud
and said:

"Summon swift my Druid Coran, for I see she has again this day the
power of speech."

Then the maiden said: "Oh, mighty Conn, fighter of a hundred fights,
the Druid's power is little loved; it has little honour in the mighty
land, peopled with so many of the upright. When the Law will come, it
will do away with the Druid's magic spells that come from the lips of
the false black demon."

Then Conn the king observed that since the maiden came, Connla his son
spoke to none that spake to him. So Conn of the hundred fights said to
him, "Is it to thy mind what the woman says, my son?"

"'Tis hard upon me," then said Connla; "I love my own folk above all
things; but yet, but yet a longing seizes me for the maiden."

When the maiden heard this, she answered and said "The ocean is not so
strong as the waves of thy longing. Come with me in my curragh, the
gleaming, straight-gliding crystal canoe. Soon we can reach Boadag's
realm. I see the bright sun sink, yet far as it is, we can reach it
before dark. There is, too, another land worthy of thy journey, a land
joyous to all that seek it. Only wives and maidens dwell there. If thou
wilt, we can seek it and live there alone together in joy."

When the maiden ceased to speak, Connla of the Fiery Hair rushed away
from them and sprang into the curragh, the gleaming, straight-gliding
crystal canoe. And then they all, king and court, saw it glide away
over the bright sea towards the setting sun. Away and away, till eye
could see it no longer, and Connla and the Fairy Maiden went their way
on the sea, and were no more seen, nor did any know where they came.

GULEESH

There was once a boy in the County Mayo; Guleesh was his name. There
was the finest rath a little way off from the gable of the house, and
he was often in the habit of seating himself on the fine grass bank
that was running round it. One night he stood, half leaning against the
gable of the house, and looking up into the sky, and watching the
beautiful white moon over his head. After he had been standing that way
for a couple of hours, he said to himself: "My bitter grief that I am
not gone away out of this place altogether. I'd sooner be any place in
the world than here. Och, it's well for you, white moon," says he,
"that's turning round, turning round, as you please yourself, and no
man can put you back. I wish I was the same as you."

Hardly was the word out of his mouth when he heard a great noise coming
like the sound of many people running together, and talking, and
laughing, and making sport, and the sound went by him like a whirl of
wind, and he was listening to it going into the rath. "Musha, by my
soul," says he, "but ye're merry enough, and I'll follow ye."

What was in it but the fairy host, though he did not know at first that
it was they who were in it, but he followed them into the rath. It's
there he heard the _fulparnee_, and the _folpornee_, the
_rap-lay-hoota_, and the _roolya-boolya_, that they had there, and
every man of them crying out as loud as he could: "My horse, and
bridle, and saddle! My horse, and bridle, and saddle!"

"By my hand," said Guleesh, "my boy, that's not bad. I'll imitate ye,"
and he cried out as well as they: "My horse, and bridle, and saddle! My
horse, and bridle, and saddle!" And on the moment there was a fine
horse with a bridle of gold, and a saddle of silver, standing before
him. He leaped up on it, and the moment he was on its back he saw
clearly that the rath was full of horses, and of little people going
riding on them.

Said a man of them to him: "Are you coming with us to-night, Guleesh?"

"I am surely," said Guleesh.

"If you are, come along," said the little man, and out they went all
together, riding like the wind, faster than the fastest horse ever you
saw a-hunting, and faster than the fox and the hounds at his tail.

The cold winter's wind that was before them, they overtook her, and the
cold winter's wind that was behind them, she did not overtake them. And
stop nor stay of that full race, did they make none, until they came to
the brink of the sea.

Then every one of them said: "Hie over cap! Hie over cap!" and that
moment they were up in the air, and before Guleesh had time to remember
where he was, they were down on dry land again, and were going like the
wind.

At last they stood still, and a man of them said to Guleesh: "Guleesh,
do you know where you are now?"

"Not a know," says Guleesh.

"You're in France, Guleesh," said he. "The daughter of the king of

France is to be married to-night, the handsomest woman that the sun
ever saw, and we must do our best to bring her with us; if we're only
able to carry her off; and you must come with us that we may be able to
put the young girl up behind you on the horse, when we'll be bringing
her away, for it's not lawful for us to put her sitting behind
ourselves. But you're flesh and blood, and she can take a good grip of
you, so that she won't fall off the horse. Are you satisfied, Guleesh,
and will you do what we're telling you?"
"Why shouldn't I be satisfied?" said Guleesh. "I'm satisfied, surely,
and anything that ye will tell me to do I'll do it without doubt."

They got off their horses there, and a man of them said a word that
Guleesh did not understand, and on the moment they were lifted up, and
Guleesh found himself and his companions in the palace. There was a
great feast going on there, and there was not a nobleman or a gentleman
in the kingdom but was gathered there, dressed in silk and satin, and
gold and silver, and the night was as bright as the day with all the
lamps and candles that were lit, and Guleesh had to shut his two eyes
at the brightness. When he opened them again and looked from him, he
thought he never saw anything as fine as all he saw there. There were a
hundred tables spread out, and their full of meat and drink on each
table of them, flesh-meat, and cakes and sweetmeats, and wine and ale,
and every drink that ever a man saw. The musicians were at the two ends
of the hall, and they were playing the sweetest music that ever a man's
ear heard, and there were young women and fine youths in the middle of
the hall, dancing and turning, and going round so quickly and so
lightly, that it put a _soorawn_ in Guleesh's head to be looking at
them. There were more there playing tricks, and more making fun and
laughing, for such a feast as there was that day had not been in France
for twenty years, because the old king had no children alive but only
the one daughter, and she was to be married to the son of another king
that night. Three days the feast was going on, and the third night she
was to be married, and that was the night that Guleesh and the
sheehogues came, hoping, if they could, to carry off with them the
king's young daughter.

Guleesh and his companions were standing together at the head of the
hall, where there was a fine altar dressed up, and two bishops behind
it waiting to marry the girl, as soon as the right time should come.
Now nobody could see the sheehogues, for they said a word as they came
in, that made them all invisible, as if they had not been in it at all.

"Tell me which of them is the king's daughter," said Guleesh, when he

was becoming a little used to the noise and the light.

"Don't you see her there away from you?" said the little man that he
was talking to.

Guleesh looked where the little man was pointing with his finger, and
there he saw the loveliest woman that was, he thought, upon the ridge
of the world. The rose and the lily were fighting together in her face,
and one could not tell which of them got the victory. Her arms and
hands were like the lime, her mouth as red as a strawberry when it is
ripe, her foot was as small and as light as another one's hand, her
form was smooth and slender, and her hair was falling down from her
head in buckles of gold. Her garments and dress were woven with gold
and silver, and the bright stone that was in the ring on her hand was
as shining as the sun.

Guleesh was nearly blinded with all the loveliness and beauty that was
in her; but when he looked again, he saw that she was crying, and that
there was the trace of tears in her eyes. "It can't be," said Guleesh,
"that there's grief on her, when everybody round her is so full of
sport and merriment."

"Musha, then, she is grieved," said the little man; "for it's against
her own will she's marrying, and she has no love for the husband she is
to marry. The king was going to give her to him three years ago, when
she was only fifteen, but she said she was too young, and requested him
to leave her as she was yet. The king gave her a year's grace, and when
that year was up he gave her another year's grace, and then another;
but a week or a day he would not give her longer, and she is eighteen
years old to-night, and it's time for her to marry; but, indeed," says
he, and he crooked his mouth in an ugly way--"indeed, it's no king's
son she'll marry, if I can help it."

Guleesh pitied the handsome young lady greatly when he heard that, and
he was heart-broken to think that it would be necessary for her to
marry a man she did not like, or, what was worse, to take a nasty
sheehogue for a husband. However, he did not say a word, though he
could not help giving many a curse to the ill-luck that was laid out
for himself, to be helping the people that were to snatch her away from
her home and from her father.

He began thinking, then, what it was he ought to do to save her, but he

could think of nothing. "Oh! if I could only give her some help and
relief," said he, "I wouldn't care whether I were alive or dead; but I
see nothing that I can do for her."

He was looking on when the king's son came up to her and asked her for
a kiss, but she turned her head away from him. Guleesh had double pity
for her then, when he saw the lad taking her by the soft white hand,
and drawing her out to dance. They went round in the dance near where
Guleesh was, and he could plainly see that there were tears in her eyes.

When the dancing was over, the old king, her father, and her mother the
queen, came up and said that this was the right time to marry her, that
the bishop was ready, and it was time to put the wedding-ring on her
and give her to her husband.

The king took the youth by the hand, and the queen took her daughter,
and they went up together to the altar, with the lords and great people
following them.

When they came near the altar, and were no more than about four yards
from it, the little sheehogue stretched out his foot before the girl,
and she fell. Before she was able to rise again he threw something that
was in his hand upon her, said a couple of words, and upon the moment
the maiden was gone from amongst them. Nobody could see her, for that
word made her invisible. The little man_een_ seized her and raised her
up behind Guleesh, and the king nor no one else saw them, but out with
them through the hall till they came to the door.

Oro! dear Mary! it's there the pity was, and the trouble, and the
crying, and the wonder, and the searching, and the _rookawn_, when that
lady disappeared from their eyes, and without their seeing what did it.
Out of the door of the palace they went, without being stopped or
hindered, for nobody saw them, and, "My horse, my bridle, and saddle!"
says every man of them. "My horse, my bridle, and saddle!" says
Guleesh; and on the moment the horse was standing ready caparisoned
before him. "Now, jump up, Guleesh," said the little man, "and put the
lady behind you, and we will be going; the morning is not far off from
us now."

Guleesh raised her up on the horse's back, and leaped up himself before
her, and, "Rise, horse," said he; and his horse, and the other horses
with him, went in a full race until they came to the sea.

"Hie over cap!" said every man of them.

"Hie over cap!" said Guleesh; and on the moment the horse rose under
him, and cut a leap in the clouds, and came down in Erin.

They did not stop there, but went of a race to the place where was
Guleesh's house and the rath. And when they came as far as that,
Guleesh turned and caught the young girl in his two arms, and leaped
off the horse.

"I call and cross you to myself, in the name of God!" said he; and on
the spot, before the word was out of his mouth, the horse fell down,
and what was in it but the beam of a plough, of which they had made a
horse; and every other horse they had, it was that way they made it.
Some of them were riding on an old besom, and some on a broken stick,
and more on a bohalawn or a hemlock-stalk.

The good people called out together when they heard what Guleesh said:

"Oh! Guleesh, you clown, you thief, that no good may happen you, why
did you play that trick on us?"

But they had no power at all to carry off the girl, after Guleesh had
consecrated her to himself.

"Oh! Guleesh, isn't that a nice turn you did us, and we so kind to you?
What good have we now out of our journey to France. Never mind yet, you
clown, but you'll pay us another time for this. Believe us, you'll
repent it."

"He'll have no good to get out of the young girl," said the little man
that was talking to him in the palace before that, and as he said the
word he moved over to her and struck her a slap on the side of the
head. "Now," says he, "she'll be without talk any more; now, Guleesh,
what good will she be to you when she'll be dumb? It's time for us to
go--but you'll remember us, Guleesh!"

When he said that he stretched out his two hands, and before Guleesh
was able to give an answer, he and the rest of them were gone into the
rath out of his sight, and he saw them no more.

He turned to the young woman and said to her: "Thanks be to God,

they're gone. Would you not sooner stay with me than with them?" She
gave him no answer. "There's trouble and grief on her yet," said
Guleesh in his own mind, and he spoke to her again: "I am afraid that
you must spend this night in my father's house, lady, and if there is
anything that I can do for you, tell me, and I'll be your servant."

The beautiful girl remained silent, but there were tears in her eyes,
and her face was white and red after each other.

"Lady," said Guleesh, "tell me what you would like me to do now. I

never belonged at all to that lot of sheehogues who carried you away
with them. I am the son of an honest farmer, and I went with them
without knowing it. If I'll be able to send you back to your father
I'll do it, and I pray you make any use of me now that you may wish."
He looked into her face, and he saw the mouth moving as if she was
going to speak, but there came no word from it.

"It cannot be," said Guleesh, "that you are dumb. Did I not hear you
speaking to the king's son in the palace to-night? Or has that devil
made you really dumb, when he struck his nasty hand on your jaw?"

The girl raised her white smooth hand, and laid her finger on her
tongue, to show him that she had lost her voice and power of speech,
and the tears ran out of her two eyes like streams, and Guleesh's own
eyes were not dry, for as rough as he was on the outside he had a soft
heart, and could not stand the sight of the young girl, and she in that
unhappy plight.

He began thinking with himself what he ought to do, and he did not like
to bring her home with himself to his father's house, for he knew well
that they would not believe him, that he had been in France and brought
back with him the king of France's daughter, and he was afraid they
might make a mock of the young lady or insult her.

As he was doubting what he ought to do, and hesitating, he chanced to

remember the priest. "Glory be to God," said he, "I know now what I'll
do; I'll bring her to the priest's house, and he won't refuse me to
keep the lady and care for her." He turned to the lady again and told
her that he was loth to take her to his father's house, but that there
was an excellent priest very friendly to himself, who would take good
care of her, if she wished to remain in his house; but that if there
was any other place she would rather go, he said he would bring her to
it.

She bent her head, to show him she was obliged, and gave him to
understand that she was ready to follow him any place he was going. "We
will go to the priest's house, then," said he; "he is under an
obligation to me, and will do anything I ask him."

They went together accordingly to the priest's house, and the sun was
just rising when they came to the door. Guleesh beat it hard, and as
early as it was the priest was up, and opened the door himself. He
wondered when he saw Guleesh and the girl, for he was certain that it
was coming wanting to be married they were.

"Guleesh, Guleesh, isn't it the nice boy you are that you can't wait
till ten o'clock or till twelve, but that you must be coming to me at
this hour, looking for marriage, you and your sweetheart? You ought to
know that I can't marry you at such a time, or, at all events, can't
marry you lawfully. But ubbubboo!" said he, suddenly, as he looked
again at the young girl, "in the name of God, who have you here? Who is
she, or how did you get her?"

"Father," said Guleesh, "you can marry me, or anybody else, if you
wish; but it's not looking for marriage I came to you now, but to ask
you, if you please, to give a lodging in your house to this young lady."

The priest looked at him as though he had ten heads on him; but without
putting any other question to him, he desired him to come in, himself
and the maiden, and when they came in, he shut the door, brought them
into the parlour, and put them sitting.
"Now, Guleesh," said he, "tell me truly who is this young lady, and
whether you're out of your senses really, or are only making a joke of
me."

"I'm not telling a word of lie, nor making a joke of you," said
Guleesh; "but it was from the palace of the king of France I carried
off this lady, and she is the daughter of the king of France."

He began his story then, and told the whole to the priest, and the
priest was so much surprised that he could not help calling out at
times, or clapping his hands together.

When Guleesh said from what he saw he thought the girl was not
satisfied with the marriage that was going to take place in the palace
before he and the sheehogues broke it up, there came a red blush into
the girl's cheek, and he was more certain than ever that she had sooner
be as she was--badly as she was--than be the married wife of the man
she hated. When Guleesh said that he would be very thankful to the
priest if he would keep her in his own house, the kind man said he
would do that as long as Guleesh pleased, but that he did not know what
they ought to do with her, because they had no means of sending her
back to her father again.

Guleesh answered that he was uneasy about the same thing, and that he
saw nothing to do but to keep quiet until they should find some
opportunity of doing something better. They made it up then between
themselves that the priest should let on that it was his brother's
daughter he had, who was come on a visit to him from another county,
and that he should tell everybody that she was dumb, and do his best to
keep every one away from her. They told the young girl what it was they
intended to do, and she showed by her eyes that she was obliged to them.

Guleesh went home then, and when his people asked him where he had
been, he said that he had been asleep at the foot of the ditch, and had
passed the night there.

There was great wonderment on the priest's neighbours at the girl who
came so suddenly to his house without any one knowing where she was
from, or what business she had there. Some of the people said that
everything was not as it ought to be, and others, that Guleesh was not
like the same man that was in it before, and that it was a great story,
how he was drawing every day to the priest's house, and that the priest
had a wish and a respect for him, a thing they could not clear up at
all.

That was true for them, indeed, for it was seldom the day went by but
Guleesh would go to the priest's house, and have a talk with him, and
as often as he would come he used to hope to find the young lady well
again, and with leave to speak; but, alas! she remained dumb and
silent, without relief or cure. Since she had no other means of
talking, she carried on a sort of conversation between herself and
himself, by moving her hand and fingers, winking her eyes, opening and
shutting her mouth, laughing or smiling, and a thousand other signs, so
that it was not long until they understood each other very well.
Guleesh was always thinking how he should send her back to her father;
but there was no one to go with her, and he himself did not know what
road to go, for he had never been out of his own country before the
night he brought her away with him. Nor had the priest any better
knowledge than he; but when Guleesh asked him, he wrote three or four
letters to the king of France, and gave them to buyers and sellers of
wares, who used to be going from place to place across the sea; but
they all went astray, and never a one came to the king's hand.

This was the way they were for many months, and Guleesh was falling
deeper and deeper in love with her every day, and it was plain to
himself and the priest that she liked him. The boy feared greatly at
last, lest the king should really hear where his daughter was, and take
her back from himself, and he besought the priest to write no more, but
to leave the matter to God.

So they passed the time for a year, until there came a day when Guleesh
was lying by himself, on the grass, on the last day of the last month
in autumn, and he was thinking over again in his own mind of everything
that happened to him from the day that he went with the sheehogues
across the sea. He remembered then, suddenly, that it was one November
night that he was standing at the gable of the house, when the
whirlwind came, and the sheehogues in it, and he said to himself: "We
have November night again to-day, and I'll stand in the same place I
was last year, until I see if the good people come again. Perhaps I
might see or hear something that would be useful to me, and might bring
back her talk again to Mary"--that was the name himself and the priest
called the king's daughter, for neither of them knew her right name. He
told his intention to the priest, and the priest gave him his blessing.

Guleesh accordingly went to the old rath when the night was darkening,
and he stood with his bent elbow leaning on a grey old flag, waiting
till the middle of the night should come. The moon rose slowly; and it
was like a knob of fire behind him; and there was a white fog which was
raised up over the fields of grass and all damp places, through the
coolness of the night after a great heat in the day. The night was calm
as is a lake when there is not a breath of wind to move a wave on it,
and there was no sound to be heard but the _cronawn_ of the insects
that would go by from time to time, or the hoarse sudden scream of the
wild-geese, as they passed from lake to lake, half a mile up in the air
over his head; or the sharp whistle of the golden and green plover,
rising and lying, lying and rising, as they do on a calm night. There
were a thousand thousand bright stars shining over his head, and there
was a little frost out, which left the grass under his foot white and
crisp.

He stood there for an hour, for two hours, for three hours, and the
frost increased greatly, so that he heard the breaking of the
_traneens_ under his foot as often as he moved. He was thinking, in his
own mind, at last, that the sheehogues would not come that night, and
that it was as good for him to return back again, when he heard a sound
far away from him, coming towards him, and he recognised what it was at
the first moment. The sound increased, and at first it was like the
beating of waves on a stony shore, and then it was like the falling of
a great waterfall, and at last it was like a loud storm in the tops of
the trees, and then the whirlwind burst into the rath of one rout, and
the sheehogues were in it.

It all went by him so suddenly that he lost his breath with it, but he
came to himself on the spot, and put an ear on himself, listening to
what they would say.

Scarcely had they gathered into the rath till they all began shouting,
and screaming, and talking amongst themselves; and then each one of
them cried out: "My horse, and bridle, and saddle! My horse, and
bridle, and saddle!" and Guleesh took courage, and called out as loudly
as any of them: "My horse, and bridle, and saddle! My horse, and
bridle, and saddle!" But before the word was well out of his mouth,
another man cried out: "Ora! Guleesh, my boy, are you here with us
again? How are you getting on with your woman? There's no use in your
calling for your horse to-night. I'll go bail you won't play such a
trick on us again. It was a good trick you played on us last year?"

"It was," said another man; "he won't do it again."

"Isn't he a prime lad, the same lad! to take a woman with him that
never said as much to him as, 'How do you do?' since this time last
year!" says the third man.

"Perhaps be likes to be looking at her," said another voice.

"And if the _omadawn_ only knew that there's an herb growing up by his
own door, and if he were to boil it and give it to her, she'd be well,"
said another voice.

"That's true for you."

"He is an omadawn."

"Don't bother your head with him; we'll be going."

"We'll leave the _bodach_ as he is."

And with that they rose up into the air, and out with them with one
_roolya-boolya_ the way they came; and they left poor Guleesh standing
where they found him, and the two eyes going out of his head, looking
after them and wondering.

He did not stand long till he returned back, and he thinking in his own
mind on all he saw and heard, and wondering whether there was really an
herb at his own door that would bring back the talk to the king's
daughter. "It can't be," says he to himself, "that they would tell it
to me, if there was any virtue in it; but perhaps the sheehogue didn't
observe himself when he let the word slip out of his mouth. I'll search
well as soon as the sun rises, whether there's any plant growing beside
the house except thistles and dockings."

He went home, and as tired as he was he did not sleep a wink until the
sun rose on the morrow. He got up then, and it was the first thing he
did to go out and search well through the grass round about the house,
trying could he get any herb that he did not recognise. And, indeed, he
was not long searching till he observed a large strange herb that was
growing up just by the gable of the house.

He went over to it, and observed it closely, and saw that there were
seven little branches coming out of the stalk, and seven leaves growing
on every branch_een_ of them; and that there was a white sap in the
leaves. "It's very wonderful," said he to himself, "that I never
noticed this herb before. If there's any virtue in an herb at all, it
ought to be in such a strange one as this."

He drew out his knife, cut the plant, and carried it into his own
house; stripped the leaves off it and cut up the stalk; and there came
a thick, white juice out of it, as there comes out of the sow-thistle
when it is bruised, except that the juice was more like oil.

He put it in a little pot and a little water in it, and laid it on the
fire until the water was boiling, and then he took a cup, filled it
half up with the juice, and put it to his own mouth. It came into his
head then that perhaps it was poison that was in it, and that the good
people were only tempting him that he might kill himself with that
trick, or put the girl to death without meaning it. He put down the cup
again, raised a couple of drops on the top of his finger, and put it to
his mouth. It was not bitter, and, indeed, had a sweet, agreeable
taste. He grew bolder then, and drank the full of a thimble of it, and
then as much again, and he never stopped till he had half the cup
drunk. He fell asleep after that, and did not wake till it was night,
and there was great hunger and great thirst on him.

He had to wait, then, till the day rose; but he determined, as soon as
he should wake in the morning, that he would go to the king's daughter
and give her a drink of the juice of the herb.

As soon as he got up in the morning, he went over to the priest's house

with the drink in his hand, and he never felt himself so bold and
valiant, and spirited and light, as he was that day, and he was quite
certain that it was the drink he drank which made him so hearty.

When he came to the house, he found the priest and the young lady
within, and they were wondering greatly why he had not visited them for
two days.

He told them all his news, and said that he was certain that there was
great power in that herb, and that it would do the lady no hurt, for he
tried it himself and got good from it, and then he made her taste it,
for he vowed and swore that there was no harm in it.

Guleesh handed her the cup, and she drank half of it, and then fell
back on her bed and a heavy sleep came on her, and she never woke out
of that sleep till the day on the morrow.

Guleesh and the priest sat up the entire night with her, waiting till
she should awake, and they between hope and unhope, between expectation
of saving her and fear of hurting her.

She awoke at last when the sun had gone half its way through the
heavens. She rubbed her eyes and looked like a person who did not know
where she was. She was like one astonished when she saw Guleesh and the
priest in the same room with her, and she sat up doing her best to
collect her thoughts.

The two men were in great anxiety waiting to see would she speak, or
would she not speak, and when they remained silent for a couple of
minutes, the priest said to her: "Did you sleep well, Mary?"

And she answered him: "I slept, thank you."

No sooner did Guleesh hear her talking than he put a shout of joy out
of him, and ran over to her and fell on his two knees, and said: "A
thousand thanks to God, who has given you back the talk; lady of my
heart, speak again to me."
The lady answered him that she understood it was he who boiled that
drink for her, and gave it to her; that she was obliged to him from her
heart for all the kindness he showed her since the day she first came
to Ireland, and that he might be certain that she never would forget it.

Guleesh was ready to die with satisfaction and delight. Then they
brought her food, and she ate with a good appetite, and was merry and
joyous, and never left off talking with the priest while she was eating.

After that Guleesh went home to his house, and stretched himself on the
bed and fell asleep again, for the force of the herb was not all spent,
and he passed another day and a night sleeping. When he woke up he went
back to the priest's house, and found that the young lady was in the
same state, and that she was asleep almost since the time that he left
the house.

He went into her chamber with the priest, and they remained watching
beside her till she awoke the second time, and she had her talk as well
as ever, and Guleesh was greatly rejoiced. The priest put food on the
table again, and they ate together, and Guleesh used after that to come
to the house from day to day, and the friendship that was between him
and the king's daughter increased, because she had no one to speak to
except Guleesh and the priest, and she liked Guleesh best.

So they married one another, and that was the fine wedding they had,
and if I were to be there then, I would not be here now; but I heard it
from a birdeen that there was neither cark nor care, sickness nor
sorrow, mishap nor misfortune on them till the hour of their death, and
may the same be with me, and with us all!

THE FIELD OF BOLIAUNS

One fine day in harvest--it was indeed Lady-day in harvest, that

everybody knows to be one of the greatest holidays in the year--Tom
Fitzpatrick was taking a ramble through the ground, and went along the
sunny side of a hedge; when all of a sudden he heard a clacking sort of
noise a little before him in the hedge. "Dear me," said Tom, "but isn't
it surprising to hear the stonechatters singing so late in the season?"
So Tom stole on, going on the tops of his toes to try if he could get a
sight of what was making the noise, to see if he was right in his
guess. The noise stopped; but as Tom looked sharply through the bushes,
what should he see in a nook of the hedge but a brown pitcher, that
might hold about a gallon and a half of liquor; and by-and-by a little
wee teeny tiny bit of an old man, with a little _motty_ of a cocked hat
stuck upon the top of his head, a deeshy daushy leather apron hanging
before him, pulled out a little wooden stool, and stood up upon it, and
dipped a little piggin into the pitcher, and took out the full of it,
and put it beside the stool, and then sat down under the pitcher, and
began to work at putting a heel-piece on a bit of a brogue just fit for
himself. "Well, by the powers," said Tom to himself, "I often heard
tell of the Lepracauns, and, to tell God's truth, I never rightly
believed in them--but here's one of them in real earnest. If I go
knowingly to work, I'm a made man. They say a body must never take
their eyes off them, or they'll escape."

Tom now stole on a little further, with his eye fixed on the little man
just as a cat does with a mouse. So when he got up quite close to him,
"God bless your work, neighbour," said Tom.

The little man raised up his head, and "Thank you kindly," said he.

"I wonder you'd be working on the holiday!" said Tom.

"That's my own business, not yours," was the reply.

"Well, may be you'd be civil enough to tell _us_ what you've got in the
pitcher there?" said Tom.

"That I will, with pleasure," said he; "it's good beer."

"Beer!" said Tom. "Thunder and fire! where did you get it?"

"Where did I get it, is it? Why, I made it. And what do you think I
made it of?"

"Devil a one of me knows," said Tom; "but of malt, I suppose, what

else?"

"There you're out. I made it of heath."

"Of heath!" said Tom, bursting out laughing; "sure you don't think me
to be such a fool as to believe that?"

"Do as you please," said he, "but what I tell you is the truth. Did you
never hear tell of the Danes?"

"Well, what about _them_?" said Tom.

"Why, all the about them there is, is that when they were here they
taught us to make beer out of the heath, and the secret's in my family
ever since."

"Will you give a body a taste of your beer?" said Tom.

"I'll tell you what it is, young man, it would be fitter for you to be
looking after your father's property than to be bothering decent quiet
people with your foolish questions. There now, while you're idling away
your time here, there's the cows have broke into the oats, and are
knocking the corn all about."

Tom was taken so by surprise with this that he was just on the very
point of turning round when he recollected himself; so, afraid that the
like might happen again, he made a grab at the Lepracaun, and caught
him up in his hand; but in his hurry he overset the pitcher, and spilt
all the beer, so that he could not get a taste of it to tell what sort
it was. He then swore that he would kill him if he did not show him
where his money was. Tom looked so wicked and so bloody-minded that the
little man was quite frightened; so says he, "Come along with me a
couple of fields off, and I'll show you a crock of gold."

So they went, and Tom held the Lepracaun fast in his hand, and never
took his eyes from off him, though they had to cross hedges and
ditches, and a crooked bit of bog, till at last they came to a great
field all full of boliauns, and the Lepracaun pointed to a big boliaun,
and says he, "Dig under that boliaun, and you'll get the great crock
all full of guineas."

Tom in his hurry had never thought of bringing a spade with him, so he
made up his mind to run home and fetch one; and that he might know the
place again he took off one of his red garters, and tied it round the
boliaun.

Then he said to the Lepracaun, "Swear ye'll not take that garter away
from that boliaun." And the Lepracaun swore right away not to touch it.

"I suppose," said the Lepracaun, very civilly, "you have no further
occasion for me?"

"No," says Tom; "you may go away now, if you please, and God speed you,
and may good luck attend you wherever you go."

"Well, good-bye to you, Tom Fitzpatrick," said the Lepracaun; "and much
good may it do you when you get it."

So Tom ran for dear life, till he came home and got a spade, and then
away with him, as hard as he could go, back to the field of boliauns;
but when he got there, lo and behold! not a boliaun in the field but
had a red garter, the very model of his own, tied about it; and as to
digging up the whole field, that was all nonsense, for there were more
than forty good Irish acres in it. So Tom came home again with his
spade on his shoulder, a little cooler than he went, and many's the
hearty curse he gave the Lepracaun every time he thought of the neat
turn he had served him.

THE HORNED WOMEN

A rich woman sat up late one night carding and preparing wool, while
all the family and servants were asleep. Suddenly a knock was given at
the door, and a voice called, "Open! open!"

"Who is there?" said the woman of the house.

"I am the Witch of one Horn," was answered.

The mistress, supposing that one of her neighbours had called and
required assistance, opened the door, and a woman entered, having in
her hand a pair of wool-carders, and bearing a horn on her forehead, as
if growing there. She sat down by the fire in silence, and began to
card the wool with violent haste. Suddenly she paused, and said aloud:
"Where are the women? they delay too long."

Then a second knock came to the door, and a voice called as before,
"Open! open!"

The mistress felt herself obliged to rise and open to the call, and
immediately a second witch entered, having two horns on her forehead,
and in her hand a wheel for spinning wool.

"Give me place," she said; "I am the Witch of the two Horns," and she
began to spin as quick as lightning.

And so the knocks went on, and the call was heard, and the witches
entered, until at last twelve women sat round the fire--the first with
one horn, the last with twelve horns.

And they carded the thread, and turned their spinning-wheels, and wound
and wove, all singing together an ancient rhyme, but no word did they
speak to the mistress of the house. Strange to hear, and frightful to
look upon, were these twelve women, with their horns and their wheels;
and the mistress felt near to death, and she tried to rise that she
might call for help, but she could not move, nor could she utter a word
or a cry, for the spell of the witches was upon her.

Then one of them called to her in Irish, and said, "Rise, woman, and
make us a cake."

Then the mistress searched for a vessel to bring water from the well
that she might mix the meal and make the cake, but she could find none.

And they said to her, "Take a sieve and bring water in it."

And she took the sieve and went to the well; but the water poured from
it, and she could fetch none for the cake, and she sat down by the well
and wept.

Then a voice came by her and said, "Take yellow clay and moss, and bind
them together, and plaster the sieve so that it will hold."

This she did, and the sieve held the water for the cake; and the voice
said again:

"Return, and when thou comest to the north angle of the house, cry
aloud three times and say, 'The mountain of the Fenian women and the
sky over it is all on fire.'"

And she did so.

When the witches inside heard the call, a great and terrible cry broke
from their lips, and they rushed forth with wild lamentations and
shrieks, and fled away to Slievenamon, where was their chief abode. But
the Spirit of the Well bade the mistress of the house to enter and
prepare her home against the enchantments of the witches if they
returned again.

And first, to break their spells, she sprinkled the water in which she
had washed her child's feet, the feet-water, outside the door on the
threshold; secondly, she took the cake which in her absence the witches
had made of meal mixed with the blood drawn from the sleeping family,
and she broke the cake in bits, and placed a bit in the mouth of each
sleeper, and they were restored; and she took the cloth they had woven,
and placed it half in and half out of the chest with the padlock; and
lastly, she secured the door with a great crossbeam fastened in the
jambs, so that the witches could not enter, and having done these
things she waited.

Not long were the witches in coming back, and they raged and called for
vengeance.

"Open! open!" they screamed; "open, feet-water!"

"I cannot," said the feet-water; "I am scattered on the ground, and my
path is down to the Lough."

"Open, open, wood and trees and beam!" they cried to the door.

"I cannot," said the door, "for the beam is fixed in the jambs and I
have no power to move."

"Open, open, cake that we have made and mingled with blood!" they cried
again.

"I cannot," said the cake, "for I am broken and bruised, and my blood
is on the lips of the sleeping children."

Then the witches rushed through the air with great cries, and fled back
to Slievenamon, uttering strange curses on the Spirit of the Well, who
had wished their ruin; but the woman and the house were left in peace,
and a mantle dropped by one of the witches in her flight was kept hung
up by the mistress in memory of that night; and this mantle was kept by
the same family from generation to generation for five hundred years
after.

CONALL YELLOWCLAW

Conall Yellowclaw was a sturdy tenant in Erin: he had three sons. There
was at that time a king over every fifth of Erin. It fell out for the
children of the king that was near Conall, that they themselves and the
children of Conall came to blows. The children of Conall got the upper
hand, and they killed the king's big son. The king sent a message for
Conall, and he said to him--"Oh, Conall! what made your sons go to
spring on my sons till my big son was killed by your children? but I
see that though I follow you revengefully, I shall not be much better
for it, and I will now set a thing before you, and if you will do it, I
will not follow you with revenge. If you and your sons will get me the
brown horse of the king of Lochlann, you shall get the souls of your
sons."

"Why," said Conall, "should not I do the pleasure of the king, though
there should be no souls of my sons in dread at all. Hard is the matter
you require of me, but I will lose my own life, and the life of my
sons, or else I will do the pleasure of the king."

After these words Conall left the king, and he went home: when he got
home he was under much trouble and perplexity. When he went to lie down
he told his wife the thing the king had set before him. His wife took
much sorrow that he was obliged to part from herself, while she knew
not if she should see him more.

"Oh, Conall," said she, "why didst not thou let the king do his own
pleasure to thy sons, rather than be going now, while I know not if
ever I shall see thee more?"

When he rose on the morrow, he set himself and his three sons in order,
and they took their journey towards Lochlann, and they made no stop but
tore through ocean till they reached it. When they reached Lochlann
they did not know what they should do. Said the old man to his sons,
"Stop ye, and we will seek out the house of the king's miller."
When they went into the house of the king's miller, the man asked them
to stop there for the night. Conall told the miller that his own
children and the children of his king had fallen out, and that his
children had killed the king's son, and there was nothing that would
please the king but that he should get the brown horse of the king of
Lochlann.

"If you will do me a kindness, and will put me in a way to get him, for
certain I will pay ye for it."

"The thing is silly that you are come to seek," said the miller; "for
the king has laid his mind on him so greatly that you will not get him
in any way unless you steal him; but if you can make out a way, I will
keep it secret."

"This is what I am thinking," said Conall, "since you are working every
day for the king, you and your gillies could put myself and my sons
into five sacks of bran."

"The plan that has come into your head is not bad," said the miller.

The miller spoke to his gillies, and he said to them to do this, and
they put them in five sacks. The king's gillies came to seek the bran,
and they took the five sacks with them, and they emptied them before
the horses. The servants locked the door, and they went away.

When they rose to lay hand on the brown horse, said Conall, "You shall
not do that. It is hard to get out of this; let us make for ourselves
five hiding holes, so that if they hear us we may go and hide." They
made the holes, then they laid hands on the horse. The horse was pretty
well unbroken, and he set to making a terrible noise through the
stable. The king heard the noise. "It must be my brown horse," said he
to his gillies; "find out what is wrong with him."

The servants went out, and when Conall and his sons saw them coming
they went into the hiding holes. The servants looked amongst the
horses, and they did not find anything wrong; and they returned and
they told this to the king, and the king said to them that if nothing
was wrong they should go to their places of rest. When the gillies had
time to be gone, Conall and his sons laid their hands again on the
horse. If the noise was great that he made before, the noise he made
now was seven times greater. The king sent a message for his gillies
again, and said for certain there was something troubling the brown
horse. "Go and look well about him." The servants went out, and they
went to their hiding holes. The servants rummaged well, and did not
find a thing. They returned and they told this.

"That is marvellous for me," said the king: "go you to lie down again,
and if I notice it again I will go out myself."

When Conall and his sons perceived that the gillies were gone, they
laid hands again on the horse, and one of them caught him, and if the
noise that the horse made on the two former times was great, he made
more this time.

"Be this from me," said the king; "it must be that some one is
troubling my brown horse." He sounded the bell hastily, and when his
waiting-man came to him, he said to him to let the stable gillies know
that something was wrong with the horse. The gillies came, and the king
went with them. When Conall and his sons perceived the company coming
they went to the hiding holes.

The king was a wary man, and he saw where the horses were making a
noise.

"Be wary," said the king, "there are men within the stable, let us get
at them somehow."

The king followed the tracks of the men, and he found them. Every one
knew Conall, for he was a valued tenant of the king of Erin, and when
the king brought them up out of the holes he said, "Oh, Conall, is it
you that are here?"

"I am, O king, without question, and necessity made me come. I am under
thy pardon, and under thine honour, and under thy grace." He told how
it happened to him, and that he had to get the brown horse for the king
of Erin, or that his sons were to be put to death. "I knew that I
should not get him by asking, and I was going to steal him."

"Yes, Conall, it is well enough, but come in," said the king. He
desired his look-out men to set a watch on the sons of Conall, and to
give them meat. And a double watch was set that night on the sons of
Conall.

"Now, O Conall," said the king, "were you ever in a harder place than
to be seeing your lot of sons hanged tomorrow? But you set it to my
goodness and to my grace, and say that it was necessity brought it on
you, so I must not hang you. Tell me any case in which you were as hard
as this, and if you tell that, you shall get the soul of your youngest
son."

"I will tell a case as hard in which I was," said Conall. "I was once a
young lad, and my father had much land, and he had parks of year-old
cows, and one of them had just calved, and my father told me to bring
her home. I found the cow, and took her with us. There fell a shower of
snow. We went into the herd's bothy, and we took the cow and the calf
in with us, and we were letting the shower pass from us. Who should
come in but one cat and ten, and one great one-eyed fox-coloured cat as
head bard over them. When they came in, in very deed I myself had no
liking for their company. 'Strike up with you,' said the head bard,
'why should we be still? and sing a cronan to Conall Yellowclaw.' I was
amazed that my name was known to the cats themselves. When they had
sung the cronan, said the head bard, 'Now, O Conall, pay the reward of
the cronan that the cats have sung to thee.' 'Well then,' said I
myself, 'I have no reward whatsoever for you, unless you should go down
and take that calf.' No sooner said I the word than the two cats and
ten went down to attack the calf, and in very deed, he did not last
them long. 'Play up with you, why should you be silent? Make a cronan
to Conall Yellowclaw,' said the head bard. Certainly I had no liking at
all for the cronan, but up came the one cat and ten, and if they did
not sing me a cronan then and there! 'Pay them now their reward,' said
the great fox-coloured cat. 'I am tired myself of yourselves and your
rewards,' said I. 'I have no reward for you unless you take that cow
down there.' They betook themselves to the cow, and indeed she did not
last them long.

"'Why will you be silent? Go up and sing a cronan to Conall

Yellowclaw,' said the head bard. And surely, oh king, I had no care for
them or for their cronan, for I began to see that they were not good
comrades. When they had sung me the cronan they betook themselves down
where the head bard was. 'Pay now their reward, said the head bard; and
for sure, oh king, I had no reward for them; and I said to them, 'I
have no reward for you.' And surely, oh king, there was catterwauling
between them. So I leapt out at a turf window that was at the back of
the house. I took myself off as hard as I might into the wood. I was
swift enough and strong at that time; and when I felt the rustling
toirm of the cats after me I climbed into as high a tree as I saw in
the place, and one that was close in the top; and I hid myself as well
as I might. The cats began to search for me through the wood, and they
could not find me; and when they were tired, each one said to the other
that they would turn back. 'But,' said the one-eyed fox-coloured cat
that was commander-in-chief over them, 'you saw him not with your two
eyes, and though I have but one eye, there's the rascal up in the
tree.' When he had said that, one of them went up in the tree, and as
he was coming where I was, I drew a weapon that I had and I killed him.
'Be this from me!' said the one-eyed one--'I must not be losing my
company thus; gather round the root of the tree and dig about it, and
let down that villain to earth.' On this they gathered about the tree,
and they dug about the root, and the first branching root that they
cut, she gave a shiver to fall, and I myself gave a shout, and it was
not to be wondered at.

"There was in the neighbourhood of the wood a priest, and he had ten
men with him delving, and he said, 'There is a shout of a man in
extremity and I must not be without replying to it.' And the wisest of
the men said, 'Let it alone till we hear it again.' The cats began
again digging wildly, and they broke the next root; and I myself gave
the next shout, and in very deed it was not a weak one. 'Certainly,'
said the priest, 'it is a man in extremity--let us move.' They set
themselves in order for moving. And the cats arose on the tree, and
they broke the third root, and the tree fell on her elbow. Then I gave
the third shout. The stalwart men hastened, and when they saw how the
cats served the tree, they began at them with the spades; and they
themselves and the cats began at each other, till the cats ran away.
And surely, oh king, I did not move till I saw the last one of them
off. And then I came home. And there's the hardest case in which I ever
was; and it seems to me that tearing by the cats were harder than
hanging to-morrow by the king of Lochlann."

"Och! Conall," said the king, "you are full of words. You have freed
the soul of your son with your tale; and if you tell me a harder case
than that you will get your second youngest son, and then you will have
two sons."

"Well then," said Conall, "on condition that thou dost that, I will
tell thee how I was once in a harder case than to be in thy power in
prison to-night."

"Let's hear," said the king.

"I was then," said Conall, "quite a young lad, and I went out hunting,
and my father's land was beside the sea, and it was rough with rocks,
caves, and rifts. When I was going on the top of the shore, I saw as if
there were a smoke coming up between two rocks, and I began to look
what might be the meaning of the smoke coming up there. When I was
looking, what should I do but fall; and the place was so full of
heather, that neither bone nor skin was broken. I knew not how I should
get out of this. I was not looking before me, but I kept looking
overhead the way I came--and thinking that the day would never come
that I could get up there. It was terrible for me to be there till I
should die. I heard a great clattering coming, and what was there but a
great giant and two dozen of goats with him, and a buck at their head.
And when the giant had tied the goats, he came up and he said to me,
'Hao O! Conall, it's long since my knife has been rusting in my pouch
waiting for thy tender flesh.' 'Och!' said I, 'it's not much you will
be bettered by me, though you should tear me asunder; I will make but
one meal for you. But I see that you are one-eyed. I am a good leech,
and I will give you the sight of the other eye.' The giant went and he
drew the great caldron on the site of the fire. I myself was telling
him how he should heat the water, so that I should give its sight to
the other eye. I got heather and I made a rubber of it, and I set him
upright in the caldron. I began at the eye that was well, pretending to
him that I would give its sight to the other one, till I left them as
bad as each other; and surely it was easier to spoil the one that was
well than to give sight to the other.

"When he saw that he could not see a glimpse, and when I myself said to
him that I would get out in spite of him, he gave a spring out of the
water, and he stood in the mouth of the cave, and he said that he would
have revenge for the sight of his eye. I had but to stay there crouched
the length of the night, holding in my breath in such a way that he
might not find out where I was.

"When he felt the birds calling in the morning, and knew that the day
was, he said--'Art thou sleeping? Awake and let out my lot of goats.' I
killed the buck. He cried, 'I do believe that thou art killing my buck.'

"'I am not,' said I, 'but the ropes are so tight that I take long to
loose them.' I let out one of the goats, and there he was caressing
her, and he said to her, 'There thou art thou shaggy, hairy white goat;
and thou seest me, but I see thee not.' I kept letting them out by the
way of one and one, as I flayed the buck, and before the last one was
out I had him flayed bag-wise. Then I went and I put my legs in place
of his legs, and my hands in place of his forelegs, and my head in
place of his head, and the horns on top of my head, so that the brute
might think that it was the buck. I went out. When I was going out the
giant laid his hand on me, and he said, 'There thou art, thou pretty
buck; thou seest me, but I see thee not.' When I myself got out, and I
saw the world about me, surely, oh, king! joy was on me. When I was out
and had shaken the skin off me, I said to the brute, 'I am out now in
spite of you.'

"'Aha!' said he, 'hast thou done this to me. Since thou wert so
stalwart that thou hast got out, I will give thee a ring that I have
here; keep the ring, and it will do thee good.'

"'I will not take the ring from you,' said I, 'but throw it, and I will
take it with me.' He threw the ring on the flat ground, I went myself
and I lifted the ring, and I put it on my finger. When he said me then,
'Is the ring fitting thee?' I said to him, 'It is.' Then he said,
'Where art thou, ring?' And the ring said, 'I am here.' The brute went
and went towards where the ring was speaking, and now I saw that I was
in a harder case than ever I was. I drew a dirk. I cut the finger from
off me, and I threw it from me as far as I could out on the loch, and
there was a great depth in the place. He shouted, 'Where art thou,
ring?' And the ring said, 'I am here,' though it was on the bed of
ocean. He gave a spring after the ring, and out he went in the sea. And
I was as pleased then when I saw him drowning, as though you should
grant my own life and the life of my two sons with me, and not lay any
more trouble on me.

"When the giant was drowned I went in, and I took with me all he had of
gold and silver, and I went home, and surely great joy was on my people
when I arrived. And as a sign now look, the finger is off me."

"Yes, indeed, Conall, you are wordy and wise," said the king. "I see
the finger is off you. You have freed your two sons, but tell me a case
in which you ever were that is harder than to be looking on your son
being hanged tomorrow, and you shall get the soul of your eldest son."

"Then went my father," said Conall, "and he got me a wife, and I was
married. I went to hunt. I was going beside the sea, and I saw an
island over in the midst of the loch, and I came there where a boat was
with a rope before her, and a rope behind her, and many precious things
within her. I looked myself on the boat to see how I might get part of
them. I put in the one foot, and the other foot was on the ground, and
when I raised my head what was it but the boat over in the middle of
the loch, and she never stopped till she reached the island. When I
went out of the boat the boat returned where she was before. I did not
know now what I should do. The place was without meat or clothing,
without the appearance of a house on it. I came out on the top of a
hill. Then I came to a glen; I saw in it, at the bottom of a hollow, a
woman with a child, and the child was naked on her knee, and she had a
knife in her hand. She tried to put the knife to the throat of the
babe, and the babe began to laugh in her face, and she began to cry,
and she threw the knife behind her. I thought to myself that I was near
my foe and far from my friends, and I called to the woman, 'What are
you doing here?' And she said to me, 'What brought you here?' I told
her myself word upon word how I came. 'Well then,' said she, 'it was so
I came also.' She showed me to the place where I should come in where
she was. I went in, and I said to her, 'What was the matter that you
were putting the knife on the neck of the child?' 'It is that he must
be cooked for the giant who is here, or else no more of my world will
be before me.' Just then we could be hearing the footsteps of the
giant, 'What shall I do? what shall I do?' cried the woman. I went to
the caldron, and by luck it was not hot, so in it I got just as the
brute came in. 'Hast thou boiled that youngster for me?' he cried.
'He's not done yet,' said she, and I cried out from the caldron,
'Mammy, mammy, it's boiling I am.' Then the giant laughed out HAI, HAW,
HOGARAICH, and heaped on wood under the caldron.

"And now I was sure I would scald before I could get out of that. As
fortune favoured me, the brute slept beside the caldron. There I was
scalded by the bottom of the caldron. When she perceived that he was
asleep, she set her mouth quietly to the hole that was in the lid, and
she said to me 'was I alive?' I said I was. I put up my head, and the
hole in the lid was so large, that my head went through easily.
Everything was coming easily with me till I began to bring up my hips.
I left the skin of my hips behind me, but I came out. When I got out of
the caldron I knew not what to do; and she said to me that there was no
weapon that would kill him but his own weapon. I began to draw his
spear and every breath that he drew I thought I would be down his
throat, and when his breath came out I was back again just as far. But
with every ill that befell me I got the spear loosed from him. Then I
was as one under a bundle of straw in a great wind for I could not
manage the spear. And it was fearful to look on the brute, who had but
one eye in the midst of his face; and it was not agreeable for the like
of me to attack him. I drew the dart as best I could, and I set it in
his eye. When he felt this he gave his head a lift, and he struck the
other end of the dart on the top of the cave, and it went through to
the back of his head. And he fell cold dead where he was; and you may
be sure, oh king, that joy was on me. I myself and the woman went out
on clear ground, and we passed the night there. I went and got the boat
with which I came, and she was no way lightened, and took the woman and
the child over on dry land; and I returned home."

The king of Lochlann's mother was putting on a fire at this time, and
listening to Conall telling the tale about the child.

"Is it you," said she, "that were there?"

"Well then," said he, "'twas I."

"Och! och!" said she, "'twas I that was there, and the king is the
child whose life you saved; and it is to you that life thanks should be
given." Then they took great joy.

The king said, "Oh, Conall, you came through great hardships. And now
the brown horse is yours, and his sack full of the most precious things
that are in my treasury."

They lay down that night, and if it was early that Conall rose, it was
earlier than that that the queen was on foot making ready. He got the
brown horse and his sack full of gold and silver and stones of great
price, and then Conall and his three sons went away, and they returned
home to the Erin realm of gladness. He left the gold and silver in his
house, and he went with the horse to the king. They were good friends
evermore. He returned home to his wife, and they set in order a feast;
and that was a feast if ever there was one, oh son and brother.

HUDDEN AND DUDDEN AND DONALD O'NEARY

There was once upon a time two farmers, and their names were Hudden and
Dudden. They had poultry in their yards, sheep on the uplands, and
scores of cattle in the meadow-land alongside the river. But for all
that they weren't happy. For just between their two farms there lived a
poor man by the name of Donald O'Neary. He had a hovel over his head
and a strip of grass that was barely enough to keep his one cow, Daisy,
from starving, and, though she did her best, it was but seldom that
Donald got a drink of milk or a roll of butter from Daisy. You would
think there was little here to make Hudden and Dudden jealous, but so
it is, the more one has the more one wants, and Donald's neighbours lay
awake of nights scheming how they might get hold of his little strip of
grass-land. Daisy, poor thing, they never thought of; she was just a
bag of bones.

One day Hudden met Dudden, and they were soon grumbling as usual, and
all to the tune of "If only we could get that vagabond Donald O'Neary
out of the country."

"Let's kill Daisy," said Hudden at last; "if that doesn't make him
clear out, nothing will."
No sooner said than agreed, and it wasn't dark before Hudden and Dudden
crept up to the little shed where lay poor Daisy trying her best to
chew the cud, though she hadn't had as much grass in the day as would
cover your hand. And when Donald came to see if Daisy was all snug for
the night, the poor beast had only time to lick his hand once before
she died.

Well, Donald was a shrewd fellow, and downhearted though he was, began
to think if he could get any good out of Daisy's death. He thought and
he thought, and the next day you could have seen him trudging off early
to the fair, Daisy's hide over his shoulder, every penny he had
jingling in his pockets. Just before he got to the fair, he made
several slits in the hide, put a penny in each slit, walked into the
best inn of the town as bold as if it belonged to him, and, hanging the
hide up to a nail in the wall, sat down.

"Some of your best whisky," says he to the landlord.

But the landlord didn't like his looks. "Is it fearing I won't pay you,
you are?" says Donald; "why I have a hide here that gives me all the
money I want." And with that he hit it a whack with his stick and out
hopped a penny. The landlord opened his eyes, as you may fancy.

"What'll you take for that hide?"

"It's not for sale, my good man."

"Will you take a gold piece?"

"It's not for sale, I tell you. Hasn't it kept me and mine for years?"
and with that Donald hit the hide another whack and out jumped a second
penny.

Well, the long and the short of it was that Donald let the hide go,
and, that very evening, who but he should walk up to Hudden's door?

"Good-evening, Hudden. Will you lend me your best pair of scales?"

Hudden stared and Hudden scratched his head, but he lent the scales.

When Donald was safe at home, he pulled out his pocketful of bright
gold and began to weigh each piece in the scales. But Hudden had put a
lump of butter at the bottom, and so the last piece of gold stuck fast
to the scales when he took them back to Hudden.

If Hudden had stared before, he stared ten times more now, and no
sooner was Donald's back turned, than he was of as hard as he could
pelt to Dudden's.

"Good-evening, Dudden. That vagabond, bad luck to him--"

"You mean Donald O'Neary?"

"And who else should I mean? He's back here weighing out sackfuls of
gold."

"How do you know that?"

"Here are my scales that he borrowed, and here's a gold piece still
sticking to them."

Off they went together, and they came to Donald's door. Donald had
finished making the last pile of ten gold pieces. And he couldn't
finish because a piece had stuck to the scales.

In they walked without an "If you please" or "By your leave."

"Well, _I_ never!" that was all _they_ could say.

"Good-evening, Hudden; good-evening, Dudden. Ah! you thought you had

played me a fine trick, but you never did me a better turn in all your
lives. When I found poor Daisy dead, I thought to myself, 'Well, her
hide may fetch something;' and it did. Hides are worth their weight in
gold in the market just now."

Hudden nudged Dudden, and Dudden winked at Hudden.

"Good-evening, Donald O'Neary."

"Good-evening, kind friends."

The next day there wasn't a cow or a calf that belonged to Hudden or
Dudden but her hide was going to the fair in Hudden's biggest cart
drawn by Dudden's strongest pair of horses.

When they came to the fair, each one took a hide over his arm, and
there they were walking through the fair, bawling out at the top of
their voices: "Hides to sell! hides to sell!"

Out came the tanner:

"How much for your hides, my good men?"

"Their weight in gold."

"It's early in the day to come out of the tavern."

That was all the tanner said, and back he went to his yard.

"Hides to sell! Fine fresh hides to sell!"

Out came the cobbler.

"How much for your hides, my men?"

"Their weight in gold."

"Is it making game of me you are! Take that for your pains," and the
cobbler dealt Hudden a blow that made him stagger.

Up the people came running from one end of the fair to the other.
"What's the matter? What's the matter?" cried they.

"Here are a couple of vagabonds selling hides at their weight in gold,"

said the cobbler.

"Hold 'em fast; hold 'em fast!" bawled the innkeeper, who was the last
to come up, he was so fat. "I'll wager it's one of the rogues who
tricked me out of thirty gold pieces yesterday for a wretched hide."

It was more kicks than halfpence that Hudden and Dudden got before they
were well on their way home again, and they didn't run the slower
because all the dogs of the town were at their heels.

Well, as you may fancy, if they loved Donald little before, they loved
him less now.

"What's the matter, friends?" said he, as he saw them tearing along,
their hats knocked in, and their coats torn off, and their faces black
and blue. "Is it fighting you've been? or mayhap you met the police,
ill luck to them?"

"We'll police you, you vagabond. It's mighty smart you thought
yourself, deluding us with your lying tales."

"Who deluded you? Didn't you see the gold with your own two eyes?"

But it was no use talking. Pay for it he must, and should. There was a
meal-sack handy, and into it Hudden and Dudden popped Donald O'Neary,
tied him up tight, ran a pole through the knot, and off they started
for the Brown Lake of the Bog, each with a pole-end on his shoulder,
and Donald O'Neary between.

But the Brown Lake was far, the road was dusty, Hudden and Dudden were
sore and weary, and parched with thirst. There was an inn by the
roadside.

"Let's go in," said Hudden; "I'm dead beat. It's heavy he is for the
little he had to eat."

If Hudden was willing, so was Dudden. As for Donald, you may be sure
his leave wasn't asked, but he was lumped down at the inn door for all
the world as if he had been a sack of potatoes.

"Sit still, you vagabond," said Dudden; "if we don't mind waiting, you
needn't."

Donald held his peace, but after a while he heard the glasses clink,
and Hudden singing away at the top of his voice.

"I won't have her, I tell you; I won't have her!" said Donald. But
nobody heeded what he said.

"I won't have her, I tell you; I won't have her!" said Donald, and this
time he said it louder; but nobody heeded what he said.

"I won't have her, I tell you; I won't have her!" said Donald; and this
time he said it as loud as he could.

"And who won't you have, may I be so bold as to ask?" said a farmer,
who had just come up with a drove of cattle, and was turning in for a
glass.

"It's the king's daughter. They are bothering the life out of me to
marry her."
"You're the lucky fellow. I'd give something to be in your shoes."

"Do you see that now! Wouldn't it be a fine thing for a farmer to be
marrying a princess, all dressed in gold and jewels?"

"Jewels, do you say? Ah, now, couldn't you take me with you?"

"Well, you're an honest fellow, and as I don't care for the king's
daughter, though she's as beautiful as the day, and is covered with
jewels from top to toe, you shall have her. Just undo the cord, and let
me out; they tied me up tight, as they knew I'd run away from her."

Out crawled Donald; in crept the farmer.

"Now lie still, and don't mind the shaking; it's only rumbling over the
palace steps you'll be. And maybe they'll abuse you for a vagabond, who
won't have the king's daughter; but you needn't mind that. Ah! it's a
deal I'm giving up for you, sure as it is that I don't care for the
princess."

"Take my cattle in exchange," said the farmer; and you may guess it
wasn't long before Donald was at their tails driving them homewards.

Out came Hudden and Dudden, and the one took one end of the pole, and
the other the other.

"I'm thinking he's heavier," said Hudden.

"Ah, never mind," said Dudden; "it's only a step now to the Brown Lake."

"I'll have her now! I'll have her now!" bawled the farmer, from inside
the sack.

"By my faith, and you shall though," said Hudden, and he laid his stick
across the sack.

"I'll have her! I'll have her!" bawled the farmer, louder than ever.

"Well, here you are," said Dudden, for they were now come to the Brown
Lake, and, unslinging the sack, they pitched it plump into the lake.

"You'll not be playing your tricks on us any longer," said Hudden.

"True for you," said Dudden. "Ah, Donald, my boy, it was an ill day
when you borrowed my scales."

Off they went, with a light step and an easy heart, but when they were
near home, who should they see but Donald O'Neary, and all around him
the cows were grazing, and the calves were kicking up their heels and
butting their heads together.

"Is it you, Donald?" said Dudden. "Faith, you've been quicker than we
have."

"True for you, Dudden, and let me thank you kindly; the turn was good,
if the will was ill. You'll have heard, like me, that the Brown Lake
leads to the Land of Promise. I always put it down as lies, but it is
just as true as my word. Look at the cattle."
Hudden stared, and Dudden gaped; but they couldn't get over the cattle;
fine fat cattle they were too.

"It's only the worst I could bring up with me," said Donald O'Neary;
"the others were so fat, there was no driving them. Faith, too, it's
little wonder they didn't care to leave, with grass as far as you could
see, and as sweet and juicy as fresh butter."

"Ah, now, Donald, we haven't always been friends," said Dudden, "but,
as I was just saying, you were ever a decent lad, and you'll show us
the way, won't you?"

"I don't see that I'm called upon to do that; there is a power more
cattle down there. Why shouldn't I have them all to myself?"

"Faith, they may well say, the richer you get, the harder the heart.
You always were a neighbourly lad, Donald. You wouldn't wish to keep
the luck all to yourself?"

"True for you, Hudden, though 'tis a bad example you set me. But I'll
not be thinking of old times. There is plenty for all there, so come
along with me."

Off they trudged, with a light heart and an eager step. When they came
to the Brown Lake, the sky was full of little white clouds, and, if the
sky was full, the lake was as full.

"Ah! now, look, there they are," cried Donald, as he pointed to the
clouds in the lake.

"Where? where?" cried Hudden, and "Don't be greedy!" cried Dudden, as

he jumped his hardest to be up first with the fat cattle. But if he
jumped first, Hudden wasn't long behind.

They never came back. Maybe they got too fat, like the cattle. As for
Donald O'Neary, he had cattle and sheep all his days to his heart's
content.

THE SHEPHERD OF MYDDVAI

Up in the Black Mountains in Caermarthenshire lies the lake known as

Lyn y Van Vach. To the margin of this lake the shepherd of Myddvai once
led his lambs, and lay there whilst they sought pasture. Suddenly, from
the dark waters of the lake, he saw three maidens rise. Shaking the
bright drops from their hair and gliding to the shore, they wandered
about amongst his flock. They had more than mortal beauty, and he was
filled with love for her that came nearest to him. He offered her the
bread he had with him, and she took it and tried it, but then sang to
him:

Hard-baked is thy bread,

'Tis not easy to catch me,

and then ran off laughing to the lake.

Next day he took with him bread not so well done, and watched for the
maidens. When they came ashore he offered his bread as before, and the
maiden tasted it and sang:

Unbaked is thy bread,

I will not have thee,

and again disappeared in the waves.

A third time did the shepherd of Myddvai try to attract the maiden, and
this time he offered her bread that he had found floating about near
the shore. This pleased her, and she promised to become his wife if he
were able to pick her out from among her sisters on the following day.
When the time came the shepherd knew his love by the strap of her
sandal. Then she told him she would be as good a wife to him as any
earthly maiden could be unless he should strike her three times without
cause. Of course he deemed that this could never be; and she, summoning
from the lake three cows, two oxen, and a bull, as her marriage
portion, was led homeward by him as his bride.

The years passed happily, and three children were born to the shepherd
and the lake-maiden. But one day here were going to a christening, and
she said to her husband it was far to walk, so he told her to go for
the horses.

"I will," said she, "if you bring me my gloves which I've left in the
house."

But when he came back with the gloves, he found she had not gone for
the horses; so he tapped her lightly on the shoulder with the gloves,
and said, "Go, go."

"That's one," said she.

Another time they were at a wedding, when suddenly the lake-maiden fell
a-sobbing and a-weeping, amid the joy and mirth of all around her.

Her husband tapped her on the shoulder, and asked her, "Why do you
weep?"

"Because they are entering into trouble; and trouble is upon you; for
that is the second causeless blow you have given me. Be careful; the
third is the last."

The husband was careful never to strike her again. But one day at a
funeral she suddenly burst out into fits of laughter. Her husband
forgot, and touched her rather roughly on the shoulder, saying, "Is
this a time for laughter?"

"I laugh," she said, "because those that die go out of trouble, but
your trouble has come. The last blow has been struck; our marriage is
at an end, and so farewell." And with that she rose up and left the
house and went to their home.

Then she, looking round upon her home, called to the cattle she had
brought with her:

Brindle cow, white speckled,

Spotted cow, bold freckled,
Old white face, and gray Geringer,
And the white bull from the king's coast,
 Grey ox, and black calf,
All, all, follow me home,

Now the black calf had just been slaughtered, and was hanging on the
hook; but it got off the hook alive and well and followed her; and the
oxen, though they were ploughing, trailed the plough with them and did
her bidding. So she fled to the lake again, they following her, and
with them plunged into the dark waters.

And to this day is the furrow seen which the plough left as it was
dragged across the mountains to the tarn.

Only once did she come again, when her sons were grown to manhood, and
then she gave them gifts of healing by which they won the name of
Meddygon Myddvai, the physicians of Myddvai.

THE SPRIGHTLY TAILOR

A sprightly tailor was employed by the great Macdonald, in his castle

at Saddell, in order to make the laird a pair of trews, used in olden
time. And trews being the vest and breeches united in one piece, and
ornamented with fringes, were very comfortable, and suitable to be worn
in walking or dancing. And Macdonald had said to the tailor, that if he
would make the trews by night in the church, he would get a handsome
reward. For it was thought that the old ruined church was haunted, and
that fearsome things were to be seen there at night.

The tailor was well aware of this; but he was a sprightly man, and when
the laird dared him to make the trews by night in the church, the
tailor was not to be daunted, but took it in hand to gain the prize.
So, when night came, away he went up the glen, about half a mile
distance from the castle, till he came to the old church. Then he chose
him a nice gravestone for a seat and he lighted his candle, and put on
his thimble, and set to work at the trews; plying his needle nimbly,
and thinking about the hire that the laird would have to give him.

For some time he got on pretty well, until he felt the floor all of a
tremble under his feet; and looking about him, but keeping his fingers
at work, he saw the appearance of a great human head rising up through
the stone pavement of the church. And when the head had risen above the
surface, there came from it a great, great voice. And the voice said:
"Do you see this great head of mine?"

"I see that, but I'll sew this!" replied the sprightly tailor; and he
stitched away at the trews.

Then the head rose higher up through the pavement, until its neck
appeared. And when its neck was shown, the thundering voice came again
and said: "Do you see this great neck of mine?"

"I see that, but I'll sew this!" said the sprightly tailor; and he
stitched away at his trews.

Then the head and neck rose higher still, until the great shoulders and
chest were shown above the ground. And again the mighty voice
thundered: "Do you see this great chest of mine?"
And again the sprightly tailor replied: "I see that, but I'll sew
this!" and stitched away at his trews.

And still it kept rising through the pavement, until it shook a great
pair of arms in the tailor's face, and said: "Do you see these great
arms of mine?"

"I see those, but I'll sew this!" answered the tailor; and he stitched
hard at his trews, for he knew that he had no time to lose.

The sprightly tailor was taking the long stitches, when he saw it
gradually rising and rising through the floor, until it lifted out a
great leg, and stamping with it upon the pavement, said in a roaring
voice: "Do you see this great leg of mine?"

"Aye, aye: I see that, but I'll sew this!" cried the tailor; and his
fingers flew with the needle, and he took such long stitches, that he
was just come to the end of the trews, when it was taking up its other
leg. But before it could pull it out of the pavement, the sprightly
tailor had finished his task; and, blowing out his candle, and
springing from off his gravestone, he buckled up, and ran out of the
church with the trews under his arm. Then the fearsome thing gave a
loud roar, and stamped with both his feet upon the pavement, and out of
the church he went after the sprightly tailor.

Down the glen they ran, faster than the stream when the flood rides it;
but the tailor had got the start and a nimble pair of legs, and he did
not choose to lose the laird's reward. And though the thing roared to
him to stop, yet the sprightly tailor was not the man to be beholden to
a monster. So he held his trews tight, and let no darkness grow under
his feet, until he had reached Saddell Castle. He had no sooner got
inside the gate, and shut it, than the apparition came up to it; and,
enraged at losing his prize, struck the wall above the gate, and left
there the mark of his five great fingers. Ye may see them plainly to
this day, if ye'll only peer close enough.

But the sprightly tailor gained his reward: for Macdonald paid him
handsomely for the trews, and never discovered that a few of the
stitches were somewhat long.

THE STORY OF DEIRDRE

There was a man in Ireland once who was called Malcolm Harper. The man
was a right good man, and he had a goodly share of this world's goods.
He had a wife, but no family. What did Malcolm hear but that a
soothsayer had come home to the place, and as the man was a right good
man, he wished that the soothsayer might come near them. Whether it was
that he was invited or that he came of himself, the soothsayer came to
the house of Malcolm.

"Are you doing any soothsaying?" says Malcolm.

"Yes, I am doing a little. Are you in need of soothsaying?"

"Well, I do not mind taking soothsaying from you, if you had

soothsaying for me, and you would be willing to do it."
"Well, I will do soothsaying for you. What kind of soothsaying do you
want?"

"Well, the soothsaying I wanted was that you would tell me my lot or
what will happen to me, if you can give me knowledge of it."

"Well, I am going out, and when I return, I will tell you."

And the soothsayer went forth out of the house and he was not long
outside when he returned.

"Well," said the soothsayer, "I saw in my second sight that it is on

account of a daughter of yours that the greatest amount of blood shall
be shed that has ever been shed in Erin since time and race began. And
the three most famous heroes that ever were found will lose their heads
on her account."

After a time a daughter was born to Malcolm, he did not allow a living
being to come to his house, only himself and the nurse. He asked this
woman, "Will you yourself bring up the child to keep her in hiding far
away where eye will not see a sight of her nor ear hear a word about
her?"

The woman said she would, so Malcolm got three men, and he took them
away to a large mountain, distant and far from reach, without the
knowledge or notice of any one. He caused there a hillock, round and
green, to be dug out of the middle, and the hole thus made to be
covered carefully over so that a little company could dwell there
together. This was done.

Deirdre and her foster-mother dwelt in the bothy mid the hills without
the knowledge or the suspicion of any living person about them and
without anything occurring, until Deirdre was sixteen years of age.
Deirdre grew like the white sapling, straight and trim as the rash on
the moss. She was the creature of fairest form, of loveliest aspect,
and of gentlest nature that existed between earth and heaven in all
Ireland--whatever colour of hue she had before, there was nobody that
looked into her face but she would blush fiery red over it.

The woman that had charge of her, gave Deirdre every information and
skill of which she herself had knowledge and skill. There was not a
blade of grass growing from root, nor a bird singing in the wood, nor a
star shining from heaven but Deirdre had a name for it. But one thing,
she did not wish her to have either part or parley with any single
living man of the rest of the world. But on a gloomy winter night, with
black, scowling clouds, a hunter of game was wearily travelling the
hills, and what happened but that he missed the trail of the hunt, and
lost his course and companions. A drowsiness came upon the man as he
wearily wandered over the hills, and he lay down by the side of the
beautiful green knoll in which Deirdre lived, and he slept. The man was
faint from hunger and wandering, and benumbed with cold, and a deep
sleep fell upon him. When he lay down beside the green hill where
Deirdre was, a troubled dream came to the man, and he thought that he
enjoyed the warmth of a fairy broch, the fairies being inside playing
music. The hunter shouted out in his dream, if there was any one in the
broch, to let him in for the Holy One's sake. Deirdre heard the voice
and said to her foster-mother: "O foster-mother, what cry is that?" "It
is nothing at all, Deirdre--merely the birds of the air astray and
seeking each other. But let them go past to the bosky glade. There is
no shelter or house for them here." "Oh, foster-mother, the bird asked
to get inside for the sake of the God of the Elements, and you yourself
tell me that anything that is asked in His name we ought to do. If you
will not allow the bird that is being benumbed with cold, and done to
death with hunger, to be let in, I do not think much of your language
or your faith. But since I give credence to your language and to your
faith, which you taught me, I will myself let in the bird." And Deirdre
arose and drew the bolt from the leaf of the door, and she let in the
hunter. She placed a seat in the place for sitting, food in the place
for eating, and drink in the place for drinking for the man who came to
the house. "Oh, for this life and raiment, you man that came in, keep
restraint on your tongue!" said the old woman. "It is not a great thing
for you to keep your mouth shut and your tongue quiet when you get a
home and shelter of a hearth on a gloomy winter's night."

"Well," said the hunter, "I may do that--keep my mouth shut and my
tongue quiet, since I came to the house and received hospitality from
you; but by the hand of thy father and grandfather, and by your own two
hands, if some other of the people of the world saw this beauteous
creature you have here hid away, they would not long leave her with
you, I swear."

"What men are these you refer to?" said Deirdre.

"Well, I will tell you, young woman," said the hunter.

"They are Naois, son of Uisnech, and Allen and Arden his two brothers."

"What like are these men when seen, if we were to see them?" said
Deirdre.

"Why, the aspect and form of the men when seen are these," said the
hunter: "they have the colour of the raven on their hair, their skin
like swan on the wave in whiteness, and their cheeks as the blood of
the brindled red calf, and their speed and their leap are those of the
salmon of the torrent and the deer of the grey mountain side. And Naois
is head and shoulders over the rest of the people of Erin."

"However they are," said the nurse, "be you off from here and take
another road. And, King of Light and Sun! in good sooth and certainty,
little are my thanks for yourself or for her that let you in!"

The hunter went away, and went straight to the palace of King
Connachar. He sent word in to the king that he wished to speak to him
if he pleased. The king answered the message and came out to speak to
the man. "What is the reason of your journey?" said the king to the
hunter.

"I have only to tell you, O king," said the hunter, "that I saw the
fairest creature that ever was born in Erin, and I came to tell you of
it."

"Who is this beauty and where is she to be seen, when she was not seen
before till you saw her, if you did see her?"

"Well, I did see her," said the hunter. "But, if I did, no man else can
see her unless he get directions from me as to where she is dwelling."

"And will you direct me to where she dwells? and the reward of your
directing me will be as good as the reward of your message," said the
king.

"Well, I will direct you, O king, although it is likely that this will
not be what they want," said the hunter.

Connachar, King of Ulster, sent for his nearest kinsmen, and he told
them of his intent. Though early rose the song of the birds mid the
rocky caves and the music of the birds in the grove, earlier than that
did Connachar, King of Ulster, arise, with his little troop of dear
friends, in the delightful twilight of the fresh and gentle May; the
dew was heavy on each bush and flower and stem, as they went to bring
Deirdre forth from the green knoll where she stayed. Many a youth was
there who had a lithe leaping and lissom step when they started whose
step was faint, failing, and faltering when they reached the bothy on
account of the length of the way and roughness of the road.

"Yonder, now, down in the bottom of the glen is the bothy where the
woman dwells, but I will not go nearer than this to the old woman,"
said the hunter.

Connachar with his band of kinsfolk went down to the green knoll where
Deirdre dwelt and he knocked at the door of the bothy. The nurse
replied, "No less than a king's command and a king's army could put me
out of my bothy to-night. And I should be obliged to you, were you to
tell who it is that wants me to open my bothy door."

"It is I, Connachar, King of Ulster." When the poor woman heard who was
at the door, she rose with haste and let in the king and all that could
get in of his retinue.

When the king saw the woman that was before him that he had been in
quest of, he thought he never saw in the course of the day nor in the
dream of night a creature so fair as Deirdre and he gave his full
heart's weight of love to her. Deirdre was raised on the topmost of the
heroes' shoulders and she and her foster-mother were brought to the
Court of King Connachar of Ulster.

With the love that Connachar had for her, he wanted to marry Deirdre
right off there and then, will she nill she marry him. But she said to
him, "I would be obliged to you if you will give me the respite of a
year and a day." He said "I will grant you that, hard though it is, if
you will give me your unfailing promise that you will marry me at the
year's end." And she gave the promise. Connachar got for her a
woman-teacher and merry modest maidens fair that would lie down and
rise with her, that would play and speak with her. Deirdre was clever
in maidenly duties and wifely understanding, and Connachar thought he
never saw with bodily eye a creature that pleased him more.

Deirdre and her women companions were one day out on the hillock behind
the house enjoying the scene, and drinking in the sun's heat. What did
they see coming but three men a-journeying. Deirdre was looking at the
men that were coming, and wondering at them. When the men neared them,
Deirdre remembered the language of the huntsman, and she said to
herself that these were the three sons of Uisnech, and that this was
Naois, he having what was above the bend of the two shoulders above the
men of Erin all. The three brothers went past without taking any notice
of them, without even glancing at the young girls on the hillock. What
happened but that love for Naois struck the heart of Deirdre, so that
she could not but follow after him. She girded up her raiment and went
after the men that went past the base of the knoll, leaving her women
attendants there. Allen and Arden had heard of the woman that
Connachar, King of Ulster, had with him, and they thought that, if
Naois, their brother, saw her, he would have her himself, more
especially as she was not married to the King. They perceived the woman
coming, and called on one another to hasten their step as they had a
long distance to travel, and the dusk of night was coming on. They did
so. She cried: "Naois, son of Uisnech, will you leave me?" "What
piercing, shrill cry is that--the most melodious my ear ever heard, and
the shrillest that ever struck my heart of all the cries I ever heard?"
"It is anything else but the wail of the wave-swans of Connachar," said
his brothers. "No! yonder is a woman's cry of distress," said Naois,
and he swore he would not go further until he saw from whom the cry
came, and Naois turned back. Naois and Deirdre met, and Deirdre kissed
Naois three times, and a kiss each to his brothers. With the confusion
that she was in, Deirdre went into a crimson blaze of fire, and her
colour came and went as rapidly as the movement of the aspen by the
stream side. Naois thought he never saw a fairer creature, and Naois
gave Deirdre the love that he never gave to thing, to vision, or to
creature but to herself.

Then Naois placed Deirdre on the topmost height of his shoulder, and
told his brothers to keep up their pace, and they kept up their pace.
Naois thought that it would not be well for him to remain in Erin on
account of the way in which Connachar, King of Ulster, his uncle's son,
had gone against him because of the woman, though he had not married
her; and he turned back to Alba, that is, Scotland. He reached the side
of Loch-Ness and made his habitation there. He could kill the salmon of
the torrent from out his own door, and the deer of the grey gorge from
out his window. Naois and Deirdre and Allen and Arden dwelt in a tower,
and they were happy so long a time as they were there.

By this time the end of the period came at which Deirdre had to marry
Connachar, King of Ulster. Connachar made up his mind to take Deirdre
away by the sword whether she was married to Naois or not. So he
prepared a great and gleeful feast. He sent word far and wide through
Erin all to his kinspeople to come to the feast. Connachar thought to
himself that Naois would not come though he should bid him; and the
scheme that arose in his mind was to send for his father's brother,
Ferchar Mac Ro, and to send him on an embassy to Naois. He did so; and
Connachar said to Ferchar, "Tell Naois, son of Uisnech, that I am
setting forth a great and gleeful feast to my friends and kinspeople
throughout the wide extent of Erin all, and that I shall not have rest
by day nor sleep by night if he and Allen and Arden be not partakers of
the feast."

Ferchar Mac Ro and his three sons went on their journey, and reached
the tower where Naois was dwelling by the side of Loch Etive. The sons
of Uisnech gave a cordial kindly welcome to Ferchar Mac Ro and his
three sons, and asked of him the news of Erin. "The best news that I
have for you," said the hardy hero, "is that Connachar, King of Ulster,
is setting forth a great sumptuous feast to his friends and kinspeople
throughout the wide extent of Erin all, and he has vowed by the earth
beneath him, by the high heaven above him, and by the sun that wends to
the west, that he will have no rest by day nor sleep by night if the
sons of Uisnech, the sons of his own father's brother, will not come
back to the land of their home and the soil of their nativity, and to
the feast likewise, and he has sent us on embassy to invite you."
"We will go with you," said Naois.

"We will," said his brothers.

But Deirdre did not wish to go with Ferchar Mac Ro, and she tried every
prayer to turn Naois from going with him--she said:

"I saw a vision, Naois, and do you interpret it to me," said

Deirdre--then she sang:

O Naois, son of Uisnech, hear

What was shown in a dream to me.

There came three white doves out of the South

Flying over the sea,
And drops of honey were in their mouth
From the hive of the honey-bee.

O Naois, son of Uisnech, hear,

What was shown in a dream to me.

I saw three grey hawks out of the south

Come flying over the sea,
And the red red drops they bare in their mouth
They were dearer than life to me.

Said Naois:--

It is nought but the fear of woman's heart,

And a dream of the night, Deirdre.

"The day that Connachar sent the invitation to his feast will be
unlucky for us if we don't go, O Deirdre."

"You will go there," said Ferchar Mac Ro; "and if Connachar show
kindness to you, show ye kindness to him; and if he will display wrath
towards you display ye wrath towards him, and I and my three sons will
be with you."

"We will," said Daring Drop. "We will," said Hardy Holly. "We will,"
said Fiallan the Fair.

"I have three sons, and they are three heroes, and in any harm or
danger that may befall you, they will be with you, and I myself will be
along with them." And Ferchar Mac Ro gave his vow and his word in
presence of his arms that, in any harm or danger that came in the way
of the sons of Uisnech, he and his three sons would not leave head on
live body in Erin, despite sword or helmet, spear or shield, blade or
mail, be they ever so good.

Deirdre was unwilling to leave Alba, but she went with Naois. Deirdre
wept tears in showers and she sang:

Dear is the land, the land over there,

Alba full of woods and lakes;
Bitter to my heart is leaving thee,
But I go away with Naois.
Ferchar Mac Ro did not stop till he got the sons of Uisnech away with
him, despite the suspicion of Deirdre.

The coracle was put to sea,

The sail was hoisted to it;
And the second morrow they arrived
On the white shores of Erin.

As soon as the sons of Uisnech landed in Erin, Ferchar Mac Ro sent word
to Connachar, king of Ulster, that the men whom he wanted were come,
and let him now show kindness to them. "Well," said Connachar, "I did
not expect that the sons of Uisnech would come, though I sent for them,
and I am not quite ready to receive them. But there is a house down
yonder where I keep strangers, and let them go down to it today, and my
house will be ready before them tomorrow."

But he that was up in the palace felt it long that he was not getting
word as to how matters were going on for those down in the house of the
strangers. "Go you, Gelban Grednach, son of Lochlin's King, go you down
and bring me information as to whether her former hue and complexion
are on Deirdre. If they be, I will take her out with edge of blade and
point of sword, and if not, let Naois, son of Uisnech, have her for
himself," said Connachar.

Gelban, the cheering and charming son of Lochlin's King, went down to
the place of the strangers, where the sons of Uisnech and Deirdre were
staying. He looked in through the bicker-hole on the door-leaf. Now she
that he gazed upon used to go into a crimson blaze of blushes when any
one looked at her. Naois looked at Deirdre and knew that some one was
looking at her from the back of the door-leaf. He seized one of the
dice on the table before him and fired it through the bicker-hole, and
knocked the eye out of Gelban Grednach the Cheerful and Charming, right
through the back of his head. Gelban returned back to the palace of
King Connachar.

"You were cheerful, charming, going away, but you are cheerless,
charmless, returning. What has happened to you, Gelban? But have you
seen her, and are Deirdre's hue and complexion as before?" said
Connachar.

"Well, I have seen Deirdre, and I saw her also truly, and while I was
looking at her through the bicker-hole on the door, Naois, son of
Uisnech, knocked out my eye with one of the dice in his hand. But of a
truth and verity, although he put out even my eye, it were my desire
still to remain looking at her with the other eye, were it not for the
hurry you told me to be in," said Gelban.

"That is true," said Connachar; "let three hundred bravo heroes go down
to the abode of the strangers, and let them bring hither to me Deirdre,
and kill the rest."

Connachar ordered three hundred active heroes to go down to the abode

of the strangers and to take Deirdre up with them and kill the rest.
"The pursuit is coming," said Deirdre.

"Yes, but I will myself go out and stop the pursuit," said Naois.

"It is not you, but we that will go," said Daring Drop, and Hardy
Holly, and Fiallan the Fair; "it is to us that our father entrusted
your defence from harm and danger when he himself left for home." And
the gallant youths, full noble, full manly, full handsome, with
beauteous brown locks, went forth girt with battle arms fit for fierce
fight and clothed with combat dress for fierce contest fit, which was
burnished, bright, brilliant, bladed, blazing, on which were many
pictures of beasts and birds and creeping things, lions and
lithe-limbed tigers, brown eagle and harrying hawk and adder fierce;
and the young heroes laid low three-thirds of the company.

Connachar came out in haste and cried with wrath: "Who is there on the
floor of fight, slaughtering my men?"

"We, the three sons of Ferchar Mac Ro."

"Well," said the king, "I will give a free bridge to your grandfather,
a free bridge to your father, and a free bridge each to you three
brothers, if you come over to my side tonight."

"Well, Connachar, we will not accept that offer from you nor thank you
for it. Greater by far do we prefer to go home to our father and tell
the deeds of heroism we have done, than accept anything on these terms
from you. Naois, son of Uisnech, and Allen and Arden are as nearly
related to yourself as they are to us, though you are so keen to shed
their blood, and you would shed our blood also, Connachar." And the
noble, manly, handsome youths with beauteous, brown locks returned
inside. "We are now," said they, "going home to tell our father that
you are now safe from the hands of the king." And the youths all fresh
and tall and lithe and beautiful, went home to their father to tell
that the sons of Uisnech were safe. This happened at the parting of the
day and night in the morning twilight time, and Naois said they must go
away, leave that house, and return to Alba.

Naois and Deirdre, Allan and Arden started to return to Alba. Word came
to the king that the company he was in pursuit of were gone. The king
then sent for Duanan Gacha Druid, the best magician he had, and he
spoke to him as follows:--"Much wealth have I expended on you, Duanan
Gacha Druid, to give schooling and learning and magic mystery to you,
if these people get away from me today without care, without
consideration or regard for me, without chance of overtaking them, and
without power to stop them."

"Well, I will stop them," said the magician, "until the company you
send in pursuit return." And the magician placed a wood before them
through which no man could go, but the sons of Uisnech marched through
the wood without halt or hesitation, and Deirdre held on to Naois's
hand.

"What is the good of that? that will not do yet," said Connachar. "They
are off without bending of their feet or stopping of their step,
without heed or respect to me, and I am without power to keep up to
them or opportunity to turn them back this night."

"I will try another plan on them," said the druid; and he placed before
them a grey sea instead of a green plain. The three heroes stripped and
tied their clothes behind their heads, and Naois placed Deirdre on the
top of his shoulder.

They stretched their sides to the stream,

And sea and land were to them the same,
 The rough grey ocean was the same
As meadow-land green and plain.

"Though that be good, O Duanan, it will not make the heroes return,"
said Connachar; "they are gone without regard for me, and without
honour to me, and without power on my part to pursue them or to force
them to return this night."

"We shall try another method on them, since yon one did not stop them,"
said the druid. And the druid froze the grey ridged sea into hard rocky
knobs, the sharpness of sword being on the one edge and the poison
power of adders on the other. Then Arden cried that he was getting
tired, and nearly giving over. "Come you, Arden, and sit on my right
shoulder," said Naois. Arden came and sat, on Naois's shoulder. Arden
was long in this posture when he died; but though he was dead Naois
would not let him go. Allen then cried out that he was getting faint
and nigh-well giving up. When Naois heard his prayer, he gave forth the
piercing sigh of death, and asked Allen to lay hold of him and he would
bring him to land.

Allen was not long when the weakness of death came on him and his hold
failed. Naois looked around, and when he saw his two well-beloved
brothers dead, he cared not whether he lived or died, and he gave forth
the bitter sigh of death, and his heart burst.

"They are gone," said Duanan Gacha Druid to the king, "and I have done
what you desired me. The sons of Uisnech are dead and they will trouble
you no more; and you have your wife hale and whole to yourself."

"Blessings for that upon you and may the good results accrue to me,
Duanan. I count it no loss what I spent in the schooling and teaching
of you. Now dry up the flood, and let me see if I can behold Deirdre,"
said Connachar. And Duanan Gacha Druid dried up the flood from the
plain and the three sons of Uisnech were lying together dead, without
breath of life, side by side on the green meadow plain and Deirdre
bending above showering down her tears.

Then Deirdre said this lament: "Fair one, loved one, flower of beauty;
beloved upright and strong; beloved noble and modest warrior. Fair one,
blue-eyed, beloved of thy wife; lovely to me at the trysting-place came
thy clear voice through the woods of Ireland. I cannot eat or smile
henceforth. Break not to-day, my heart: soon enough shall I lie within
my grave. Strong are the waves of sorrow, but stronger is sorrow's
self, Connachar."

The people then gathered round the heroes' bodies and asked Connachar
what was to be done with the bodies. The order that he gave was that
they should dig a pit and put the three brothers in it side by side.

Deirdre kept sitting on the brink of the grave, constantly asking the
gravediggers to dig the pit wide and free. When the bodies of the
brothers were put in the grave, Deirdre said:--

Come over hither, Naois, my love,

Let Arden close to Allen lie;
If the dead had any sense to feel,
Ye would have made a place for Deirdre.

The men did as she told them. She jumped into the grave and lay down by
Naois, and she was dead by his side.

The king ordered the body to be raised from out the grave and to be
buried on the other side of the loch. It was done as the king bade, and
the pit closed. Thereupon a fir shoot grew out of the grave of Deirdre
and a fir shoot from the grave of Naois, and the two shoots united in a
knot above the loch. The king ordered the shoots to be cut down, and
this was done twice, until, at the third time, the wife whom the king
had married caused him to stop this work of evil and his vengeance on
the remains of the dead.

MUNACHAR AND MANACHAR

There once lived a Munachar and a Manachar, a long time ago, and it is
a long time since it was, and if they were alive now they would not be
alive then. They went out together to pick raspberries, and as many as
Munachar used to pick Manachar used to eat. Munachar said he must go
look for a rod to make a gad to hang Manachar, who ate his raspberries
every one; and he came to the rod. "What news the day?" said the rod.
"It is my own news that I'm seeking. Going looking for a rod, a rod to
make a gad, a gad to hang Manachar, who ate my raspberries every one."

"You will not get me," said the rod, "until you get an axe to cut me."
He came to the axe. "What news to-day?" said the axe. "It's my own news
I'm seeking. Going looking for an axe, an axe to cut a rod, a rod to
make a gad, a gad to hang Manachar, who ate my raspberries every one."

"You will not get me," said the
He came to the flag. "What news
news I'm seeking. Going looking
cut a rod, a rod to make a gad,
raspberries every one."
axe, "until you get a flag to edge me."
today?" says the flag. "It's my own
for a flag, flag to edge axe, axe to
a gad to hang Manachar, who ate my

"You will not get me," says the flag, "till you get water to wet me."
He came to the water. "What news to-day?" says the water. "It's my own
news that I'm seeking. Going looking for water, water to wet flag, flag
to edge axe, axe to cut a rod, a rod to make a gad, a gad to hang
Manachar, who ate my raspberries every one."

"You will not get me," said the water, "until you get a deer who will
swim me." He came to the deer. "What news to-day?" says the deer. "It's
my own news I'm seeking. Going looking for a deer, deer to swim water,
water to wet flag, flag to edge axe, axe to cut a rod, a rod to make a
gad, a gad to hang Manachar, who ate my raspberries every one."

"You will not get me," said the deer, "until you get a hound who will
hunt me." He came to the hound. "What news to-day?" says the hound.
"It's my own news I'm seeking. Going looking for a hound, hound to hunt
deer, deer to swim water, water to wet flag, flag to edge axe, axe to
cut a rod, a rod to make a gad, a gad to hang Manachar, who ate my
raspberries every one."

"You will not get me," said the hound, "until you get a bit of butter
to put in my claw." He came to the butter. "What news to-day?" says the
butter. "It's my own news I'm seeking. Going looking for butter, butter
to go in claw of hound, hound to hunt deer, deer to swim water, water
to wet flag, flag to edge axe, axe to cut a rod, a rod to make a gad, a
gad to hang Manachar, who ate my raspberries every one."

"You will not get me," said the butter, "until you get a cat who shall
scrape me." He came to the cat. "What news to-day?" said the cat. "It's
my own news I'm seeking. Going looking for a cat, cat to scrape butter,
butter to go in claw of hound, hound to hunt deer, deer to swim water,
water to wet flag, flag to edge axe, axe to cut a rod, a rod to make a
gad, gad to hang Manachar, who ate my raspberries every one."

"You will not get me," said the cat, "until you will get milk which you
will give me." He came to the cow. "What news to-day?" said the cow.
"It's my own news I'm seeking. Going looking for a cow, cow to give me
milk, milk I will give to the cat, cat to scrape butter, butter to go
in claw of hound, hound to hunt deer, deer to swim water, water to wet
flag, flag to edge axe, axe to cut a rod, a rod to make a gad, a gad to
hang Manachar, who ate my raspberries every one."

"You will not get any milk from me," said the cow, "until you bring me
a whisp of straw from those threshers yonder." He came to the
threshers. "What news to-day?" said the threshers. "It's my own news
I'm seeking. Going looking for a whisp of straw from ye to give to the
cow, the cow to give me milk, milk I will give to the cat, cat to
scrape butter, butter to go in claw of hound, hound to hunt deer, deer
to swim water, water to wet flag, flag to edge axe, axe to cut a rod, a
rod to make a gad, a gad to hang Manachar, who ate my raspberries every
one."

"You will not get any whisp of straw from us," said the threshers,
"until you bring us the makings of a cake from the miller over yonder."
He came to the miller. "What news to-day?" said the miller. "It's my
own news I'm seeking. Going looking for the makings of a cake which I
will give to the threshers, the threshers to give me a whisp of straw,
the whisp of straw I will give to the cow, the cow to give me milk,
milk I will give to the cat, cat to scrape butter, butter to go in claw
of hound, hound to hunt deer, deer to swim water, water to wet flag,
flag to edge axe, axe to cut a rod, a rod to make a gad, a gad to hang
Manachar, who ate my raspberries every one."

"You will not get any makings of a cake from me," said the miller,
"till you bring me the full of that sieve of water from the river over
there."

He took the sieve in his hand and went over to the river, but as often
as ever he would stoop and fill it with water, the moment he raised it
the water would run out of it again, and sure, if he had been there
from that day till this, he never could have filled it. A crow went
flying by him, over his head. "Daub! daub!" said the crow.

"My blessings on ye, then," said Munachar, "but it's the good advice
you have," and he took the red clay and the daub that was by the brink,
and he rubbed it to the bottom of the sieve, until all the holes were
filled, and then the sieve held the water, and he brought the water to
the miller, and the miller gave him the makings of a cake, and he gave
the makings of the cake to the threshers, and the threshers gave him a
whisp of straw, and he gave the whisp of straw to the cow, and the cow
gave him milk, the milk he gave to the cat, the cat scraped the butter,
the butter went into the claw of the hound, the hound hunted the deer,
the deer swam the water, the water wet the flag, the flag sharpened the
axe, the axe cut the rod, and the rod made a gad, and when he had it
ready to hang Manachar he found that Manachar had BURST.

GOLD-TREE AND SILVER-TREE

Once upon a time there was a king who had a wife, whose name was
Silver-tree, and a daughter, whose name was Gold-tree. On a certain day
of the days, Gold-tree and Silver-tree went to a glen, where there was
a well, and in it there was a trout.

Said Silver-tree, "Troutie, bonny little fellow, am not I the most

beautiful queen in the world?"

"Oh! indeed you are not."

"Who then?"

"Why, Gold-tree, your daughter."

Silver-tree went home, blind with rage. She lay down on the bed, and
vowed she would never be well until she could get the heart and the
liver of Gold-tree, her daughter, to eat.

At nightfall the king came home, and it was told him that Silver-tree,
his wife, was very ill. He went where she was, and asked her what was
wrong with her.

"Oh! only a thing--which you may heal if you like."

"Oh! indeed there is nothing at all which I could do for you that I
would not do."

"If I get the heart and the liver of Gold-tree, my daughter, to eat, I
shall be well."

Now it happened about this time that the son of a great king had come
from abroad to ask Gold-tree for marrying. The king now agreed to this,
and they went abroad.

The king then went and sent his lads to the hunting-hill for a he-goat,
and he gave its heart and its liver to his wife to eat; and she rose
well and healthy.

A year after this Silver-tree went to the glen, where there was the
well in which there was the trout.

"Troutie, bonny little fellow," said she, "am not I the most beautiful
queen in the world?"

"Oh! indeed you are not."

"Who then?"

"Why, Gold-tree, your daughter."

"Oh! well, it is long since she was living. It is a year since I ate
her heart and liver."

"Oh! indeed she is not dead. She is married to a great prince abroad."

Silver-tree went home, and begged the king to put the long-ship in
order, and said, "I am going to see my dear Gold-tree, for it is so
long since I saw her." The long-ship was put in order, and they went
away.

It was Silver-tree herself that was at the helm, and she steered the
ship so well that they were not long at all before they arrived.

The prince was out hunting on the hills. Gold-tree knew the long-ship
of her father coming.

"Oh!" said she to the servants, "my mother is coming, and she will kill
me."

"She shall not kill you at all; we will lock you in a room where she
cannot get near you."

This is how it was done; and when Silver-tree came ashore, she began to
cry out:

"Come to meet your own mother, when she comes to see you," Gold-tree
said that she could not, that she was locked in the room, and that she
could not get out of it.

"Will you not put out," said Silver-tree, "your little finger through
the key-hole, so that your own mother may give a kiss to it?"

She put out her little finger, and Silver-tree went and put a poisoned
stab in it, and Gold-tree fell dead.

When the prince came home, and found Gold-tree dead, he was in great
sorrow, and when he saw how beautiful she was, he did not bury her at
all, but he locked her in a room where nobody would get near her.

In the course of time he married again, and the whole house was under
the hand of this wife but one room, and he himself always kept the key
of that room. On a certain day of the days he forgot to take the key
with him, and the second wife got into the room. What did she see there
but the most beautiful woman that she ever saw.

She began to turn and try to wake her, and she noticed the poisoned
stab in her finger. She took the stab out, and Gold-tree rose alive, as
beautiful as she was ever.

At the fall of night the prince came home from the hunting-hill,
looking very downcast.

"What gift," said his wife, "would you give me that I could make you
laugh?"

"Oh! indeed, nothing could make me laugh, except Gold-tree were to come
alive again."

"Well, you'll find her alive down there in the room."

When the prince saw Gold-tree alive he made great rejoicings, and he
began to kiss her, and kiss her, and kiss her. Said the second wife,
"Since she is the first one you had it is better for you to stick to
her, and I will go away."

"Oh! indeed you shall not go away, but I shall have both of you."

At the end of the year, Silver-tree went to the glen, where there was
the well, in which there was the trout.

"Troutie, bonny little fellow," said she, "am not I the most beautiful
queen in the world?"

"Oh! indeed you are not."

"Who then?"

"Why, Gold-tree, your daughter."

"Oh! well, she is not alive. It is a year since I put the poisoned stab
into her finger."

"Oh! indeed she is not dead at all, at all."

Silver-tree, went home, and begged the king to put the long-ship in
order, for that she was going to see her dear Gold-tree, as it was so
long since she saw her. The long-ship was put in order, and they went
away. It was Silver-tree herself that was at the helm, and she steered
the ship so well that they were not long at all before they arrived.

The prince was out hunting on the hills. Gold-tree knew her father's
ship coming.

"Oh!" said she, "my mother is coming, and she will kill me."

"Not at all," said the second wife; "we will go down to meet her."

Silver-tree came ashore. "Come down, Gold-tree, love," said she, "for
your own mother has come to you with a precious drink."

"It is a custom in this country," said the second wife, "that the
person who offers a drink takes a draught out of it first."

Silver-tree put her mouth to it, and the second wife went and struck it
so that some of it went down her throat, and she fell dead. They had
only to carry her home a dead corpse and bury her.

The prince and his two wives were long alive after this, pleased and
peaceful.

I left them there.

KING O'TOOLE AND HIS GOOSE

Och, I thought all the world, far and near, had heerd o' King
O'Toole--well, well, but the darkness of mankind is untellible! Well,
sir, you must know, as you didn't hear it afore, that there was a king,
called King O'Toole, who was a fine old king in the old ancient times,
long ago; and it was he that owned the churches in the early days. The
king, you see, was the right sort; he was the real boy, and loved sport
as he loved his life, and hunting in particular; and from the rising o'
the sun, up he got, and away he went over the mountains after the deer;
and fine times they were.

Well, it was all mighty good, as long as the king had his health; but,
you see, in course of time the king grew old, by raison he was stiff in
his limbs, and when he got stricken in years, his heart failed him, and
he was lost entirely for want o' diversion, because he couldn't go
a-hunting no longer; and, by dad, the poor king was obliged at last to
get a goose to divert him. Oh, you may laugh, if you like, but it's
truth I'm telling you; and the way the goose diverted him was
this-a-way: You see, the goose used to swim across the lake, and go
diving for trout, and catch fish on a Friday for the king, and flew
every other day round about the lake, diverting the poor king. All went
on mighty well until, by dad, the goose got stricken in years like her
master, and couldn't divert him no longer, and then it was that the
poor king was lost entirely. The king was walkin' one mornin' by the
edge of the lake, lamentin' his cruel fate, and thinking of drowning
himself, that could get no diversion in life, when all of a sudden,
turning round the corner, who should he meet but a mighty decent young
man coming up to him.

"God save you," says the king to the young man.

"God save you kindly, King O'Toole," says the young man.

"True for you," says the king. "I am King O'Toole," says he, "prince
and plennypennytinchery of these parts," says he; "but how came ye to
know that?" says he.

"Oh, never mind," says St. Kavin.

You see it was Saint Kavin, sure enough--the saint himself in disguise,
and nobody else. "Oh, never mind," says he, "I know more than that. May
I make bold to ask how is your goose, King O'Toole?" says he.

"Blur-an-agers, how came ye to know about my goose?" says the king.

"Oh, no matter; I was given to understand it," says Saint Kavin.

After some more talk the king says, "What are you?"

"I'm an honest man," says Saint Kavin.

"Well, honest man," says the king, "and how is it you make your money
so aisy?"

"By makin' old things as good as new," says Saint Kavin.

"Is it a tinker you are?" says the king.

"No," says the saint; "I'm no tinker by trade, King O'Toole; I've a
better trade than a tinker," says he--"what would you say," says he,
"if I made your old goose as good as new?"
My dear, at the word of making his goose as good as new, you'd think
the poor old king's eyes were ready to jump out of his head. With that
the king whistled, and down came the poor goose, just like a hound,
waddling up to the poor cripple, her master, and as like him as two
peas. The minute the saint clapt his eyes on the goose, "I'll do the
job for you," says he, "King O'Toole."

"By _Jaminee_!" says King O'Toole, "if you do, I'll say you're the
cleverest fellow in the seven parishes."

"Oh, by dad," says St. Kavin, "you must say more nor that--my horn's
not so soft all out," says he, "as to repair your old goose for
nothing; what'll you gi' me if I do the job for you?--that's the chat,"
says St. Kavin.

"I'll give you whatever you ask," says the king; "isn't that fair?"

"Divil a fairer," says the saint; "that's the way to do business. Now,"
says he, "this is the bargain I'll make with you, King O'Toole: will
you gi' me all the ground the goose flies over, the first offer, after
I make her as good as new?"

"I will," says the king.

"You won't go back o' your word?" says St. Kavin.

"Honour bright!" says King O'Toole, holding out his fist.

"Honour bright!" says St. Kavin, back agin, "it's a bargain. Come
here!" says he to the poor old goose--"come here, you unfortunate ould
cripple, and it's I that'll make you the sporting bird." With that, my
dear, he took up the goose by the two wings--"Criss o' my cross an
you," says he, markin' her to grace with the blessed sign at the same
minute--and throwing her up in the air, "whew," says he, jist givin'
her a blast to help her; and with that, my jewel, she took to her
heels, flyin' like one o' the eagles themselves, and cutting as many
capers as a swallow before a shower of rain.

Well, my dear, it was a beautiful sight to see the king standing with
his mouth open, looking at his poor old goose flying as light as a
lark, and better than ever she was: and when she lit at his feet,
patted her on the head, and "_Ma vourneen_," says he, "but you are the
_darlint_ o' the world."

"And what do you say to me," says 'Saint Kavin, "for making her the
like?"

"By Jabers," says the king, "I say nothing beats the art o' man,
barring the bees."

"And do you say no more nor that?" says Saint Kavin.

"And that I'm beholden to you," says the king.

"But will you gi'e me all the ground the goose flew over?" says Saint
Kavin.

"I will," says King O'Toole, "and you're welcome to it," says he,
"though it's the last acre I have to give."
"But you'll keep your word true?" says the saint.

"As true as the sun," says the king.

"It's well for you, King O'Toole, that you said that word," says he;
"for if you didn't say that word, the devil the bit o' your goose would
ever fly agin."

When the king was as good as his word, Saint Kavin was pleased with
him, and then it was that he made himself known to the king. "And,"
says he, "King O'Toole, you're a decent man, for I only came here to
try you. You don't know me," says he, "because I'm disguised."

"Musha! then," says the king, "who are you?"

"I'm Saint Kavin," said the saint, blessing himself.

"Oh, queen of heaven!" says the king, making the sign of the cross
between his eyes, and falling down on his knees before the saint; "is
it the great Saint Kavin," says he, "that I've been discoursing all
this time without knowing it," says he, "all as one as if he was a lump
of a _gossoon_?--and so you're a saint?" says the king.

"I am," says Saint Kavin.

"By Jabers, I thought I was only talking to a dacent boy," says the
king.

"Well, you know the difference now," says the saint. "I'm Saint Kavin,"
says he, "the greatest of all the saints."

And so the king had his goose as good as new, to divert him as long as
he lived: and the saint supported him after he came into his property,
as I told you, until the day of his death--and that was soon after; for
the poor goose thought he was catching a trout one Friday; but, my
jewel, it was a mistake he made--and instead of a trout, it was a
thieving horse-eel; and instead of the goose killing a trout for the
king's supper--by dad, the eel killed the king's goose--and small blame
to him; but he didn't ate her, because he darn't ate what Saint Kavin
had laid his blessed hands on.

THE WOOING OF OLWEN

Shortly after the birth of Kilhuch, the son of King Kilyth, his mother
died. Before her death she charged the king that he should not take a
wife again until he saw a briar with two blossoms upon her grave, and
the king sent every morning to see if anything were growing thereon.
After many years the briar appeared, and he took to wife the widow of
King Doged. She foretold to her stepson, Kilhuch, that it was his
destiny to marry a maiden named Olwen, or none other, and he, at his
father's bidding, went to the court of his cousin, King Arthur, to ask
as a boon the hand of the maiden. He rode upon a grey steed with
shell-formed hoofs, having a bridle of linked gold, and a saddle also
of gold. In his hand were two spears of silver, well-tempered, headed
with steel, of an edge to wound the wind and cause blood to flow, and
swifter than the fall of the dew-drop from the blade of reed grass upon
the earth when the dew of June is at its heaviest. A gold-hilted sword
was on his thigh, and the blade was of gold, having inlaid upon it a
cross of the hue of the lightning of heaven. Two brindled,
white-breasted greyhounds, with strong collars of rubies, sported round
him, and his courser cast up four sods with its four hoofs like four
swallows about his head. Upon the steed was a four-cornered cloth of
purple, and an apple of gold was at each corner. Precious gold was upon
the stirrups and shoes, and the blade of grass bent not beneath them,
so light was the courser's tread as he went towards the gate of King
Arthur's palace.

Arthur received him with great ceremony, and asked him to remain at the
palace; but the youth replied that he came not to consume meat and
drink, but to ask a boon of the king.

Then said Arthur, "Since thou wilt not remain here, chieftain, thou
shalt receive the boon, whatsoever thy tongue may name, as far as the
wind dries and the rain moistens, and the sun revolves, and the sea
encircles, and the earth extends, save only my ships and my mantle, my
sword, my lance, my shield, my dagger, and Guinevere my wife."

So Kilhuch craved of him the hand of Olwen, the daughter of Yspathaden

Penkawr, and also asked the favour and aid of all Arthur's court.

Then said Arthur, "O chieftain, I have never heard of the maiden of
whom thou speakest, nor of her kindred, but I will gladly send
messengers in search of her."

And the youth said, "I will willingly grant from this night to that at
the end of the year to do so."

Then Arthur sent messengers to every land within his dominions to seek
for the maiden; and at the end of the year Arthur's messengers returned
without having gained any knowledge or information concerning Olwen
more than on the first day.

Then said Kilhuch, "Every one has received his boon, and I yet lack
mine. I will depart and bear away thy honour with me."

Then said Kay, "Rash chieftain! dost thou reproach Arthur? Go with us,
and we will not part until thou dost either confess that the maiden
exists not in the world, or until we obtain her."

Thereupon Kay rose up.

Kay had this peculiarity, that his breath lasted nine nights and nine
days under water, and he could exist nine nights and nine days without
sleep. A wound from Kay's sword no physician could heal. Very subtle
was Kay. When it pleased him he could render himself as tall as the
highest tree in the forest. And he had another peculiarity--so great
was the heat of his nature, that, when it rained hardest, whatever he
carried remained dry for a handbreadth above and a handbreadth below
his hand; and when his companions were coldest, it was to them as fuel
with which to light their fire.

And Arthur called Bedwyr, who never shrank from any enterprise upon
which Kay was bound. None was equal to him in swiftness throughout this
island except Arthur and Drych Ail Kibthar. And although he was
one-handed, three warriors could not shed blood faster than he on the
field of battle. Another property he had; his lance would produce a
wound equal to those of nine opposing lances.

And Arthur called to Kynthelig the guide. "Go thou upon this expedition
with the Chieftain." For as good a guide was he in a land which he had
never seen as he was in his own.

He called Gwrhyr Gwalstawt Ieithoedd, because he knew all tongues.

He called Gwalchmai, the son of Gwyar, because he never returned home

without achieving the adventure of which he went in quest. He was the
best of footmen and the best of knights. He was nephew to Arthur, the
son of his sister, and his cousin.

And Arthur called Menw, the son of Teirgwaeth, in order that if they
went into a savage country, he might cast a charm and an illusion over
them, so that none might see them whilst they could see every one.

They journeyed on till they came to a vast open plain, wherein they saw
a great castle, which was the fairest in the world. But so far away was
it that at night it seemed no nearer, and they scarcely reached it on
the third day. When they came before the castle they beheld a vast
flock of sheep, boundless and without end. They told their errand to
the herdsman, who endeavoured to dissuade them, since none who had come
thither on that quest had returned alive. They gave to him a gold ring,
which he conveyed to his wife, telling her who the visitors were.

On the approach of the latter, she ran out with joy to greet them, and
sought to throw her arms about their necks. But Kay, snatching a billet
out of the pile, placed the log between her two hands, and she squeezed
it so that it became a twisted coil.

"O woman," said Kay, "if thou hadst squeezed me thus, none could ever
again have set their affections on me. Evil love were this."

They entered the house, and after meat she told them that the maiden
Olwen came there every Saturday to wash. They pledged their faith that
they would not harm her, and a message was sent to her. So Olwen came,
clothed in a robe of flame-coloured silk, and with a collar of ruddy
gold, in which were emeralds and rubies, about her neck. More golden
was her hair than the flower of the broom, and her skin was whiter than
the foam of the wave, and fairer were her hands and her fingers than
the blossoms of the wood anemone amidst the spray of the meadow
fountain. Brighter were her glances than those of a falcon; her bosom
was more snowy than the breast of the white swan, her cheek redder than
the reddest roses. Whoso beheld was filled with her love. Four white
trefoils sprang up wherever she trod, and therefore was she called
Olwen.

Then Kilhuch, sitting beside her on a bench, told her his love, and she
said that he would win her as his bride if he granted whatever her
father asked.

Accordingly they went up to the castle and laid their request before
him.

"Raise up the forks beneath my two eyebrows which have fallen over my
eyes," said Yspathaden Penkawr, "that I may see the fashion of my
son-in-law."

They did so, and he promised, them an answer on the morrow. But as they
were going forth, Yspathaden seized one of the three poisoned darts
that lay beside him and threw it back after them.

And Bedwyr caught it and flung it back, wounding Yspathaden in the knee.

Then said he, "A cursed ungentle son-in-law, truly. I shall ever walk
the worse for his rudeness. This poisoned iron pains me like the bite
of a gad-fly. Cursed be the smith who forged it, and the anvil whereon
it was wrought."

The knights rested in the house of Custennin the herdsman, but the next
day at dawn they returned to the castle and renewed their request.

Yspathaden said it was necessary that he should consult Olwen's four

great-grandmothers and her four great-grand-sires.

The knights again withdrew, and as they were going he took the second
dart and cast it after them.

But Menw caught it and flung it back, piercing Yspathaden's breast with
it, so that it came out at the small of his back.

"A cursed ungentle son-in-law, truly," says he, "the hard iron pains me
like the bite of a horse-leech. Cursed be the hearth whereon it was
heated! Henceforth whenever I go up a hill, I shall have a scant in my
breath and a pain in my chest."

On the third day the knights returned once more to the palace, and
Yspathaden took the third dart and cast it at them.

But Kilhuch caught it and threw it vigorously, and wounded him through
the eyeball, so that the dart came out at the back of his head.

"A cursed ungentle son-in-law, truly. As long as I remain alive my

eyesight will be the worse. Whenever I go against the wind my eyes will
water, and peradventure my head will burn, and I shall have a giddiness
every new moon. Cursed be the fire in which it was forged. Like the
bite of a mad dog is the stroke of this poisoned iron."

And they went to meat.

Said Yspathaden Penkawr, "Is it thou that seekest my daughter?"

"It is I," answered Kilhuch.

"I must have thy pledge that thou wilt not do towards me otherwise than
is just, and when I have gotten that which I shall name, my daughter
thou shalt have."

"I promise thee that willingly," said Kilhuch, "name what thou wilt."

"I will do so," said he.

"Throughout the world there is not a comb or scissors with which I can
arrange my hair, on, account of its rankness, except the comb and
scissors that are between the two ears of Turch Truith, the son of
Prince Tared. He will not give them of his own free will, and thou wilt
not be able to compel him."

"It will be easy for me to compass this, although thou mayest think
that it will not be easy."

"Though thou get this, there is yet that which thou wilt not get. It
will not be possible to hunt Turch Truith without Drudwyn the whelp of
Greid, the son of Eri, and know that throughout the world there is not
a huntsman who can hunt with this dog, except Mabon the son of Modron.
He was taken from his mother when three nights old, and it is not known
where he now is, nor whether he is living or dead."

"It will be easy for me to compass this, although thou mayest think
that it will not be easy."

"Though thou get this, there is yet that which thou wilt not get. Thou
wilt not get Mabon, for it is not known where he is, unless thou find
Eidoel, his kinsman in blood, the son of Aer. For it would be useless
to seek for him. He is his cousin."

"It will be easy for me to compass this, although thou mayest think
that it will not be easy. Horses shall I have, and chivalry; and my
lord and kinsman Arthur will obtain for me all these things. And I
shall gain thy daughter, and thou shalt lose thy life."

"Go forward. And thou shalt not be chargeable for food or raiment for
my daughter while thou art seeking these things; and when thou hast
compassed all these marvels, thou shalt have my daughter for wife."

Now, when they told Arthur how they had sped, Arthur said, "Which of
these marvels will it be best for us to seek first?"

"It will be best," said they, "to seek Mabon the son of Modron; and he
will not be found unless we first find Eidoel, the son of Aer, his
kinsman."

Then Arthur rose up, and the warriors of the Islands of Britain with
him, to seek for Eidoel; and they proceeded until they came before the
castle of Glivi, where Eidoel was imprisoned.

Glivi stood on the summit of his castle, and said, "Arthur, what
requirest thou of me, since nothing remains to me in this fortress, and
I have neither joy nor pleasure in it; neither wheat nor oats?"

Said Arthur, "Not to injure thee came I hither, but to seek for the
prisoner that is with thee."

"I will give thee my prisoner, though I had not thought to give him up
to any one; and therewith shalt thou have my support and my aid."

His followers then said unto Arthur, "Lord, go thou home, thou canst
not proceed with thy host in quest of such small adventures as these."

Then said Arthur, "It were well for thee, Gwrhyr Gwalstawt Ieithoedd,
to go upon this quest, for thou knowest all languages, and art familiar
with those of the birds and the beasts. Go, Eidoel, likewise with my
men in search of thy cousin. And as for you, Kay and Bedwyr, I have
hope of whatever adventure ye are in quest of, that ye will achieve it.
Achieve ye this adventure for me."

These went forward until they came to the Ousel of Cilgwri, and Gwrhyr
adjured her for the sake of Heaven, saying, "Tell me if thou knowest
aught of Mabon, the son of Modron, who was taken when three nights old
from between his mother and the wall."

And the Ousel answered, "When I first came here there was a smith's
anvil in this place, and I was then a young bird, and from that time no
work has been done upon it, save the pecking of my beak every evening,
and now there is not so much as the size of a nut remaining thereof;
yet the vengeance of Heaven be upon me if during all that time I have
ever heard of the man for whom you inquire. Nevertheless, there is a
race of animals who were formed before me, and I will be your guide to
them."

So they proceeded to the place where was the Stag of Redynvre.

"Stag of Redynvre, behold we are come to thee, an embassy from Arthur,

for we have not heard of any animal older than thou. Say, knowest thou
aught of Mabon?"

The stag said, "When first I came hither there was a plain all around
me, without any trees save one oak sapling, which grew up to be an oak
with an hundred branches. And that oak has since perished, so that now
nothing remains of it but the withered stump; and from that day to this
I have been here, yet have I never heard of the man for whom you
inquire. Nevertheless, I will be your guide to the place where there is
an animal which was formed before I was."

So they proceeded to the place where was the Owl of Cwm Cawlwyd, to
inquire of him concerning Mabon.

And the owl said, "If I knew I would tell you. When first I came
hither, the wide valley you see was a wooded glen. And a race of men
came and rooted it up. And there grew there a second wood, and this
wood is the third. My wings, are they not withered stumps? Yet all this
time, even until to-day, I have never heard of the man for whom you
inquire. Nevertheless, I will be the guide of Arthur's embassy until
you come to the place where is the oldest animal in this world, and the
one who has travelled most, the eagle of Gwern Abwy."

When they came to the eagle, Gwrhyr asked it the same question; but it
replied, "I have been here for a great space of time, and when I first
came hither there was a rock here, from the top of which I pecked at
the stars every evening, and now it is not so much as a span high. From
that day to this I have been here, and I have never heard of the man
for whom you inquire, except once when I went in search of food as far
as Llyn Llyw. And when I came there, I struck my talons into a salmon,
thinking he would serve me as food for a long time. But he drew me into
the deep, and I was scarcely able to escape from him. After that I went
with my whole kindred to attack him and to try to destroy him, but he
sent messengers and made peace with me, and came and besought me to
take fifty fish-spears out of his back. Unless he know something of him
whom you seek, I cannot tell you who may. However, I will guide you to
the place where he is."

So they went thither, and the eagle said, "Salmon of Llyn Llyw, I have
come to thee with an embassy from Arthur to ask thee if thou knowest
aught concerning Mabon, the son of Modron, who was taken away at three
nights old from between his mother and the wall."

And the salmon answered, "As much as I know I will tell thee. With
every tide I go along the river upwards, until I come near to the walls
of Gloucester, and there have I found such wrong as I never found
elsewhere; and to the end that ye may give credence thereto, let one of
you go thither upon each of my two shoulders."

So Kay and Gwrhyr went upon his shoulders, and they proceeded till they
came to the wall of the prison, and they heard a great wailing and
lamenting from the dungeon. Said Gwrhyr, "Who is it that laments in
this house of stone?"

And the voice replied, "Alas, it is Mabon, the son of Modron, who is
here imprisoned!"

Then they returned and told Arthur, who, summoning his warriors,
attacked the castle.

And whilst the fight was going on, Kay and Bedwyr, mounting on the
shoulders of the fish, broke into the dungeon, and brought away with
them Mabon, the son of Modron.

Then Arthur summoned unto him all the warriors that were in the three
islands of Britain and in the three islands adjacent; and he went as
far as Esgeir Ocrvel in Ireland where the Boar Truith was with his
seven young pigs. And the dogs were let loose upon him from all sides.
But he wasted the fifth part of Ireland, and then set forth through the
sea to Wales. Arthur and his hosts, and his horses, and his dogs
followed hard after him. But ever and awhile the boar made a stand, and
many a champion of Arthur's did he slay. Throughout all Wales did
Arthur follow him, and one by one the young pigs were killed. At
length, when he would fain have crossed the Severn and escaped into
Cornwall, Mabon the son of Modron came up with him, and Arthur fell
upon him together with the champions of Britain. On the one side Mabon
the son of Modron spurred his steed and snatched his razor from him,
whilst Kay came up with him on the other side and took from him the
scissors. But before they could obtain the comb he had regained the
ground with his feet, and from the moment that he reached the shore,
neither dog nor man nor horse could overtake him until he came to
Cornwall. There Arthur and his hosts followed in his track until they
overtook him in Cornwall. Hard had been their trouble before, but it
was child's play to what they met in seeking the comb. Win it they did,
and the Boar Truith they hunted into the deep sea, and it was never
known whither he went.

Then Kilhuch set forward, and as many as wished ill to Yspathaden

Penkawr. And they took the marvels with them to his court. And Kaw of
North Britain came and shaved his beard, skin and flesh clean off to
the very bone from ear to ear.

"Art thou shaved, man?" said Kilhuch.

"I am shaved," answered he.

"Is thy daughter mine now?"

"She is thine, but therefore needst thou not thank me, but Arthur who
hath accomplished this for thee. By my free will thou shouldst never
have had her, for with her I lose my life."

Then Goreu the son of Custennin seized him by the hair of his head and
dragged him after him to the keep, and cut off his head and placed it
on a stake on the citadel.

Thereafter the hosts of Arthur dispersed themselves each man to his own
country.

Thus did Kilhuch son of Kelython win to wife Olwen, the daughter of
Yspathaden Penkawr.

JACK AND HIS COMRADES

Once there was a poor widow, as often there has been, and she had one
son. A very scarce summer came, and they didn't know how they'd live
till the new potatoes would be fit for eating. So Jack said to his
mother one evening, "Mother, bake my cake, and kill my hen, till I go
seek my fortune; and if I meet it, never fear but I'll soon be back to
share it with you."

So she did as he asked her, and he set out at break of day on his
journey. His mother came along with him to the yard gate, and says she,
"Jack, which would you rather have, half the cake and half the hen with
my blessing, or the whole of 'em with my curse?"

"O musha, mother," says Jack, "why do you ax me that question? sure you
know I wouldn't have your curse and Damer's estate along with it."

"Well, then, Jack," says she, "here's the whole lot of 'em with my
thousand blessings along with them." So she stood on the yard fence and
blessed him as far as her eyes could see him.

Well, he went along and along till he was tired, and ne'er a farmer's
house he went into wanted a boy. At last his road led by the side of a
bog, and there was a poor ass up to his shoulders near a big bunch of
grass he was striving to come at.

"Ah, then, Jack asthore," says he, "help me out or I'll be drowned."

"Never say't twice," says Jack, and he pitched in big stones and sods
into the slob, till the ass got good ground under him.

"Thank you, Jack," says he, when he was out on the hard road; "I'll do
as much for you another time. Where are you going?"

"Faith, I'm going to seek my fortune till harvest comes in, God bless
it!"

"And if you like," says the ass, "I'll go along with you; who knows
what luck we may have!"

"With all my heart, it's getting late, let us be jogging."

Well, they were going through a village, and a whole army of gossoons
were hunting a poor dog with a kettle tied to his tail. He ran up to
Jack for protection, and the ass let such a roar out of him, that the
little thieves took to their heels as if the ould boy was after them.

"More power to you, Jack," says the dog.

"I'm much obleeged to you: where is the baste and yourself going?"

"We're going to seek our fortune till harvest comes in."

"And wouldn't I be proud to go with you!" says the dog, "and get rid of
them ill conducted boys; purshuin' to 'em."

"Well, well, throw your tail over your arm, and come along."

They got outside the town, and sat down under an old wall, and Jack
pulled out his bread and meat, and shared with the dog; and the ass
made his dinner on a bunch of thistles. While they were eating and
chatting, what should come by but a poor half-starved cat, and the
moll-row he gave out of him would make your heart ache.

"You look as if you saw the tops of nine houses since breakfast," says
Jack; "here's a bone and something on it."

"May your child never know a hungry belly!" says Tom; "it's myself
that's in need of your kindness. May I be so bold as to ask where yez
are all going?"

"We're going to seek our fortune till the harvest comes in, and you may
join us if you like."

"And that I'll do with a heart and a half," says the cat, "and thank'ee
for asking me."'

Off they set again, and just as the shadows of the trees were three
times as long as themselves, they heard a great cackling in a field
inside the road, and out over the ditch jumped a fox with a fine black
cock in his mouth.

"Oh, you anointed villain!" says the ass, roaring like thunder.

"At him, good dog!" says Jack, and the word wasn't out of his mouth
when Coley was in full sweep after the Red Dog. Reynard dropped his
prize like a hot potato, and was off like shot, and the poor cock came
back fluttering and trembling to Jack and his comrades.

"O musha, naybours!" says he, "wasn't it the height o' luck that threw
you in my way! Maybe I won't remember your kindness if ever I find you
in hardship; and where in the world are you all going?"

"We're going to seek our fortune till the harvest comes in; you may
join our party if you like, and sit on Neddy's crupper when your legs
and wings are tired."

Well, the march began again, and just as the sun was gone down they
looked around, and there was neither cabin nor farm house in sight.

"Well, well," says Jack, "the worse luck now the better another time,
and it's only a summer night after all. We'll go into the wood, and
make our bed on the long grass."

No sooner said than done. Jack stretched himself on a bunch of dry

grass, the ass lay near him, the dog and cat lay in the ass's warm lap,
and the cock went to roost in the next tree.

Well, the soundness of deep sleep was over them all, when the cock took
a notion of crowing.

"Bother you, Black Cock!" says the ass: "you disturbed me from as nice
a wisp of hay as ever I tasted. What's the matter?"

"It's daybreak that's the matter: don't you see light yonder?"

"I see a light indeed," says Jack, "but it's from a candle it's coming,
and not from the sun. As you've roused us we may as well go over, and
ask for lodging."

So they all shook themselves, and went on through grass, and rocks, and
briars, till they got down into a hollow, and there was the light
coming through the shadow, and along with it came singing, and
laughing, and cursing.

"Easy, boys!" says Jack: "walk on your tippy toes till we see what sort
of people we have to deal with."

So they crept near the window, and there they saw six robbers inside,
with pistols, and blunderbushes, and cutlashes, sitting at a table,
eating roast beef and pork, and drinking mulled beer, and wine, and
whisky punch.

"Wasn't that a fine haul we made at the Lord of Dunlavin's!" says one
ugly-looking thief with his mouth full, "and it's little we'd get only
for the honest porter! here's his purty health!"

"The porter's purty health!" cried out every one of them, and Jack bent
his finger at his comrades.

"Close your ranks, my men," says he in a whisper, "and let every one
mind the word of command."

So the ass put his fore-hoofs on the sill of the window, the dog got on
the ass's head, the cat on the dog's head, and the cock on the cat's
head. Then Jack made a sign, and they all sung out like mad.

"Hee-haw, hee-haw!" roared the ass; "bow-wow!" barked the dog;

"meaw-meaw!" cried the cat; "cock-a-doodle-doo!" crowed the cock.

"Level your pistols!" cried Jack, "and make smithereens of 'em. Don't
leave a mother's son of 'em alive; present, fire!" With that they gave
another halloo, and smashed every pane in the window. The robbers were
frightened out of their lives. They blew out the candles, threw down
the table, and skelped out at the back door as if they were in earnest,
and never drew rein till they were in the very heart of the wood.

Jack and his party got into the room, closed the shutters, lighted the
candles, and ate and drank till hunger and thirst were gone. Then they
lay down to rest;--Jack in the bed, the ass in the stable, the dog on
the door-mat, the cat by the fire, and the cock on the perch.
At first the robbers were very glad to find themselves safe in the
thick wood, but they soon began to get vexed.

"This damp grass is very different from our warm room," says one.

"I was obliged to drop a fine pig's foot," says another.

"I didn't get a tayspoonful of my last tumbler," says another.

"And all the Lord of Dunlavin's gold and silver that we left behind!"
says the last.

"I think I'll venture back," says the captain, "and see if we can
recover anything."

"That's a good boy!" said they all, and away he went.

The lights were all out, and so he groped his way to the fire, and
there the cat flew in his face, and tore him with teeth and claws. He
let a roar out of him, and made for the room door, to look for a candle
inside. He trod on the dog's tail, and if he did, he got the marks of
his teeth in his arms, and legs, and thighs.

"Thousand murders!" cried he; "I wish I was out of this unlucky house."

When he got to the street door, the cock dropped down upon him with his
claws and bill, and what the cat and dog done to him was only a
flay-bite to what he got from the cock.

"Oh, tattheration to you all, you unfeeling vagabones!" says he, when
he recovered his breath; and he staggered and spun round and round till
he reeled into the stable, back foremost, but the ass received him with
a kick on the broadest part of his small clothes, and laid him
comfortably on the dunghill.

When he came to himself, he scratched his head, and began to think what
happened him; and as soon as he found that his legs were able to carry
him, he crawled away, dragging one foot after another, till he reached
the wood.

"Well, well," cried them all, when he came within hearing, "any chance
of our property?"

"You may say chance," says he, "and it's itself is the poor chance all
out. Ah, will any of you pull a bed of dry grass for me? All the
sticking-plaster in Enniscorthy will be too little for the cuts and
bruises I have on me. Ah, if you only knew what I have gone through for
you! When I got to the kitchen fire, looking for a sod of lighted turf,
what should be there but an old woman carding flax, and you may see the
marks she left on my face with the cards. I made to the room door as
fast as I could, and who should I stumble over but a cobbler and his
seat, and if he did not work at me with his awls and his pinchers you
may call me a rogue. Well, I got away from him somehow, but when I was
passing through the door, it must be the divel himself that pounced
down on me with his claws, and his teeth, that were equal to sixpenny
nails, and his wings--ill luck be in his road! Well, at last I reached
the stable, and there, by way of salute, I got a pelt from a
sledge-hammer that sent me half a mile off. If you don't believe me,
I'll give you leave to go and judge for yourselves."

"Oh, my poor captain," says they, "we believe you to the nines. Catch
us, indeed, going within a hen's race of that unlucky cabin!"

Well, before the sun shook his doublet next morning, Jack and his
comrades were up and about. They made a hearty breakfast on what was
left the night before, and then they all agreed to set off to the
castle of the Lord of Dunlavin, and give him back all his gold and
silver. Jack put it all in the two ends of a sack and laid it across
Neddy's back, and all took the road in their hands. Away they went,
through bogs, up hills, down dales, and sometimes along the yellow high
road, till they came to the hall-door of the Lord of Dunlavin, and who
should be there, airing his powdered head, his white stockings, and his
red breeches, but the thief of a porter.

He gave a cross look to the visitors, and says he to Jack, "What do you
want here, my fine fellow? there isn't room for you all."

"We want," says Jack, "what I'm sure you haven't to give us--and that
is, common civility."

"Come, be off, you lazy strollers!" says he, "while a cat 'ud be
licking her ear, or I'll let the dogs at you."

"Would you tell a body," says the cock that was perched on the ass's
head, "who was it that opened the door for the robbers the other night?"

Ah! maybe the porter's red face didn't turn the colour of his frill,
and the Lord of Dunlavin and his pretty daughter, that were standing at
the parlour window unknownst to the porter, put out their heads.

"I'd be glad, Barney," says the master, "to hear your answer to the
gentleman with the red comb on him."

"Ah, my lord, don't believe the rascal; sure I didn't open the door to
the six robbers."

"And how did you know there were six, you poor innocent?" said the lord.

"Never mind, sir," says Jack, "all your gold and silver is there in
that sack, and I don't think you will begrudge us our supper and bed
after our long march from the wood of Athsalach."

"Begrudge, indeed! Not one of you will ever see a poor day if I can
help it."

So all were welcomed to their heart's content, and the ass and the dog
and the cock got the best posts in the farmyard, and the cat took
possession of the kitchen. The lord took Jack in hands, dressed him
from top to toe in broadcloth, and frills as white as snow, and
turnpumps, and put a watch in his fob. When they sat down to dinner,
the lady of the house said Jack had the air of a born gentleman about
him, and the lord said he'd make him his steward. Jack brought his
mother, and settled her comfortably near the castle, and all were as
happy as you please.
THE SHEE AN GANNON AND THE GRUAGACH GAIRE

The Shee an Gannon was born in the morning, named at noon, and went in
the evening to ask his daughter of the king of Erin.

"I will give you my daughter in marriage," said the king of Erin; "you
won't get her, though, unless you go and bring me back the tidings that
I want, and tell me what it is that put a stop to the laughing of the
Gruagach Gaire, who before this laughed always, and laughed so loud
that the whole world heard him. There are twelve iron spikes out here
in the garden behind my castle. On eleven of the spikes are the heads
of kings' sons who came seeking my daughter in marriage, and all of
them went away to get the knowledge I wanted. Not one was able to get
it and tell me what stopped the Gruagach Gaire from laughing. I took
the heads off them all when they came back without the tidings for
which they went, and I'm greatly in dread that your head'll be on the
twelfth spike, for I'll do the same to you that I did to the eleven
kings' sons unless you tell what put a stop to the laughing of the
Gruagach."

The Shee an Gannon made no answer, but left the king and pushed away to
know could he find why the Gruagach was silent.

He took a glen at a step, a hill at a leap, and travelled all day till
evening. Then he came to a house. The master of the house asked him
what sort was he, and he said: "A young man looking for hire."

"Well," said the master of the house, "I was going tomorrow to look for
a man to mind my cows. If you'll work for me, you'll have a good place,
the best food a man could have to eat in this world, and a soft bed to
lie on."

The Shee an Gannon took service, and ate his supper. Then the master of
the house said: "I am the Gruagach Gaire; now that you are my man and
have eaten your supper, you'll have a bed of silk to sleep on."

Next morning after breakfast the Gruagach said to the Shee an Gannon:
"Go out now and loosen my five golden cows and my bull without horns,
and drive them to pasture; but when you have them out on the grass, be
careful you don't let them go near the land of the giant."

The new cowboy drove the cattle to pasture, and when near the land of
the giant, he saw it was covered with woods and surrounded by a high
wall. He went up, put his back against the wall, and threw in a great
stretch of it; then he went inside and threw out another great stretch
of the wall, and put the five golden cows and the bull without horns on
the land of the giant.

Then he climbed a tree, ate the sweet apples himself, and threw the
sour ones down to the cattle of the Gruagach Gaire.

Soon a great crashing was heard in the woods,--the noise of young trees
bending, and old trees breaking. The cowboy looked around and saw a
five-headed giant pushing through the trees; and soon he was before him.

"Poor miserable creature!" said the giant; "but weren't you impudent to
come to my land and trouble me in this way? You're too big for one
bite, and too small for two. I don't know what to do but tear you to
pieces."

"You nasty brute," said the cowboy, coming down to him from the tree,
"'tis little I care for you;" and then they went at each other. So
great was the noise between them that there was nothing in the world
but what was looking on and listening to the combat.

They fought till late in the afternoon, when the giant was getting the
upper hand; and then the cowboy thought that if the giant should kill
him, his father and mother would never find him or set eyes on him
again, and he would never get the daughter of the king of Erin. The
heart in his body grew strong at this thought. He sprang on the giant,
and with the first squeeze and thrust he put him to his knees in the
hard ground, with the second thrust to his waist, and with the third to
his shoulders.

"I have you at last; you're done for now!", said the cowboy. Then he
took out his knife, cut the five heads off the giant, and when he had
them off he cut out the tongues and threw the heads over the wall.

Then he put the tongues in his pocket and drove home the cattle. That
evening the Gruagach couldn't find vessels enough in all his place to
hold the milk of the five golden cows.

But when the cowboy was on the way home with the cattle, the son of the
king of Tisean came and took the giant's heads and claimed the princess
in marriage when the Gruagach Gaire should laugh.

After supper the cowboy would give no talk to his master, but kept his
mind to himself, and went to the bed of silk to sleep.

On the morning the cowboy rose before his master, and the first words
he said to the Gruagach were:

"What keeps you from laughing, you who used to laugh so loud that the
whole world heard you?"

"I'm sorry," said the Gruagach, "that the daughter of the king of Erin
sent you here."

"If you don't tell me of your own will, I'll make you tell me," said
the cowboy; and he put a face on himself that was terrible to look at,
and running through the house like a madman, could find nothing that
would give pain enough to the Gruagach but some ropes made of untanned
sheepskin hanging on the wall.

He took these down, caught the Gruagach, fastened him by the three
smalls, and tied him so that his little toes were whispering to his
ears. When he was in this state the Gruagach said: "I'll tell you what
stopped my laughing if you set me free."

So the cowboy unbound him, the two sat down together, and the Gruagach
said:--

"I lived in this castle here with my twelve sons. We ate, drank, played
cards, and enjoyed ourselves, till one day when my sons and I were
playing, a slender brown hare came rushing in, jumped on to the hearth,
tossed up the ashes to the rafters and ran away.
"On another day he came again; but if he did, we were ready for him, my
twelve sons and myself. As soon as he tossed up the ashes and ran off,
we made after him, and followed him till nightfall, when he went into a
glen. We saw a light before us. I ran on, and came to a house with a
great apartment, where there was a man named Yellow Face with twelve
daughters, and the hare was tied to the side of the room near the women.

"There was a large pot over the fire in the room, and a great stork
boiling in the pot. The man of the house said to me: 'There are bundles
of rushes at the end of the room, go there and sit down with your men!'

"He went into the next room and brought out two pikes, one of wood, the
other of iron, and asked me which of the pikes would I take. I said,
'I'll take the iron one;' for I thought in my heart that if an attack
should come on me, I could defend myself better with the iron than the
wooden pike.

"Yellow Face gave me the iron pike, and the first chance of taking what
I could out of the pot on the point of the pike. I got but a small
piece of the stork, and the man of the house took all the rest on his
wooden pike. We had to fast that night; and when the man and his twelve
daughters ate the flesh of the stork, they hurled the bare bones in the
faces of my sons and myself. We had to stop all night that way, beaten
on the faces by the bones of the stork.

"Next morning, when we were going away, the man of the house asked me
to stay a while; and going into the next room, he brought out twelve
loops of iron and one of wood, and said to me: 'Put the heads of your
twelve sons into the iron loops, or your own head into the wooden one;'
and I said: 'I'll put the twelve heads of my sons in the iron loops,
and keep my own out of the wooden one.'

"He put the iron loops on the necks of my twelve sons, and put the
wooden one on his own neck. Then he snapped the loops one after
another, till he took the heads off my twelve sons and threw the heads
and bodies out of the house; but he did nothing to hurt his own neck.

"When he had killed my sons he took hold of me and stripped the skin
and flesh from the small of my back down, and when he had done that he
took the skin of a black sheep that had been hanging on the wall for
seven years and clapped it on my body in place of my own flesh and
skin; and the sheepskin grew on me, and every year since then I shear
myself, and every bit of wool I use for the stockings that I wear I
clip off my own back."

When he had said this, the Gruagach showed the cowboy his back covered
with thick black wool.

After what he had seen and heard, the cowboy said: "I know now why you
don't laugh, and small blame to you. But does that hare come here
still?"

"He does indeed," said the Gruagach.

Both went to the table to play, and they were not long playing cards
when the hare ran in; and before they could stop him he was out again.

But the cowboy made after the hare, and the Gruagach after the cowboy,
and they ran as fast as ever their legs could carry them till
nightfall; and when the hare was entering the castle where the twelve
sons of the Gruagach were killed, the cowboy caught him by the two hind
legs and dashed out his brains against the wall; and the skull of the
hare was knocked into the chief room of the castle, and fell at the
feet of the master of the place.

"Who has dared to interfere with my fighting pet?" screamed Yellow Face.

"I," said the cowboy; "and if your pet had had manners, he might be
alive now."

The cowboy and the Gruagach stood by the fire. A stork was boiling in
the pot, as when the Gruagach came the first time. The master of the
house went into the next room and brought out an iron and a wooden
pike, and asked the cowboy which would he choose.

"I'll take the wooden one," said the cowboy; "and you may keep the iron
one for yourself."

So he took the wooden one; and going to the pot, brought out on the
pike all the stork except a small bite, and he and the Gruagach fell to
eating, and they were eating the flesh of the stork all night. The
cowboy and the Gruagach were at home in the place that time.

In the morning the master of the house went into the next room, took
down the twelve iron loops with a wooden one, brought them out, and
asked the cowboy which would he take, the twelve iron or the one wooden
loop.

"What could I do with the twelve iron ones for myself or my master?
I'll take the wooden one."

He put it on, and taking the twelve iron loops, put them on the necks
of the twelve daughters of the house, then snapped the twelve heads off
them, and turning to their father, said: "I'll do the same thing to you
unless you bring the twelve sons of my master to life, and make them as
well and strong as when you took their heads."

The master of the house went out and brought the twelve to life again;
and when the Gruagach saw all his sons alive and as well as ever, he
let a laugh out of himself, and all the Eastern world heard the laugh.

Then the cowboy said to the Gruagach: "It's a bad thing you have done
to me, for the daughter of the king of Erin will be married the day
after your laugh is heard."

"Oh! then we must be there in time," said the Gruagach; and they all
made away from the place as fast as ever they could, the cowboy, the
Gruagach, and his twelve sons.

They hurried on; and when within three miles of the king's castle there
was such a throng of people that no one could go a step ahead. "We must
clear a road through this," said the cowboy.

"We must indeed," said the Gruagach; and at it they went, threw the
people some on one side and some on the other, and soon they had an
opening for themselves to the king's castle.

As they went in, the daughter of the king of Erin and the son of the
king of Tisean were on their knees just going to be married. The cowboy
drew his hand on the bride-groom, and gave a blow that sent him
spinning till he stopped under a table at the other side of the room.

"What scoundrel struck that blow?" asked the king of Erin.

"It was I," said the cowboy.

"What reason had you to strike the man who won my daughter?"

"It was I who won your daughter, not he; and if you don't believe me,
the Gruagach Gaire is here himself. He'll tell you the whole story from
beginning to end, and show you the tongues of the giant."

So the Gruagach came up and told the king the whole story, how the Shee
an Gannon had become his cowboy, had guarded the five golden cows and
the bull without horns, cut off the heads of the five-headed giant,
killed the wizard hare, and brought his own twelve sons to life. "And
then," said the Gruagach, "he is the only man in the whole world I have
ever told why I stopped laughing, and the only one who has ever seen my
fleece of wool."

When the king of Erin heard what the Gruagach said, and saw the tongues
of the giant fitted in the head, he made the Shee an Gannon kneel down
by his daughter, and they were married on the spot.

Then the son of the king of Tisean was thrown into prison, and the next
day they put down a great fire, and the deceiver was burned to ashes.

The wedding lasted nine days, and the last day was better than the
first.

THE STORY-TELLER AT FAULT

At the time when the Tuatha De Dannan held the sovereignty of Ireland,
there reigned in Leinster a king, who was remarkably fond of hearing
stories. Like the other princes and chieftains of the island, he had a
favourite story-teller, who held a large estate from his Majesty, on
condition of telling him a new story every night of his life, before he
went to sleep. Many indeed were the stories he knew, so that he had
already reached a good old age without failing even for a single night
in his task; and such was the skill he displayed that whatever cares of
state or other annoyances might prey upon the monarch's mind, his
story-teller was sure to send him to sleep.

One morning the story-teller arose early, and as his custom was,
strolled out into his garden turning over in his mind incidents which
he might weave into a story for the king at night. But this morning he
found himself quite at fault; after pacing his whole demesne, he
returned to his house without being able to think of anything new or
strange. He found no difficulty in "there was once a king who had three
sons" or "one day the king of all Ireland," but further than that he
could not get. At length he went in to breakfast, and found his wife
much perplexed at his delay.

"Why don't you come to breakfast, my dear?" said she.

"I have no mind to eat anything," replied the story-teller; "long as I
have been in the service of the king of Leinster, I never sat down to
breakfast without having a new story ready for the evening, but this
morning my mind is quite shut up, and I don't know what to do. I might
as well lie down and die at once. I'll be disgraced for ever this
evening, when the king calls for his story-teller."

Just at this moment the lady looked out of the window.

"Do you see that black thing at the end of the field?" said she.

"I do," replied her husband.

They drew nigh, and saw a miserable looking old man lying on the ground
with a wooden leg placed beside him.

"Who are you, my good man?" asked the story-teller.

"Oh, then, 'tis little matter who I am. I'm a poor, old, lame,
decrepit, miserable creature, sitting down here to rest awhile."

"An' what are you doing with that box and dice I see in your hand?"

"I am waiting here to see if any one will play a game with me," replied
the beggar man.

"Play with you! Why what has a poor old man like you to play for?"

"I have one hundred pieces of gold in this leathern purse," replied the
old man.

"You may as well play with him," said the story-teller's wife; "and
perhaps you'll have something to tell the king in the evening."

A smooth stone was placed between them, and upon it they cast their
throws.

It was but a little while and the story-teller lost every penny of his
money.

"Much good may it do you, friend," said he. "What better hap could I
look for, fool that I am!"

"Will you play again?" asked the old man.

"Don't be talking, man: you have all my money."

"Haven't you chariot and horses and hounds?"

"Well, what of them!"

"I'll stake all the money I have against thine."

"Nonsense, man! Do you think for all the money in Ireland, I'd run the
risk of seeing my lady tramp home on foot?"

"Maybe you'd win," said the bocough.

"Maybe I wouldn't," said the story-teller.

"Play with him, husband," said his wife. "I don't mind walking, if you
do, love."

"I never refused you before," said the story-teller, "and I won't do so
now."

Down he sat again, and in one throw lost houses, hounds, and chariot.

"Will you play again?" asked the beggar.

"Are you making game of me, man; what else have I to stake?"

"I'll stake all my winnings against your wife," said the old man.

The story-teller turned away in silence, but his wife stopped him.

"Accept his offer," said she. "This is the third time, and who knows
what luck you may have? You'll surely win now."

They played again, and the story-teller lost. No sooner had he done so,
than to his sorrow and surprise, his wife went and sat down near the
ugly old beggar.

"Is that the way you're leaving me?" said the story-teller.

"Sure I was won," said she. "You would not cheat the poor man, would
you?"

"Have you any more to stake?" asked the old man.

"You know very well I have not," replied the story-teller.

"I'll stake the whole now, wife and all, against your own self," said
the old man.

Again they played, and again the story-teller lost.

"Well! here I am, and what do you want with me?"

"I'll soon let you know," said the old man, and he took from his pocket
a long cord and a wand.

"Now," said he to the story-teller, "what kind of animal would you

rather be, a deer, a fox, or a hare? You have your choice now, but you
may not have it later."

To make a long story short, the story-teller made his choice of a hare;
the old man threw the cord round him, struck him with the wand, and lo!
a long-eared, frisking hare was skipping and jumping on the green.

But it wasn't for long; who but his wife called the hounds, and set
them on him. The hare fled, the dogs followed. Round the field ran a
high wall, so that run as he might, he couldn't get out, and mightily
diverted were beggar and lady to see him twist and double.

In vain did he take refuge with his wife, she kicked him back again to
the hounds, until at length the beggar stopped the hounds, and with a
stroke of the wand, panting and breathless, the story-teller stood
before them again.

"And how did you like the sport?" said the beggar.

"It might be sport to others," replied the story-teller looking at his

wife, "for my part I could well put up with the loss of it."

"Would it be asking too much," he went on to the beggar, "to know who
you are at all, or where you come from, or why you take a pleasure in
plaguing a poor old man like me?"

"Oh!" replied the stranger, "I'm an odd kind of good-for-little fellow,

one day poor, another day rich, but if you wish to know more about me
or my habits, come with me and perhaps I may show you more than you
would make out if you went alone."

"I'm not my own master to go or stay," said the story-teller, with a

sigh.

The stranger put one hand into his wallet and drew out of it before
their eyes a well-looking middle-aged man, to whom he spoke as follows:

"By all you heard and saw since I put you into my wallet, take charge
of this lady and of the carriage and horses, and have them ready for me
whenever I want them."

Scarcely had he said these words when all vanished, and the
story-teller found himself at the Foxes' Ford, near the castle of Red
Hugh O'Donnell. He could see all but none could see him.

O'Donnell was in his hall, and heaviness of flesh and weariness of

spirit were upon him.

"Go out," said he to his doorkeeper, "and see who or what may be
coming."

The doorkeeper went, and what he saw was a lank, grey beggarman; half
his sword bared behind his haunch, his two shoes full of cold
road-a-wayish water sousing about him, the tips of his two ears out
through his old hat, his two shoulders out through his scant tattered
cloak, and in his hand a green wand of holly.

"Save you, O'Donnell," said the lank grey beggarman.

"And you likewise," said O'Donnell. "Whence come you, and what is your
craft?"

"I come from the outmost stream of earth,

From the glens where the white swans glide,
A night in Islay, a night in Man,
A night on the cold hillside."

"It's the great traveller you are," said O'Donnell.

"Maybe you've learnt something on the road."

"I am a juggler," said the lank grey beggarman, "and for five pieces of
silver you shall see a trick of mine."
"You shall have them," said O'Donnell; and the lank grey beggarman took
three small straws and placed them in his hand.

"The middle one," said he, "I'll blow away; the other two I'll leave."

"Thou canst not do it," said one and all.

But the lank grey beggarman put a finger on either outside straw and,
whiff, away he blew the middle one.

"'Tis a good trick," said O'Donnell; and he paid him his five pieces of
silver.

"For half the money," said one of the chief's lads, "I'll do the same
trick."

"Take him at his word, O'Donnell."

The lad put the three straws on his hand, and a finger on either
outside straw and he blew; and what happened but that the fist was
blown away with the straw.

"Thou art sore, and thou wilt be sorer," said O'Donnell.

"Six more pieces, O'Donnell, and I'll do another trick for thee," said
the lank grey beggarman.

"Six shalt thou have."

"Seest thou my two ears! One I'll move but not t'other."

"'Tis easy to see them, they're big enough, but thou canst never move
one ear and not the two together."

The lank grey beggarman put his hand to his ear, and he gave it a pull.

O'Donnell laughed and paid him the six pieces.

"Call that a trick," said the fistless lad, "any one can do that," and
so saying, he put up his hand, pulled his ear, and what happened was
that he pulled away ear and head.

"Sore thou art; and sorer thou'lt be," said O'Donnell.

"Well, O'Donnell," said the lank grey beggarman, "strange are the
tricks I've shown thee, but I'll show thee a stranger one yet for the
same money."

"Thou hast my word for it," said O'Donnell.

With that the lank grey beggarman took a bag from under his armpit, and
from out the bag a ball of silk, and he unwound the ball and he flung
it slantwise up into the clear blue heavens, and it became a ladder;
then he took a hare and placed it upon the thread, and up it ran; again
he took out a red-eared hound, and it swiftly ran up after the hare.

"Now," said the lank grey beggarman; "has any one a mind to run after
the dog and on the course?"
"I will," said a lad of O'Donnell's.

"Up with you then," said the juggler; "but I warn you if you let my
hare be killed I'll cut off your head when you come down."

The lad ran up the thread and all three soon disappeared. After looking
up for a long time, the lank grey beggarman said: "I'm afraid the hound
is eating the hare, and that our friend has fallen asleep."

Saying this he began to wind the thread, and down came the lad fast
asleep; and down came the red-eared hound and in his mouth the last
morsel of the hare.

He struck the lad a stroke with the edge of his sword, and so cast his
head off. As for the hound, if he used it no worse, he used it no
better.

"It's little I'm pleased, and sore I'm angered," said O'Donnell, "that
a hound and a lad should be killed at my court."

"Five pieces of silver twice over for each of them," said the juggler,
"and their heads shall be on them as before."

"Thou shalt get that," said O'Donnell.

Five pieces, and again five were paid him, and lo! the lad had his head
and the hound his. And though they lived to the uttermost end of time,
the hound would never touch a hare again, and the lad took good care to
keep his eyes open.

Scarcely had the lank grey beggarman done this when he vanished from
out their sight, and no one present could say if he had flown through
the air or if the earth had swallowed him up.

He moved as wave tumbling o'er wave

As whirlwind following whirlwind,
As a furious wintry blast,
So swiftly, sprucely, cheerily,
Right proudly,
And no stop made
Until he came
To the court of Leinster's King,
He gave a cheery light leap
O'er top of turret,
Of court and city
Of Leinster's King.

Heavy was the flesh and weary the spirit of Leinster's king. 'Twas the
hour he was wont to hear a story, but send he might right and left, not
a jot of tidings about the story-teller could he get.

"Go to the door," said he to his doorkeeper, "and see if a soul is in

sight who may tell me something about my story-teller."

The doorkeeper went, and what he saw was a lank grey beggarman, half
his sword bared behind his haunch, his two old shoes full of cold
road-a-wayish water sousing about him, the tips of his two ears out
through his old hat, his two shoulders out through his scant tattered
cloak, and in his hand a three-stringed harp.

"What canst thou do?" said the doorkeeper.

"I can play," said the lank grey beggarman.

"Never fear," added he to the story-teller, "thou shalt see all, and
not a man shall see thee."

When the king heard a harper was outside, he bade him in.

"It is I that have the best harpers in the five-fifths of Ireland,"

said he, and he signed them to play. They did so, and if they played,
the lank grey beggarman listened.

"Heardst thou ever the like?" said the king.

"Did you ever, O king, hear a cat purring over a bowl of broth, or the
buzzing of beetles in the twilight, or a shrill tongued old woman
scolding your head off?"

"That I have often," said the king.

"More melodious to me," said the lank grey beggarman, "were the worst
of these sounds than the sweetest harping of thy harpers."

When the harpers heard this, they drew their swords and rushed at him,
but instead of striking him, their blows fell on each other, and soon
not a man but was cracking his neighbour's skull and getting his own
cracked in turn.

When the king saw this, he thought it hard the harpers weren't content
with murdering their music, but must needs murder each other.

"Hang the fellow who began it all," said he; "and if I can't have a
story, let me have peace."

Up came the guards, seized the lank grey beggarman, marched him to the
gallows and hanged him high and dry. Back they marched to the hall, and
who should they see but the lank grey beggarman seated on a bench with
his mouth to a flagon of ale.

"Never welcome you in," cried the captain of the guard, "didn't we hang
you this minute, and what brings you here?"

"Is it me myself, you mean?"

"Who else?" said the captain.

"May your hand turn into a pig's foot with you when you think of tying
the rope; why should you speak of hanging me?"

Back they scurried to the gallows, and there hung the king's favourite
brother.

Back they hurried to the king who had fallen fast asleep.

"Please your Majesty," said the captain, "we hanged that strolling
vagabond, but here he is back again as well as ever."
"Hang him again," said the king, and off he went to sleep once more.

They did as they were told, but what happened was that they found the
king's chief harper hanging where the lank grey beggarman should have
been.

The captain of the guard was sorely puzzled.

"Are you wishful to hang me a third time?" said the lank grey beggarman.

"Go where you will," said the captain, "and as fast as you please if
you'll only go far enough. It's trouble enough you've given us already."

"Now you're reasonable," said the beggarman; "and since you've given up
trying to hang a stranger because he finds fault with your music, I
don't mind telling you that if you go back to the gallows you'll find
your friends sitting on the sward none the worse for what has happened."

As he said these words he vanished; and the story-teller found himself

on the spot where they first met, and where his wife still was with the
carriage and horses.

"Now," said the lank grey beggarman, "I'll torment you no longer.
There's your carriage and your horses, and your money and your wife; do
what you please with them."

"For my carriage and my houses and my hounds," said the story-teller,

"I thank you; but my wife and my money you may keep."

"No," said the other. "I want neither, and as for your wife, don't
think ill of her for what she did, she couldn't help it."

"Not help it! Not help kicking me into the mouth of my own hounds! Not
help casting me off for the sake of a beggarly old--"

"I'm not as beggarly or as old as ye think. I am Angus of the Bruff;

many a good turn you've done me with the King of Leinster. This morning
my magic told me the difficulty you were in, and I made up my mind to
get you out of it. As for your wife there, the power that changed your
body changed her mind. Forget and forgive as man and wife should do,
and now you have a story for the King of Leinster when he calls for
one;" and with that he disappeared.

It's true enough he now had a story fit for a king. From first to last
he told all that had befallen him; so long and loud laughed the king
that he couldn't go to sleep at all. And he told the story-teller never
to trouble for fresh stories, but every night as long as he lived he
listened again and he laughed afresh at the tale of the lank grey
beggarman.

THE SEA-MAIDEN

There was once a poor old fisherman, and one year he was not getting
much fish. On a day of days, while he was fishing, there rose a
sea-maiden at the side of his boat, and she asked him, "Are you getting
much fish?" The old man answered and said, "Not I." "What reward would
you give me for sending plenty of fish to you?" "Ach!" said the old
man, "I have not much to spare." "Will you give me the first son you
have?" said she. "I would give ye that, were I to have a son," said he.
"Then go home, and remember me when your son is twenty years of age,
and you yourself will get plenty of fish after this." Everything
happened as the sea-maiden said, and he himself got plenty of fish; but
when the end of the twenty years was nearing, the old man was growing
more and more sorrowful and heavy hearted, while he counted each day as
it came.

He had rest neither day nor night. The son asked his father one day,
"Is any one troubling you?" The old man said, "Some one is, but that's
nought to do with you nor any one else." The lad said, "I must know
what it is." His father told him at last how the matter was with him
and the sea-maiden. "Let not that put you in any trouble," said the
son; "I will not oppose you." "You shall not; you shall not go, my son,
though I never get fish any more." "If you will not let me go with you,
go to the smithy, and let the smith make me a great strong sword, and I
will go seek my fortune."

His father went to the smithy, and the smith made a doughty sword for
him. His father came home with the sword. The lad grasped it and gave
it a shake or two, and it flew into a hundred splinters. He asked his
father to go to the smithy and get him another sword in which there
should be twice as much weight; and so his father did, and so likewise
it happened to the next sword--it broke in two halves. Back went the
old man to the smithy; and the smith made a great sword, its like he
never made before. "There's thy sword for thee," said the smith, "and
the fist must be good that plays this blade." The old man gave the
sword to his son; he gave it a shake or two. "This will do," said he;
"it's high time now to travel on my way."

On the next morning he put a saddle on a black horse that his father
had, and he took the world for his pillow. When he went on a bit, he
fell in with the carcass of a sheep beside the road. And there were a
great black dog, a falcon, and an otter, and they were quarrelling over
the spoil. So they asked him to divide it for them. He came down off
the horse, and he divided the carcass amongst the three. Three shares
to the dog, two shares to the otter, and a share to the falcon. "For
this," said the dog, "if swiftness of foot or sharpness of tooth will
give thee aid, mind me, and I will be at thy side." Said the otter, "If
the swimming of foot on the ground of a pool will loose thee, mind me,
and I will be at thy side." Said the falcon, "If hardship comes on
thee, where swiftness of wing or crook of a claw will do good, mind me,
and I will be at thy side."

On this he went onward till he reached a king's house, and he took

service to be a herd, and his wages were to be according to the milk of
the cattle. He went away with the cattle, and the grazing was but bare.
In the evening when he took them home they had not much milk, the place
was so bare, and his meat and drink was but spare that night.

On the next day he went on further with them; and at last he came to a
place exceedingly grassy, in a green glen, of which he never saw the
like.

But about the time when he should drive the cattle homewards, who
should he see coming but a great giant with his sword in his hand? "HI!
HO!! HOGARACH!!!" says the giant. "Those cattle are mine; they are on
my land, and a dead man art thou." "I say not that," says the herd;
"there is no knowing, but that may be easier to say than to do."

He drew the great clean-sweeping sword, and he neared the giant. The
herd drew back his sword, and the head was off the giant in a
twinkling. He leaped on the black horse, and he went to look for the
giant's house. In went the herd, and that's the place where there was
money in plenty, and dresses of each kind in the wardrobe with gold and
silver, and each thing finer than the other. At the mouth of night he
took himself to the king's house, but he took not a thing from the
giant's house. And when the cattle were milked this night there _was_
milk. He got good feeding this night, meat and drink without stint, and
the king was hugely pleased that he had caught such a herd. He went on
for a time in this way, but at last the glen grew bare of grass, and
the grazing was not so good.

So he thought he would go a little further forward in on the giant's

land; and he sees a great park of grass. He returned for the cattle,
and he put them into the park.

They were but a short time grazing in the park when a great wild giant
came full of rage and madness. "HI! HAW!! HOGARAICH!!!" said the giant.
"It is a drink of thy blood that will quench my thirst this night."
"There is no knowing," said the herd, "but that's easier to say than to
do." And at each other went the men. _There_ was shaking of blades! At
length and at last it seemed as if the giant would get the victory over
the herd. Then he called on the dog, and with one spring the black dog
caught the giant by the neck, and swiftly the herd struck off his head.

He went home very tired this night, but it's a wonder if the king's
cattle had not milk. The whole family was delighted that they had got
such a herd.

Next day he betakes himself to the castle. When he reached the door, a
little flattering carlin met him standing in the door. "All hail and
good luck to thee, fisher's son; 'tis I myself am pleased to see thee;
great is the honour for this kingdom, for thy like to be come into
it--thy coming in is fame for this little bothy; go in first; honour to
the gentles; go on, and take breath."

"In before me, thou crone; I like not flattery out of doors; go in and
let's hear thy speech." In went the crone, and when her back was to him
he drew his sword and whips her head off; but the sword flew out of his
hand. And swift the crone gripped her head with both hands, and puts it
on her neck as it was before. The dog sprung on the crone, and she
struck the generous dog with the club of magic; and there he lay. But
the herd struggled for a hold of the club of magic, and with one blow
on the top of the head she was on earth in the twinkling of an eye. He
went forward, up a little, and there was spoil! Gold and silver, and
each thing more precious than another, in the crone's castle. He went
back to the king's house, and then there was rejoicing.

He followed herding in this way for a time; but one night after he came
home, instead of getting "All hail" and "Good luck" from the dairymaid,
all were at crying and woe.

He asked what cause of woe there was that night. The dairymaid said
"There is a great beast with three heads in the loch, and it must get
some one every year, and the lot had come this year on the king's
daughter, and at midday to-morrow she is to meet the Laidly Beast at
the upper end of the loch, but there is a great suitor yonder who is
going to rescue her."

"What suitor is that?" said the herd. "Oh, he is a great General of

arms," said the dairymaid, "and when he kills the beast, he will marry
the king's daughter, for the king has said that he who could save his
daughter should get her to marry."

But on the morrow, when the time grew near, the king's daughter and
this hero of arms went to give a meeting to the beast, and they reached
the black rock, at the upper end of the loch. They were but a short
time there when the beast stirred in the midst of the loch; but when
the General saw this terror of a beast with three heads, he took
fright, and he slunk away, and he hid himself. And the king's daughter
was under fear and under trembling, with no one at all to save her.
Suddenly she sees a doughty handsome youth, riding a black horse, and
coming where she was. He was marvellously arrayed and full armed, and
his black dog moved after him. "There is gloom on your face, girl,"
said the youth; "what do you here?"

"Oh! that's no matter," said the king's daughter. "It's not long I'll
be here, at all events."

"I say not that," said he.

"A champion fled as likely as you, and not long since," said she.

"He is a champion who stands the war," said the youth. And to meet the
beast he went with his sword and his dog. But there was a spluttering
and a splashing between himself and the beast! The dog kept doing all
he might, and the king's daughter was palsied by fear of the noise of
the beast! One of them would now be under, and now above. But at last
he cut one of the heads off it. It gave one roar, and the son of earth,
echo of the rocks, called to its screech, and it drove the loch in
spindrift from end to end, and in a twinkling it went out of sight.

"Good luck and victory follow you, lad!" said the king's daughter. "I
am safe for one night, but the beast will come again and again, until
the other two heads come off it." He caught the beast's head, and he
drew a knot through it, and he told her to bring it with her there
to-morrow. She gave him a gold ring, and went home with the head on her
shoulder, and the herd betook himself to the cows. But she had not gone
far when this great General saw her, and he said to her, "I will kill
you if you do not say that 'twas I took the head off the beast." "Oh!"
says she, "'tis I will say it; who else took the head off the beast but
you!" They reached the king's house, and the head was on the General's
shoulder. But here was rejoicing, that she should come home alive and
whole, and this great captain with the beast's head full of blood in
his hand. On the morrow they went away, and there was no question at
all but that this hero would save the king's daughter.

They reached the same place, and they were not long there when the
fearful Laidly Beast stirred in the midst of the loch, and the hero
slunk away as he did on yesterday, but it was not long after this when
the man of the black horse came, with another dress on. No matter; she
knew that it was the very same lad. "It is I am pleased to see you,"
said she. "I am in hopes you will handle your great sword to-day as you
did yesterday. Come up and take breath." But they were not long there
when they saw the beast steaming in the midst of the loch.

At once he went to meet the beast, but _there_ was Cloopersteich and
Claperstich, spluttering, splashing, raving, and roaring on the beast!
They kept at it thus for a long time, and about the mouth of night he
cut another head off the beast. He put it on the knot and gave it to
her. She gave him one of her earrings, and he leaped on the black
horse, and he betook himself to the herding. The king's daughter went
home with the heads. The General met her, and took the heads from her,
and he said to her, that she must tell that it was he who took the head
off the beast this time also. "Who else took the head off the beast but
you?" said she. They reached the king's house with the heads. Then
there was joy and gladness.

About the same time on the morrow, the two went away. The officer hid
himself as he usually did. The king's daughter betook herself to the
bank of the loch. The hero of the black horse came, and if roaring and
raving were on the beast on the days that were passed, this day it was
horrible. But no matter, he took the third head off the beast, and drew
it through the knot, and gave it to her. She gave him her other
earring, and then she went home with the heads. When they reached the
king's house, all were full of smiles, and the General was to marry the
king's daughter the next day. The wedding was going on, and every one
about the castle longing till the priest should come. But when the
priest came, she would marry only the one who could take the heads off
the knot without cutting it. "Who should take the heads off the knot
but the man that put the heads on?" said the king.

The General tried them; but he could not loose them; and at last there
was no one about the house but had tried to take the heads off the
knot, but they could not. The king asked if there were any one else
about the house that would try to take the heads off the knot. They
said that the herd had not tried them yet. Word went for the herd; and
he was not long throwing them hither and thither. "But stop a bit, my
lad," said the king's daughter; "the man that took the heads off the
beast, he has my ring and my two earrings." The herd put his hand in
his pocket, and he threw them on the board. "Thou art my man," said the
king's daughter. The king was not so pleased when he saw that it was a
herd who was to marry his daughter, but he ordered that he should be
put in a better dress; but his daughter spoke, and she said that he had
a dress as fine as any that ever was in his castle; and thus it
happened. The herd put on the giant's golden dress, and they married
that same day.

They were now married, and everything went on well. But one day, and it
was the namesake of the day when his father had promised him to the
sea-maiden, they were sauntering by the side of the loch, and lo and
behold! she came and took him away to the loch without leave or asking.
The king's daughter was now mournful, tearful, blind-sorrowful for her
married man; she was always with her eye on the loch. An old soothsayer
met her, and she told how it had befallen her married mate. Then he
told her the thing to do to save her mate, and that she did.

She took her harp to the sea-shore, and sat and played; and the
sea-maiden came up to listen, for sea-maidens are fonder of music than
all other creatures. But when the wife saw the sea-maiden she stopped.
The sea-maiden said, "Play on!" but the princess said, "No, not till I
see my man again." So the sea-maiden put up his head out of the loch.
Then the princess played again, and stopped till the sea-maiden put him
up to the waist. Then the princess played and stopped again, and this
time the sea-maiden put him all out of the loch, and he called on the
falcon and became one and flew on shore. But the sea-maiden took the
princess, his wife.

Sorrowful was each one that was in the town on this night. Her man was
mournful, tearful, wandering down and up about the banks of the loch,
by day and night. The old soothsayer met him. The soothsayer told him
that there was no way of killing the sea-maiden but the one way, and
this is it--"In the island that is in the midst of the loch is the
white-footed hind of the slenderest legs and the swiftest step, and
though she be caught, there will spring a hoodie out of her, and though
the hoodie should be caught, there will spring a trout out of her, but
there is an egg in the mouth of the trout, and the soul of the
sea-maiden is in the egg, and if the egg breaks, she is dead."

Now, there was no way of getting to this island, for the sea-maiden
would sink each boat and raft that would go on the loch. He thought he
would try to leap the strait with the black horse, and even so he did.
The black horse leaped the strait. He saw the hind, and he let the
black dog after her, but when he was on one side of the island, the
hind would be on the other side. "Oh! would the black dog of the
carcass of flesh were here!" No sooner spoke he the word than the
grateful dog was at his side; and after the hind he went, and they were
not long in bringing her to earth. But he no sooner caught her than a
hoodie sprang out of her. "Would that the falcon grey, of sharpest eye
and swiftest wing, were here!" No sooner said he this than the falcon
was after the hoodie, and she was not long putting her to earth; and as
the hoodie fell on the bank of the loch, out of her jumps the trout.
"Oh! that thou wert by me now, oh otter!" No sooner said than the otter
was at his side, and out on the loch she leaped, and brings the trout
from the midst of the loch; but no sooner was the otter on shore with
the trout than the egg came from his mouth. He sprang and he put his
foot on it. 'Twas then the sea-maiden appeared, and she said, "Break
not the egg, and you shall get all you ask." "Deliver to me my wife!"
In the wink of an eye she was by his side. When he got hold of her hand
in both his hands, he let his foot down on the egg, and the sea-maiden
died.

A LEGEND OF KNOCKMANY

What Irish man, woman, or child has not heard of our renowned Hibernian
Hercules, the great and glorious Fin M'Coul? Not one, from Cape Clear
to the Giant's Causeway, nor from that back again to Cape Clear. And,
by-the-way, speaking of the Giant's Causeway brings me at once to the
beginning of my story. Well, it so happened that Fin and his men were
all working at the Causeway, in order to make a bridge across to
Scotland; when Fin, who was very fond of his wife Oonagh, took it into
his head that he would go home and see how the poor woman got on in his
absence. So, accordingly, he pulled up a fir-tree, and, after lopping
off the roots and branches, made a walking-stick of it, and set out on
his way to Oonagh.

Oonagh, or rather Fin, lived at this time on the very tip-top of

Knockmany Hill, which faces a cousin of its own called Cullamore, that
rises up, half-hill, half-mountain, on the opposite side.

There was at that time another giant, named Cucullin--some say he was
Irish, and some say he was Scotch--but whether Scotch or Irish, sorrow
doubt of it but he was a targer. No other giant of the day could stand
before him; and such was his strength, that, when well vexed, he could
give a stamp that shook the country about him. The fame and name of him
went far and near; and nothing in the shape of a man, it was said, had
any chance with him in a fight. By one blow of his fists he flattened a
thunderbolt and kept it in his pocket, in the shape of a pancake, to
show to all his enemies, when they were about to fight him. Undoubtedly
he had given every giant in Ireland a considerable beating, barring Fin
M'Coul himself; and he swore that he would never rest, night or day,
winter or summer, till he would serve Fin with the same sauce, if he
could catch him. However, the short and long of it was, with reverence
be it spoken, that Fin heard Cucullin was coming to the Causeway to
have a trial of strength with him; and he was seized with a very warm
and sudden fit of affection for his wife, poor woman, leading a very
lonely, uncomfortable life of it in his absence. He accordingly pulled
up the fir-tree, as I said before, and having snedded it into a
walking-stick, set out on his travels to see his darling Oonagh on the
top of Knockmany, by the way.

In truth, the people wondered very much why it was that Fin selected
such a windy spot for his dwelling-house, and they even went so far as
to tell him as much.

"What can you mane, Mr. M'Coul," said they, "by pitching your tent upon
the top of Knockmany, where you never are without a breeze, day or
night, winter or summer, and where you're often forced to take your
nightcap without either going to bed or turning up your little finger;
ay, an' where, besides this, there's the sorrow's own want of water?"

"Why," said Fin, "ever since I was the height of a round tower, I was
known to be fond of having a good prospect of my own; and where the
dickens, neighbours, could I find a better spot for a good prospect
than the top of Knockmany? As for water, I am sinking a pump, and,
plase goodness, as soon as the Causeway's made, I intend to finish it."

Now, this was more of Fin's philosophy; for the real state of the case
was, that he pitched upon the top of Knockmany in order that he might
be able to see Cucullin coming towards the house. All we have to say
is, that if he wanted a spot from which to keep a sharp look-out--and,
between ourselves, he did want it grievously--barring Slieve Croob, or
Slieve Donard, or its own cousin, Cullamore, he could not find a neater
or more convenient situation for it in the sweet and sagacious province
of Ulster.

"God save all here!" said Fin, good-humouredly, on putting his honest
face into his own door.

"Musha, Fin, avick, an' you're welcome home to your own Oonagh, you
darlin' bully." Here followed a smack that is said to have made the
waters of the lake at the bottom of the hill curl, as it were, with
kindness and sympathy.

Fin spent two or three happy days with Oonagh, and felt himself very
comfortable, considering the dread he had of Cucullin. This, however,
grew upon him so much that his wife could not but perceive something
lay on his mind which he kept altogether to himself. Let a woman alone,
in the meantime, for ferreting or wheedling a secret out of her good
man, when she wishes. Fin was a proof of this.

"It's this Cucullin," said he, "that's troubling me. When the fellow
gets angry, and begins to stamp, he'll shake you a whole townland; and
it's well known that he can stop a thunderbolt, for he always carries
one about him in the shape of a pancake, to show to any one that might
misdoubt it."

As he spoke, he clapped his thumb in his mouth, which he always did

when he wanted to prophesy, or to know anything that happened in his
absence; and the wife asked him what he did it for.

"He's coming," said Fin; "I see him below Dungannon."

"Thank goodness, dear! an' who is it, avick? Glory be to God!"

"That baste, Cucullin," replied Fin; "and how to manage I don't know.
If I run away, I am disgraced; and I know that sooner or later I must
meet him, for my thumb tells me so."

"When will he be here?" said she.

"To-morrow, about two o'clock," replied Fin, with a groan.

"Well, my bully, don't be cast down," said Oonagh; "depend on me, and
maybe I'll bring you better out of this scrape than ever you could
bring yourself, by your rule o' thumb."

She then made a high smoke on the top of the hill, after which she put
her finger in her mouth, and gave three whistles, and by that Cucullin
knew he was invited to Cullamore--for this was the way that the Irish
long ago gave a sign to all strangers and travellers, to let them know
they were welcome to come and take share of whatever was going.

In the meantime, Fin was very melancholy, and did not know what to do,
or how to act at all. Cucullin was an ugly customer to meet with; and,
the idea of the "cake" aforesaid flattened the very heart within him.
What chance could he have, strong and brave though he was, with a man
who could, when put in a passion, walk the country into earthquakes and
knock thunderbolts into pancakes? Fin knew not on what hand to turn
him. Right or left--backward or forward--where to go he could form no
guess whatsoever.

"Oonagh," said he, "can you do nothing for me? Where's all your
invention? Am I to be skivered like a rabbit before your eyes, and to
have my name disgraced for ever in the sight of all my tribe, and me
the best man among them? How am I to fight this man-mountain--this huge
cross between an earthquake and a thunderbolt?--with a pancake in his
pocket that was once--"

"Be easy, Fin," replied Oonagh; "troth, I'm ashamed of you. Keep your
toe in your pump, will you? Talking of pancakes, maybe, we'll give him
as good as any he brings with him--thunderbolt or otherwise. If I don't
treat him to as smart feeding as he's got this many a day, never trust
Oonagh again. Leave him to me, and do just as I bid you."

This relieved Fin very much; for, after all, he had great confidence in
his wife, knowing, as he did, that she had got him out of many a
quandary before. Oonagh then drew the nine woollen threads of different
colours, which she always did to find out the best way of succeeding in
anything of importance she went about. She then platted them into three
plats with three colours in each, putting one on her right arm, one
round her heart, and the third round her right ankle, for then she knew
that nothing could fail with her that she undertook.

Having everything now prepared, she sent round to the neighbours and
borrowed one-and-twenty iron griddles, which she took and kneaded into
the hearts of one-and-twenty cakes of bread, and these she baked on the
fire in the usual way, setting them aside in the cupboard according as
they were done. She then put down a large pot of new milk, which she
made into curds and whey. Having done all this, she sat down quite
contented, waiting for his arrival on the next day about two o'clock,
that being the hour at which he was expected--for Fin knew as much by
the sucking of his thumb. Now this was a curious property that Fin's
thumb had. In this very thing, moreover, he was very much resembled by
his great foe, Cucullin; for it was well known that the huge strength
he possessed all lay in the middle finger of his right hand, and that,
if he happened by any mischance to lose it, he was no more, for all his
bulk, than a common man.

At length, the next day, Cucullin was seen coming across the valley,
and Oonagh knew that it was time to commence operations. She
immediately brought the cradle, and made Fin to lie down in it, and
cover himself up with the clothes.

"You must pass for your own child," said she; "so just lie there snug,
and say nothing, but be guided by me."

About two o'clock, as he had been expected, Cucullin came in. "God save
all here!" said he; "is this where the great Fin M'Coul lives?"

"Indeed it is, honest man," replied Oonagh; "God save you kindly--won't
you be sitting?"

"Thank you, ma'am," says he, sitting down; "you're Mrs. M'Coul, I
suppose?"

"I am," said she; "and I have no reason, I hope, to be ashamed of my

husband."

"No," said the other, "he has the name of being the strongest and
bravest man in Ireland; but for all that, there's a man not far from
you that's very desirous of taking a shake with him. Is he at home?"

"Why, then, no," she replied; "and if ever a man left his house in a
fury, he did. It appears that some one told him of a big basthoon of
a--giant called Cucullin being down at the Causeway to look for him,
and so he set out there to try if he could catch him. Troth, I hope,
for the poor giant's sake, he won't meet with him, for if he does, Fin
will make paste of him at once."

"Well," said the other, "I am Cucullin, and I have been seeking him
these twelve months, but he always kept clear of me; and I will never
rest night or day till I lay my hands on him."

At this Oonagh set up a loud laugh, of great contempt, by-the-way, and

looked at him as if he was only a mere handful of a man.

"Did you ever see Fin?" said she, changing her manner all at once.

"How could I?" said he; "he always took care to keep his distance."

"I thought so," she replied; "I judged as much; and if you take my
advice, you poor-looking creature, you'll pray night and day that you
may never see him, for I tell you it will be a black day for you when
you do. But, in the meantime, you perceive that the wind's on the door,
and as Fin himself is from home, maybe you'd be civil enough to turn
the house, for it's always what Fin does when he's here."

This was a startler even to Cucullin; but he got up, however, and after
pulling the middle finger of his right hand until it cracked three
times, he went outside, and getting his arms about the house, turned it
as she had wished. When Fin saw this, he felt the sweat of fear oozing
out through every pore of his skin; but Oonagh, depending upon her
woman's wit, felt not a whit daunted.

"Arrah, then," said she, "as you are so civil, maybe you'd do another
obliging turn for us, as Fin's not here to do it himself. You see,
after this long stretch of dry weather we've had, we feel very badly
off for want of water. Now, Fin says there's a fine spring-well
somewhere under the rocks behind the hill here below, and it was his
intention to pull them asunder; but having heard of you, he left the
place in such a fury, that he never thought of it. Now, if you try to
find it, troth I'd feel it a kindness."

She then brought Cucullin down to see the place, which was then all one
solid rock; and, after looking at it for some time, he cracked his
right middle finger nine times, and, stooping down, tore a cleft about
four hundred feet deep, and a quarter of a mile in length, which has
since been christened by the name of Lumford's Glen.

"You'll now come in," said she, "and eat a bit of such humble fare as
we can give you. Fin, even although he and you are enemies, would scorn
not to treat you kindly in his own house; and, indeed, if I didn't do
it even in his absence, he would not be pleased with me."

She accordingly brought him in, and placing half-a-dozen of the cakes
we spoke of before him, together with a can or two of butter, a side of
boiled bacon, and a stack of cabbage, she desired him to help
himself--for this, be it known, was long before the invention of
potatoes. Cucullin put one of the cakes in his mouth to take a huge
whack out of it, when he made a thundering noise, something between a
growl and a yell. "Blood and fury!" he shouted; "how is this? Here are
two of my teeth out! What kind of bread this is you gave me."

"What's the matter?" said Oonagh coolly.

"Matter!" shouted the other again; "why, here are the two best teeth in
my head gone."

"Why," said she, "that's Fin's bread--the only bread he ever eats when
at home; but, indeed, I forgot to tell you that nobody can eat it but
himself, and that child in the cradle there. I thought, however, that,
as you were reported to be rather a stout little fellow of your size,
you might be able to manage it, and I did not wish to affront a man
that thinks himself able to fight Fin. Here's another cake--maybe it's
not so hard as that."

Cucullin at the moment was not only hungry, but ravenous, so he

accordingly made a fresh set at the second cake, and immediately
another yell was heard twice as loud as the first. "Thunder and
gibbets!" he roared, "take your bread out of this, or I will not have a
tooth in my head; there's another pair of them gone!"

"Well, honest man," replied Oonagh, "if you're not able to eat the
bread, say so quietly, and don't be wakening the child in the cradle
there. There, now, he's awake upon me."

Fin now gave a skirl that startled the giant, as coming from such a
youngster as he was supposed to be.

"Mother," said he, "I'm hungry--get me something to eat." Oonagh went

over, and putting into his hand a cake that had no griddle in it, Fin,
whose appetite in the meantime had been sharpened by seeing eating
going forward, soon swallowed it. Cucullin was thunderstruck, and
secretly thanked his stars that he had the good fortune to miss meeting
Fin, for, as he said to himself, "I'd have no chance with a man who
could eat such bread as that, which even his son that's but in his
cradle can munch before my eyes."

"I'd like to take a glimpse at the lad in the cradle," said he to

Oonagh; "for I can tell you that the infant who can manage that
nutriment is no joke to look at, or to feed of a scarce summer."

"With all the veins of my heart," replied Oonagh; "get up, acushla, and
show this decent little man something that won't be unworthy of your
father, Fin M'Coul."

Fin, who was dressed for the occasion as much like a boy as possible,
got up, and bringing Cucullin out, "Are you strong?" said he.

"Thunder an' ounds!" exclaimed the other, "what a voice in so small a

chap!"

"Are you strong?" said Fin again; "are you able to squeeze water out of
that white stone?" he asked, putting one into Cucullin's hand. The
latter squeezed and squeezed the stone, but in vain.

"Ah, you're a poor creature!" said Fin. "You a giant! Give me the stone
here, and when I'll show what Fin's little son can do, you may then
judge of what my daddy himself is."

Fin then took the stone, and exchanging it for the curds, he squeezed
the latter until the whey, as clear as water, oozed out in a little
shower from his hand.

"I'll now go in," said he, "to my cradle; for I scorn to lose my time
with any one that's not able to eat my daddy's bread, or squeeze water
out of a stone. Bedad, you had better be off out of this before he
comes back; for if he catches you, it's in flummery he'd have you in
two minutes."

Cucullin, seeing what he had seen, was of the same opinion himself; his
knees knocked together with the terror of Fin's return, and he
accordingly hastened to bid Oonagh farewell, and to assure her, that
from that day out, he never wished to hear of, much less to see, her
husband. "I admit fairly that I'm not a match for him," said he,
"strong as I am; tell him I will avoid him as I would the plague, and
that I will make myself scarce in this part of the country while I
live."

Fin, in the meantime, had gone into the cradle, where he lay very
quietly, his heart at his mouth with delight that Cucullin was about to
take his departure, without discovering the tricks that had been played
off on him.

"It's well for you," said Oonagh, "that he doesn't happen to be here,
for it's nothing but hawk's meat he'd make of you."

"I know that," says Cucullin; "divil a thing else he'd make of me; but
before I go, will you let me feel what kind of teeth Fin's lad has got
that can eat griddle-bread like that?"

"With all pleasure in life," said she; "only, as they're far back in
his head, you must put your finger a good way in."

Cucullin was surprised to find such a powerful set of grinders in one

so young; but he was still much more so on finding, when he took his
hand from Fin's mouth, that he had left the very finger upon which his
whole strength depended, behind him. He gave one loud groan, and fell
down at once with terror and weakness. This was all Fin wanted, who now
knew that his most powerful and bitterest enemy was at his mercy. He
started out of the cradle, and in a few minutes the great Cucullin,
that was for such a length of time the terror of him and all his
followers, lay a corpse before him. Thus did Fin, through the wit and
invention of Oonagh, his wife, succeed in overcoming his enemy by
cunning, which he never could have done by force.

FAIR, BROWN, AND TREMBLING

King Hugh Curucha lived in Tir Conal, and he had three daughters, whose
names were Fair, Brown, and Trembling. Fair and Brown had new dresses,
and went to church every Sunday. Trembling was kept at home to do the
cooking and work. They would not let her go out of the house at all;
for she was more beautiful than the other two, and they were in dread
she might marry before themselves.

They carried on in this way for seven years. At the end of seven years
the son of the king of Emania fell in love with the eldest sister.

One Sunday morning, after the other two had gone to church, the old
henwife came into the kitchen to Trembling, and said: "It's at church
you ought to be this day, instead of working here at home."

"How could I go?" said Trembling. "I have no clothes good enough to
wear at church; and if my sisters were to see me there, they'd kill me
for going out of the house."

"I'll give you," said the henwife, "a finer dress than either of them
has ever seen. And now tell me what dress will you have?"
"I'll have," said Trembling, "a dress as white as snow, and green shoes
for my feet."

Then the henwife put on the cloak of darkness, clipped a piece from the
old clothes the young woman had on, and asked for the whitest robes in
the world and the most beautiful that could be found, and a pair of
green shoes.

That moment she had the robe and the shoes, and she brought them to
Trembling, who put them on. When Trembling was dressed and ready, the
henwife said: "I have a honey-bird here to sit on your right shoulder,
and a honey-finger to put on your left. At the door stands a milk-white
mare, with a golden saddle for you to sit on, and a golden bridle to
hold in your hand."

Trembling sat on the golden saddle; and when she was ready to start,
the henwife said: "You must not go inside the door of the church, and
the minute the people rise up at the end of Mass, do you make off, and
ride home as fast as the mare will carry you."

When Trembling came to the door of the church there was no one inside
who could get a glimpse of her but was striving to know who she was;
and when they saw her hurrying away at the end of Mass, they ran out to
overtake her. But no use in their running; she was away before any man
could come near her. From the minute she left the church till she got
home, she overtook the wind before her, and outstripped the wind behind.

She came down at the door, went in, and found the henwife had dinner
ready. She put off the white robes, and had on her old dress in a
twinkling.

When the two sisters came home the henwife asked: "Have you any news
to-day from the church?"

"We have great news," said they. "We saw a wonderful grand lady at the
church-door. The like of the robes she had we have never seen on woman
before. It's little that was thought of our dresses beside what she had
on; and there wasn't a man at the church, from the king to the beggar,
but was trying to look at her and know who she was."

The sisters would give no peace till they had two dresses like the
robes of the strange lady; but honey-birds and honey-fingers were not
to be found.

Next Sunday the two sisters went to church again, and left the youngest
at home to cook the dinner.

After they had gone, the henwife came in and asked: "Will you go to
church to-day?"

"I would go," said Trembling, "if I could get the going."

"What robe will you wear?" asked the henwife.

"The finest black satin that can be found, and red shoes for my feet."

"What colour do you want the mare to be?"

"I want her to be so black and so glossy that I can see myself in her
body."

The henwife put on the cloak of darkness, and asked for the robes and
the mare. That moment she had them. When Trembling was dressed, the
henwife put the honey-bird on her right shoulder and the honey-finger
on her left. The saddle on the mare was silver, and so was the bridle.

When Trembling sat in the saddle and was going away, the henwife
ordered her strictly not to go inside the door of the church, but to
rush away as soon as the people rose at the end of Mass, and hurry home
on the mare before any man could stop her.

That Sunday, the people were more astonished than ever, and gazed at
her more than the first time; and all they were thinking of was to know
who she was. But they had no chance; for the moment the people rose at
the end of Mass she slipped from the church, was in the silver saddle,
and home before a man could stop her or talk to her.

The henwife had the dinner ready. Trembling took off her satin robe,
and had on her old clothes before her sisters got home.

"What news have you to-day?" asked the henwife of the sisters when they
came from the church.

"Oh, we saw the grand strange lady again! And it's little that any man
could think of our dresses after looking at the robes of satin that she
had on! And all at church, from high to low, had their mouths open,
gazing at her, and no man was looking at us."

The two sisters gave neither rest nor peace till they got dresses as
nearly like the strange lady's robes as they could find. Of course they
were not so good; for the like of those robes could not be found in
Erin.

When the third Sunday came, Fair and Brown went to church dressed in
black satin. They left Trembling at home to work in the kitchen, and
told her to be sure and have dinner ready when they came back.

After they had gone and were out of sight, the henwife came to the
kitchen and said: "Well, my dear, are you for church to-day?"

"I would go if I had a new dress to wear."

"I'll get you any dress you ask for. What dress would you like?" asked
the henwife.

"A dress red as a rose from the waist down, and white as snow from the
waist up; a cape of green on my shoulders; and a hat on my head with a
red, a white, and a green feather in it; and shoes for my feet with the
toes red, the middle white, and the backs and heels green."

The henwife put on the cloak of darkness, wished for all these things,
and had them. When Trembling was dressed, the henwife put the
honey-bird on her right shoulder and the honey-finger on her left, and,
placing the hat on her head, clipped a few hairs from one lock and a
few from another with her scissors, and that moment the most beautiful
golden hair was flowing down over the girl's shoulders. Then the
henwife asked what kind of a mare she would ride. She said white, with
blue and gold-coloured diamond-shaped spots all over her body, on her
back a saddle of gold, and on her head a golden bridle.

The mare stood there before the door, and a bird sitting between her
ears, which began to sing as soon as Trembling was in the saddle, and
never stopped till she came home from the church.

The fame of the beautiful strange lady had gone out through the world,
and all the princes and great men that were in it came to church that
Sunday, each one hoping that it was himself would have her home with
him after Mass.

The son of the king of Emania forgot all about the eldest sister, and
remained outside the church, so as to catch the strange lady before she
could hurry away.

The church was more crowded than ever before, and there were three
times as many outside. There was such a throng before the church that
Trembling could only come inside the gate.

As soon as the people were rising at the end of Mass, the lady slipped
out through the gate, was in the golden saddle in an instant, and
sweeping away ahead of the wind. But if she was, the prince of Emania
was at her side, and, seizing her by the foot, he ran with the mare for
thirty perches, and never let go of the beautiful lady till the shoe
was pulled from her foot, and he was left behind with it in his hand.
She came home as fast as the mare could carry her, and was thinking all
the time that the henwife would kill her for losing the shoe.

Seeing her so vexed and so changed in the face, the old woman asked:
"What's the trouble that's on you now?" "Oh! I've lost one of the shoes
off my feet," said Trembling.

"Don't mind that; don't be vexed," said the henwife; "maybe it's the
best thing that ever happened to you."

Then Trembling gave up all the things she had to the henwife, put on
her old clothes, and went to work in the kitchen. When the sisters came
home, the henwife asked: "Have you any news from the church?"

"We have indeed," said they, "for we saw the grandest sight to-day. The
strange lady came again, in grander array than before. On herself and
the horse she rode were the finest colours of the world, and between
the ears of the horse was a bird which never stopped singing from the
time she came till she went away. The lady herself is the most
beautiful woman ever seen by man in Erin."

After Trembling had disappeared from the church, the son of the king of
Emania said to the other kings' sons: "I will have that lady for my
own."

They all said: "You didn't win her just by taking the shoe off her
foot; you'll have to win her by the point of the sword; you'll have to
fight for her with us before you can call her your own."

"Well," said the son of the king of Emania, "when I find the lady that
shoe will fit, I'll fight for her, never fear, before I leave her to
any of you."
Then all the kings' sons were uneasy, and anxious to know who was she
that lost the shoe; and they began to travel all over Erin to know
could they find her. The prince of Emania and all the others went in a
great company together, and made the round of Erin; they went
everywhere,--north, south, east, and west. They visited every place
where a woman was to be found, and left not a house in the kingdom they
did not search, to know could they find the woman the shoe would fit,
not caring whether she was rich or poor, of high or low degree.

The prince of Emania always kept the shoe; and when the young women saw
it, they had great hopes, for it was of proper size, neither large nor
small, and it would beat any man to know of what material it was made.
One thought it would fit her if she cut a little from her great toe;
and another, with too short a foot, put something in the tip of her
stocking. But no use; they only spoiled their feet, and were curing
them for months afterwards.

The two sisters, Fair and Brown, heard that the princes of the world
were looking all over Erin for the woman that could wear the shoe, and
every day they were talking of trying it on; and one day Trembling
spoke up and said: "Maybe it's my foot that the shoe will fit."

"Oh, the breaking of the dog's foot on you! Why say so when you were at
home every Sunday?"

They were that way waiting, and scolding the younger sister, till the
princes were near the place. The day they were to come, the sisters put
Trembling in a closet, and locked the door on her. When the company
came to the house, the prince of Emania gave the shoe to the sisters.
But though they tried and tried, it would fit neither of them.

"Is there any other young woman in the house?" asked the prince.

"There is," said Trembling, speaking up in the closet; "I'm here."

"Oh! we have her for nothing but to put out the ashes," said the
sisters.

But the prince and the others wouldn't leave the house till they had
seen her; so the two sisters had to open the door. When Trembling came
out, the shoe was given to her, and it fitted exactly.

The prince of Emania looked at her and said: "You are the woman the
shoe fits, and you are the woman I took the shoe from."

Then Trembling spoke up, and said: "Do you stay here till I return."

Then she went to the henwife's house. The old woman put on the cloak of
darkness, got everything for her she had the first Sunday at church,
and put her on the white mare in the same fashion. Then Trembling rode
along the highway to the front of the house. All who saw her the first
time said: "This is the lady we saw at church."

Then she went away a second time, and a second time came back on the
black mare in the second dress which the henwife gave her. All who saw
her the second Sunday said: "That is the lady we saw at church."

A third time she asked for a short absence, and soon came back on the
third mare and in the third dress. All who saw her the third time said:
"That is the lady we saw at church." Every man was satisfied, and knew
that she was the woman.

Then all the princes and great men spoke up, and said to the son of the
king of Emania: "You'll have to fight now for her before we let her go
with you."

"I'm here before you, ready for combat," answered the prince.

Then the son of the king of Lochlin stepped forth. The struggle began,
and a terrible struggle it was. They fought for nine hours; and then
the son of the king of Lochlin stopped, gave up his claim, and left the
field. Next day the son of the king of Spain fought six hours, and
yielded his claim. On the third day the son of the king of Nyerf�i
fought eight hours, and stopped. The fourth day the son of the king of
Greece fought six hours, and stopped. On the fifth day no more strange
princes wanted to fight; and all the sons of kings in Erin said they
would not fight with a man of their own land, that the strangers had
had their chance, and, as no others came to claim the woman, she
belonged of right to the son of the king of Emania.

The marriage-day was fixed, and the invitations were sent out. The
wedding lasted for a year and a day. When the wedding was over, the
king's son brought home the bride, and when the time came a son was
born. The young woman sent for her eldest sister, Fair, to be with her
and care for her. One day, when Trembling was well, and when her
husband was away hunting, the two sisters went out to walk; and when
they came to the seaside, the eldest pushed the youngest sister in. A
great whale came and swallowed her.

The eldest sister came home alone, and the husband asked, "Where is
your sister?"

"She has gone home to her father in Ballyshannon; now that I am well, I
don't need her."

"Well," said the husband, looking at her, "I'm in dread it's my wife
that has gone."

"Oh! no," said she; "it's my sister Fair that's gone."

Since the sisters were very much alike, the prince was in doubt. That
night he put his sword between them, and said: "If you are my wife,
this sword will get warm; if not, it will stay cold."

In the morning when he rose up, the sword was as cold as when he put it
there.

It happened, when the two sisters were walking by the seashore, that a
little cowboy was down by the water minding cattle, and saw Fair push
Trembling into the sea; and next day, when the tide came in, he saw the
whale swim up and throw her out on the sand. When she was on the sand
she said to the cowboy: "When you go home in the evening with the cows,
tell the master that my sister Fair pushed me into the sea yesterday;
that a whale swallowed me, and then threw me out, but will come again
and swallow me with the coming of the next tide; then he'll go out with
the tide, and come again with to-morrow's tide, and throw me again on
the strand. The whale will cast me out three times. I'm under the
enchantment of this whale, and cannot leave the beach or escape myself.
Unless my husband saves me before I'm swallowed the fourth time, I
shall be lost. He must come and shoot the whale with a silver bullet
when he turns on the broad of his back. Under the breast-fin of the
whale is a reddish-brown spot. My husband must hit him in that spot,
for it is the only place in which he can be killed."

When the cowboy got home, the eldest sister gave him a draught of
oblivion, and he did not tell.

Next day he went again to the sea. The whale came and cast Trembling on
shore again. She asked the boy "Did you tell the master what I told you
to tell him?"

"I did not," said he; "I forgot."

"How did you forget?" asked she.

"The woman of the house gave me a drink that made me forget."

"Well, don't forget telling him this night; and if she gives you a
drink, don't take it from her."

As soon as the cowboy came home, the eldest sister offered him a drink.
He refused to take it till he had delivered his message and told all to
the master. The third day the prince went down with his gun and a
silver bullet in it. He was not long down when the whale came and threw
Trembling upon the beach as the two days before. She had no power to
speak to her husband till he had killed the whale. Then the whale went
out, turned over once on the broad of his back, and showed the spot for
a moment only. That moment the prince fired. He had but the one chance,
and a short one at that; but he took it, and hit the spot, and the
whale, mad with pain, made the sea all around red with blood, and died.

That minute Trembling was able to speak, and went home with her
husband, who sent word to her father what the eldest sister had done.
The father came, and told him any death he chose to give her to give
it. The prince told the father he would leave her life and death with
himself. The father had her put out then on the sea in a barrel, with
provisions in it for seven years.

In time Trembling had a second child, a daughter. The prince and she
sent the cowboy to school, and trained him up as one of their own
children, and said: "If the little girl that is born to us now lives,
no other man in the world will get her but him."

The cowboy and the prince's daughter lived on till they were married.
The mother said to her husband "You could not have saved me from the
whale but for the little cowboy; on that account I don't grudge him my
daughter."

The son of the king of Emania and Trembling had fourteen children, and
they lived happily till the two died of old age.

JACK AND HIS MASTER

A poor woman had three sons. The eldest and second eldest were cunning
clever fellows, but they called the youngest Jack the Fool, because
they thought he was no better than a simpleton. The eldest got tired of
staying at home, and said he'd go look for service. He stayed away a
whole year, and then came back one day, dragging one foot after the
other, and a poor wizened face on him, and he as cross as two sticks.
When he was rested and got something to eat, he told them how he got
service with the Gray Churl of the Townland of Mischance, and that the
agreement was, whoever would first say he was sorry for his bargain,
should get an inch wide of the skin of his back, from shoulder to hips,
taken off. If it was the master, he should also pay double wages; if it
was the servant, he should get no wages at all. "But the thief," says
he, "gave me so little to eat, and kept me so hard at work, that flesh
and blood couldn't stand it; and when he asked me once, when I was in a
passion, if I was sorry for my bargain, I was mad enough to say I was,
and here I am disabled for life."

Vexed enough were the poor mother and brothers; and the second eldest
said on the spot he'd go and take service with the Gray Churl, and
punish him by all the annoyance he'd give him till he'd make him say he
was sorry for his agreement. "Oh, won't I be glad to see the skin
coming off the old villain's back!" said he. All they could say had no
effect: he started off for the Townland of Mischance, and in a
twelvemonth he was back just as miserable and helpless as his brother.

All the poor mother could say didn't prevent Jack the Fool from
starting to see if he was able to regulate the Gray Churl. He agreed
with him for a year for twenty pounds, and the terms were the same.

"Now, Jack," said the Gray Churl, "if you refuse to do anything you are
able to do, you must lose a month's wages."

"I'm satisfied," said Jack; "and if you stop me from doing a thing
after telling me to do it, you are to give me an additional month's
wages."

"I am satisfied," says the master.

"Or if you blame me for obeying your orders, you must give the same."

"I am satisfied," said the master again.

The first day that Jack served he was fed very poorly, and was worked
to the saddleskirts. Next day he came in just before the dinner was
sent up to the parlour. They were taking the goose off the spit, but
well becomes Jack he whips a knife off the dresser, and cuts off one
side of the breast, one leg and thigh, and one wing, and fell to. In
came the master, and began to abuse him for his assurance. "Oh, you
know, master, you're to feed me, and wherever the goose goes won't have
to be filled again till supper. Are you sorry for our agreement?"

The master was going to cry out he was, but he bethought himself in
time. "Oh no, not at all," said he.

"That's well," said Jack.

Next day Jack was to go clamp turf on the bog. They weren't sorry to
have him away from the kitchen at dinner time. He didn't find his
breakfast very heavy on his stomach; so he said to the mistress, "I
think, ma'am, it will be better for me to get my dinner now, and not
lose time coming home from the bog."

"That's true, Jack," said she. So she brought out a good cake, and a
print of butter, and a bottle of milk, thinking he'd take them away to
the bog. But Jack kept his seat, and never drew rein till bread,
butter, and milk went down the red lane.

"Now, mistress," said he, "I'll be earlier at my work to-morrow if I

sleep comfortably on the sheltery side of a pile of dry peat on dry
grass, and not be coming here and going back. So you may as well give
me my supper, and be done with the day's trouble." She gave him that,
thinking he'd take it to the bog; but he fell to on the spot, and did
not leave a scrap to tell tales on him; and the mistress was a little
astonished.

He called to speak to the master in the haggard, and said he, "What are
servants asked to do in this country after aten their supper?"

"Nothing at all, but to go to bed."

"Oh, very well, sir." He went up on the stable-loft, stripped, and lay
down, and some one that saw him told the master. He came up.

"Jack, you anointed scoundrel, what do you mean?" "To go to sleep,

master. The mistress, God bless her, is after giving me my breakfast,
dinner, and supper, and yourself told me that bed was the next thing.
Do you blame me, sir?"

"Yes, you rascal, I do."

"Hand me out one pound thirteen and fourpence, if you please, sir."

"One divel and thirteen imps, you tinker! what for?"

"Oh, I see, you've forgot your bargain. Are you sorry for it?"

"Oh, ya--no, I mean. I'll give you the money after your nap."

Next morning early, Jack asked how he'd be employed that day. "You are
to be holding the plough in that fallow, outside the paddock." The
master went over about nine o'clock to see what kind of a ploughman was
Jack, and what did he see but the little boy driving the bastes, and
the sock and coulter of the plough skimming along the sod, and Jack
pulling ding-dong again' the horses.

"What are you doing, you contrary thief?" said the master.

"An' ain't I strivin' to hold this divel of a plough, as you told me;
but that ounkrawn of a boy keeps whipping on the bastes in spite of all
I say; will you speak to him?"

"No, but I'll speak to you. Didn't you know, you bosthoon, that when I
said 'holding the plough,' I meant reddening the ground."

"Faith, an' if you did, I wish you had said so. Do you blame me for
what I have done?"

The master caught himself in time, but he was so stomached, he said

nothing.
"Go on and redden the ground now, you knave, as other ploughmen do."

"An' are you sorry for our agreement?"

"Oh, not at all, not at all!"

Jack, ploughed away like a good workman all the rest of the day.

In a day or two the master bade him go and mind the cows in a field
that had half of it under young corn. "Be sure, particularly," said he,
"to keep Browney from the wheat; while she's out of mischief there's no
fear of the rest."

About noon, he went to see how Jack was doing his duty, and what did he
find but Jack asleep with his face to the sod, Browney grazing near a
thorn-tree, one end of a long rope round her horns, and the other end
round the tree, and the rest of the beasts all trampling and eating the
green wheat. Down came the switch on Jack.

"Jack, you vagabone, do you see what the cows are at?"

"And do you blame, master?"

"To be sure, you lazy sluggard, I do?"

"Hand me out one pound thirteen and fourpence, master. You said if I
only kept Browney out of mischief, the rest would do no harm. There she
is as harmless as a lamb. Are you sorry for hiring me, master?"

"To be--that is, not at all. I'll give you your money when you go to
dinner. Now, understand me; don't let a cow go out of the field nor
into the wheat the rest of the day."

"Never fear, master!" and neither did he. But the churl would rather
than a great deal he had not hired him.

The next day three heifers were missing, and the master bade Jack go in
search of them.

"Where will I look for them?" said Jack.

"Oh, every place likely and unlikely for them all to be in."

The churl was getting very exact in his words. When he was coming into
the bawn at dinner-time, what work did he find Jack at but pulling
armfuls of the thatch off the roof, and peeping into the holes he was
making?

"What are you doing there, you rascal?"

"Sure, I'm looking for the heifers, poor things!"

"What would bring them there?"

"I don't think anything could bring them in it; but I looked first into
the likely places, that is, the cow-houses, and the pastures, and the
fields next 'em, and now I'm looking in the unlikeliest place I can
think of. Maybe it's not pleasing to you it is."
"And to be sure it isn't pleasing to me, you aggravating goose-cap!"

"Please, sir, hand me one pound thirteen and four pence before you sit
down to your dinner. I'm afraid it's sorrow that's on you for hiring me
at all."

"May the div--oh no; I'm not sorry. Will you begin, if you please, and
put in the thatch again, just as if you were doing it for your mother's
cabin?"

"Oh, faith I will, sir, with a heart and a half;" and by the time the
farmer came out from his dinner, Jack had the roof better than it was
before, for he made the boy give him new straw.

Says the master when he came out, "Go, Jack, and look for the heifers,
and bring them home."

"And where will I look for 'em?"

"Go and search for them as if they were your own." The heifers were all
in the paddock before sunset.

Next morning, says the master, "Jack, the path across the bog to the
pasture is very bad; the sheep does be sinking in it every step; go and
make the sheep's feet a good path." About an hour after he came to the
edge of the bog, and what did he find Jack at but sharpening a carving
knife, and the sheep standing or grazing round.

"Is this the way you are mending the path, Jack?" said he.

"Everything must have a beginning, master," said Jack, "and a thing

well begun is half done. I am sharpening the knife, and I'll have the
feet off every sheep in the flock while you'd be blessing yourself."

"Feet off my sheep, you anointed rogue! and what would you be taking
their feet off for?"

"An' sure to mend the path as you told me. Says you, 'Jack, make a path
with the foot of the sheep.'"

"Oh, you fool, I meant make good the path for the sheep's feet."

"It's a pity you didn't say so, master. Hand me out one pound thirteen
and fourpence if you don't like me to finish my job."

"Divel do you good with your one pound thirteen and fourpence!"

"It's better pray than curse, master. Maybe you're sorry for your
bargain?"

"And to be sure I am--not yet, any way."

The next night the master was going to a wedding; and says he to Jack,
before he set out: "I'll leave at midnight, and I wish you, to come and
be with me home, for fear I might be overtaken with the drink. If
you're there before, you may throw a sheep's eye at me, and I'll be
sure to see that they'll give you something for yourself."
About eleven o'clock, while the master was in great spirits, he felt
something clammy hit him on the cheek. It fell beside his tumbler, and
when he looked at it what was it but the eye of a sheep. Well, he
couldn't imagine who threw it at him, or why it was thrown at him.
After a little he got a blow on the other cheek, and still it was by
another sheep's eye. Well, he was very vexed, but he thought better to
say nothing. In two minutes more, when he was opening his mouth to take
a sup, another sheep's eye was slapped into it. He sputtered it out,
and cried, "Man o' the house, isn't it a great shame for you to have
any one in the room that would do such a nasty thing?"

"Master," says Jack, "don't blame the honest man. Sure it's only myself
that was thrown' them sheep's eyes at you, to remind you I was here,
and that I wanted to drink the bride and bridegroom's health. You know
yourself bade me."

"I know that you are a great rascal; and where did you get the eyes?"

"An' where would I get em' but in the heads of your own sheep? Would
you have me meddle with the bastes of any neighbour, who might put me
in the Stone Jug for it?"

"Sorrow on me that ever I had the bad luck to meet with you."

"You're all witness," said Jack, "that my master says he is sorry for
having met with me. My time is up. Master, hand me over double wages,
and come into the next room, and lay yourself out like a man that has
some decency in him, till I take a strip of skin an inch broad from
your shoulder to your hip."

Every one shouted out against that; but, says Jack, "You didn't hinder
him when he took the same strips from the backs of my two brothers, and
sent them home in that state, and penniless, to their poor mother."

When the company heard the rights of the business, they were only too
eager to see the job done. The master bawled and roared, but there was
no help at hand. He was stripped to his hips, and laid on the floor in
the next room, and Jack had the carving knife in his hand ready to
begin.

"Now you cruel old villain," said he, giving the knife a couple of
scrapes along the floor, "I'll make you an offer. Give me, along with
my double wages, two hundred guineas to support my poor brothers, and
I'll do without the strap."

"No!" said he, "I'd let you skin me from head to foot first."

"Here goes then," said Jack with a grin, but the first little scar he
gave, Churl roared out, "Stop your hand; I'll give the money."

"Now, neighbours," said Jack, "you mustn't think worse of me than I

deserve. I wouldn't have the heart to take an eye out of a rat itself;
I got half a dozen of them from the butcher, and only used three of
them."

So all came again into the other room, and Jack was made sit down, and
everybody drank his health, and he drank everybody's health at one
offer. And six stout fellows saw himself and the master home, and
waited in the parlour while he went up and brought down the two hundred
guineas, and double wages for Jack himself. When he got home, he
brought the summer along with him to the poor mother and the disabled
brothers; and he was no more Jack the Fool in the people's mouths, but
"Skin Churl Jack."

BETH GELLERT

Print Llewelyn had a favourite greyhound named Gellert that had been
given to him by his father-in-law, King John. He was as gentle as a
lamb at home but a lion in the chase. One day Llewelyn went to the
chase and blew his horn in front of his castle. All his other dogs came
to the call but Gellert never answered it. So he blew a louder blast on
his horn and called Gellert by name, but still the greyhound did not
come. At last Prince Llewelyn could wait no longer and went off to the
hunt without Gellert. He had little sport that day because Gellert was
not there, the swiftest and boldest of his hounds.

He turned back in a rage to his castle, and as he came to the gate,

who should he see but Gellert come bounding out to meet him. But when
the hound came near him, the Prince was startled to see that his lips
and fangs were dripping with blood. Llewelyn started back and the
greyhound crouched down at his feet as if surprised or afraid at the
way his master greeted him.

Now Prince Llewelyn had a little son a year old with whom Gellert used
to play, and a terrible thought crossed the Prince's mind that made him
rush towards the child's nursery. And the nearer he came the more blood
and disorder he found about the rooms. He rushed into it and found the
child's cradle overturned and daubed with blood.

Prince Llewelyn grew more and more terrified, and sought for his little
son everywhere. He could find him nowhere but only signs of some
terrible conflict in which much blood had been shed. At last he felt
sure the dog had destroyed his child, and shouting to Gellert,
"Monster, thou hast devoured my child," he drew out his sword and
plunged it in the greyhound's side, who fell with a deep yell and still
gazing in his master's eyes.

As Gellert raised his dying yell, a little child's cry answered it from
beneath the cradle, and there Llewelyn found his child unharmed and
just awakened from sleep. But just beside him lay the body of a great
gaunt wolf all torn to pieces and covered with blood. Too late,
Llewelyn learned what had happened while he was away. Gellert had
stayed behind to guard the child and had fought and slain the wolf that
had tried to destroy Llewelyn's heir.

In vain was all Llewelyn's grief; he could not bring his faithful dog
to life again. So he buried him outside the castle walls within sight
of the great mountain of Snowdon, where every passer-by might see his
grave, and raised over it a great cairn of stones. And to this day the
place is called Beth Gellert, or the Grave of Gellert.

THE TALE OF IVAN

There were formerly a man and a woman living in the parish of
Llanlavan, in the place which is called Hwrdh. And work became scarce,
so the man said to his wife, "I will go search for work, and you may
live here." So he took fair leave, and travelled far toward the East,
and at last came to the house of a farmer and asked for work.

"What work can ye do?" said the farmer. "I can do all kinds of work,"
said Ivan. Then they agreed upon three pounds for the year's wages.

When the end of the year came his master showed him the three pounds.
"See, Ivan," said he, "here's your wage; but if you will give it me
back I'll give you a piece of advice instead."

"Give me my wage," said Ivan.

"No, I'll not," said the master; "I'll explain my advice."

"Tell it me, then," said Ivan.

Then said the master, "Never leave the old road for the sake of a new
one."

After that they agreed for another year at the old wages, and at the
end of it Ivan took instead a piece of advice, and this was it: "Never
lodge where an old man is married to a young woman."

The same thing happened at the end of the third year, when the piece of
advice was: "Honesty is the best policy."

But Ivan would not stay longer, but wanted to go back to his wife.

"Don't go to-day," said his master; "my wife bakes to-morrow, and she
shall make thee a cake to take home to thy good woman."

And when Ivan was going to leave, "Here," said his master, "here is a
cake for thee to take home to thy wife, and, when ye are most joyous
together, then break the cake, and not sooner."

So he took fair leave of them and travelled towards home, and at last
he came to Wayn Her, and there he met three merchants from Tre Rhyn, of
his own parish, coming home from Exeter Fair. "Oho! Ivan," said they,
"come with us; glad are we to see you. Where have you been so long?"

"I have been in service," said Ivan, "and now I'm going home to my
wife."

"Oh, come with us! you'll be right welcome." But when they took the new
road Ivan kept to the old one. And robbers fell upon them before they
had gone far from Ivan as they were going by the fields of the houses
in the meadow. They began to cry out, "Thieves!" and Ivan shouted out
"Thieves!" too. And when the robbers heard Ivan's shout they ran away,
and the merchants went by the new road and Ivan by the old one till
they met again at Market-Jew.

"Oh, Ivan," said the merchants, "we are beholding to you; but for you
we would have been lost men. Come lodge with us at our cost, and
welcome."
When they came to the place where they used to lodge, Ivan said, "I
must see the host."

"The host," they cried; "what do you want with the host? Here is the
hostess, and she's young and pretty. If you want to see the host you'll
find him in the kitchen."

So he went into the kitchen to see the host; he found him a weak old
man turning the spit.

"Oh! oh!" quoth Ivan, "I'll not lodge here, but will go next door."

"Not yet," said the merchants, "sup with us, and welcome."

Now it happened that the hostess had plotted with a certain monk in
Market-Jew to murder the old man in his bed that night while the rest
were asleep, and they agreed to lay it on the lodgers.

So while Ivan was in bed next door, there was a hole in the pine-end of
the house, and he saw a light through it. So he got up and looked, and
heard the monk speaking. "I had better cover this hole," said he, "or
people in the next house may see our deeds." So he stood with his back
against it while the hostess killed the old man.

But meanwhile Ivan out with his knife, and putting it through the hole,
cut a round piece off the monk's robe. The very next morning the
hostess raised the cry that her husband was murdered, and as there was
neither man nor child in the house but the merchants, she declared they
ought to be hanged for it.

So they were taken and carried to prison, till a last Ivan came to
them. "Alas! alas! Ivan," cried they, "bad luck sticks to us; our host
was killed last night, and we shall be hanged for it."

"Ah, tell the justices," said Ivan, "to summon the real murderers."

"Who knows," they replied, "who committed the crime?"

"Who committed the crime!" said Ivan. "If I cannot prove who committed
the crime, hang me in your stead."

So he told all he knew, and brought out the piece of cloth from the
monk's robe, and with that the merchants were set at liberty, and the
hostess and the monk were seized and hanged.

Then they came all together out of Market-Jew, and they said to him:
"Come as far as Coed Carrn y Wylfa, the Wood of the Heap of Stones of
Watching, in the parish of Burman." Then their two roads separated, and
though the merchants wished Ivan to go with them, he would not go with
them, but went straight home to his wife.

And when his wife saw him she said: "Home in the nick of time. Here's a
purse of gold that I've found; it has no name, but sure it belongs to
the great lord yonder. I was just thinking what to do when you came."

Then Ivan thought of the third counsel, and he said "Let us go and give
it to the great lord."

So they went up to the castle, but the great lord was not in it, so
they left the purse with the servant that minded the gate, and then
they went home again and lived in quiet for a time.

But one day the great lord stopped at their house for a drink of water,
and Ivan's wife said to him: "I hope your lordship found your
lordship's purse quite safe with all its money in it."

"What purse is that you are talking about?" said the lord.

"Sure, it's your lordship's purse that I left at the castle," said Ivan.

"Come with me and we will see into the matter," said the lord.

So Ivan and his wife went up to the castle, and there they pointed out
the man to whom they had given the purse, and he had to give it up and
was sent away from the castle. And the lord was so pleased with Ivan
that he made him his servant in the stead of the thief.

"Honesty's the best policy!" quoth Ivan, as he skipped about in his new
quarters. "How joyful I am!"

Then he thought of his old master's cake that he was to eat when he was
most joyful, and when he broke it, to and behold, inside it was his
wages for the three years he had been with him.

ANDREW COFFEY

My grandfather, Andrew Coffey, was known to the whole barony as a

quiet, decent man. And if the whole barony knew him, he knew the whole
barony, every inch, hill and dale, bog and pasture, field and covert.
Fancy his surprise one evening, when he found himself in a part of the
demesne he couldn't recognise a bit. He and his good horse were always
stumbling up against some tree or stumbling down into some bog-hole
that by rights didn't ought to be there. On the top of all this the
rain came pelting down wherever there was a clearing, and the cold
March wind tore through the trees. Glad he was then when he saw a light
in the distance, and drawing near found a cabin, though for the life of
him he couldn't think how it came there. However, in he walked, after
tying up his horse, and right welcome was the brushwood fire blazing on
the hearth. And there stood a chair right and tight, that seemed to
say, "Come, sit down in me." There wasn't a soul else in the room.
Well, he did sit, and got a little warm and cheered after his
drenching. But all the while he was wondering and wondering.

"Andrew Coffey! Andrew Coffey!"

Good heavens! who was calling him, and not a soul in sight? Look around
as he might, indoors and out, he could find no creature with two legs
or four, for his horse was gone.

"ANDREW COFFEY! ANDREW COFFEY! tell me a story."

It was louder this time, and it was nearer. And then what a thing to
ask for! It was bad enough not to be let sit by the fire and dry
oneself, without being bothered for a story.
"ANDREW COFFEY! ANDREW COFFEY!! Tell me a story, or it'll be the worse
for you."

My poor grandfather was so dumbfounded that he could only stand and

stare.

"ANDREW COFFEY! ANDREW COFFEY! I told you it'd be the worse for you."

And with that, out there bounced, from a cupboard that Andrew Coffey
had never noticed before, _a man_. And the man was in a towering rage.
But it wasn't that. And he carried as fine a blackthorn as you'd wish
to crack a man's head with. But it wasn't that either. But when my
grandfather clapped eyes on him, he knew him for Patrick Rooney, and
all the world knew _he'd_ gone overboard, fishing one night long years
before.

Andrew Coffey would neither stop nor stay, but he took to his heels and
was out of the house as hard as he could. He ran and he ran taking
little thought of what was before till at last he ran up against a big
tree. And then he sat down to rest.

He hadn't sat for a moment when he heard voices.

"It's heavy he is, the vagabond." "Steady now, we'll rest when we get
under the big tree yonder." Now that happened to be the tree under
which Andrew Coffey was sitting. At least he thought so, for seeing a
branch handy he swung himself up by it and was soon snugly hidden away.
Better see than be seen, thought he.

The rain had stopped and the wind fallen. The night was blacker than
ever, but Andrew Coffey could see four men, and they were carrying
between them a long box. Under the tree they came, set the box down,
opened it, and who should they bring out but--Patrick Rooney. Never a
word did he say, and he looked as pale as old snow.

Well, one gathered brushwood, and another took out tinder and flint,
and soon they had a big fire roaring, and my grandfather could see
Patrick plainly enough. If he had kept still before, he kept stiller
now. Soon they had four poles up and a pole across, right over the
fire, for all the world like a spit, and on to the pole they slung
Patrick Rooney.

"He'll do well enough," said one; "but who's to mind him whilst we're
away, who'll turn the fire, who'll see that he doesn't burn?"

With that Patrick opened his lips: "Andrew Coffey," said he.

"Andrew Coffey! Andrew Coffey! Andrew Coffey! Andrew Coffey!"

"I'm much obliged to you, gentlemen," said Andrew Coffey, "but indeed I
know nothing about the business."

"You'd better come down, Andrew Coffey," said Patrick.

It was the second time he spoke, and Andrew Coffey decided he would
come down. The four men went off and he was left all alone with Patrick.

Then he sat and he kept the fire even, and he kept the spit turning,
and all the while Patrick looked at him.
Poor Andrew Coffey couldn't make it all out at all, at all, and he
stared at Patrick and at the fire, and he thought of the little house
in the wood, till he felt quite dazed.

"Ah, but it's burning me ye are!" says Patrick, very short and sharp.

"I'm sure I beg your pardon," said my grandfather "but might I ask you
a question?"

"If you want a crooked answer," said Patrick; "turn away or it'll be
the worse for you."

But my grandfather couldn't get it out of his head; hadn't everybody,

far and near, said Patrick had fallen overboard. There was enough to
think about, and my grandfather did think.

"ANDREW COFFEY! ANDREW COFFEY! IT'S BURNING ME YE ARE."

Sorry enough my grandfather was, and he vowed he wouldn't do so again.

"You'd better not," said Patrick, and he gave him a cock of his eye,
and a grin of his teeth, that just sent a shiver down Andrew Coffey's
back. Well it was odd, that here he should be in a thick wood he had
never set eyes upon, turning Patrick Rooney upon a spit. You can't
wonder at my grandfather thinking and thinking and not minding the fire.

"ANDREW COFFEY, ANDREW COFFEY, IT'S THE DEATH OF YOU I'LL BE."

And with that what did my grandfather see, but Patrick unslinging
himself from the spit and his eyes glared and his teeth glistened.

It was neither stop nor stay my grandfather made, but out he ran into
the night of the wood. It seemed to him there wasn't a stone but was
for his stumbling, not a branch but beat his face, not a bramble but
tore his skin. And wherever it was clear the rain pelted down and the
cold March wind howled along.

Glad he was to see a light, and a minute after he was kneeling, dazed,
drenched, and bedraggled by the hearth side. The brushwood flamed, and
the brushwood crackled, and soon my grandfather began to feel a little
warm and dry and easy in his mind.

"ANDREW COFFEY! ANDREW COFFEY!"

It's hard for a man to jump when he has been through all my grandfather
had, but jump he did. And when he looked around, where should he find
himself but in the very cabin he had first met Patrick in.

"Andrew Coffey, Andrew Coffey, tell me a story."

"Is it a story you want?" said my grandfather as bold as may be, for he
was just tired of being frightened. "Well if you can tell me the rights
of this one, I'll be thankful."

And he told the tale of what had befallen him from first to last that
night. The tale was long, and may be Andrew Coffey was weary. It's
asleep he must have fallen, for when he awoke he lay on the hill-side
under the open heavens, and his horse grazed at his side.
THE BATTLE OF THE BIRDS

I will tell you a story about the wren. There was once a farmer who was
seeking a servant, and the wren met him and said: "What are you
seeking?"

"I am seeking a servant," said the farmer to the wren.

"Will you take me?" said the wren.

"You, you poor creature, what good would you do?"

"Try me," said the wren.

So he engaged him, and the first work he set him to do was threshing in
the barn. The wren threshed (what did he thresh with? Why a flail to be
sure), and he knocked off one grain. A mouse came out and she eats that.

"I'll trouble you not to do that again," said the wren.

He struck again, and he struck off two grains. Out came the mouse and
she eats them. So they arranged a contest to see who was strongest, and
the wren brings his twelve birds, and the mouse her tribe.

"You have your tribe with you," said the wren.

"As well as yourself," said the mouse, and she struck out her leg
proudly. But the wren broke it with his flail, and there was a pitched
battle on a set day.

When every creature and bird was gathering to battle, the son of the
king of Tethertown said that he would go to see the battle, and that he
would bring sure word home to his father the king, who would be king of
the creatures this year. The battle was over before he arrived all but
one fight, between a great black raven and a snake. The snake was
twined about the raven's neck, and the raven held the snake's throat in
his beak, and it seemed as if the snake would get the victory over the
raven. When the king's son saw this he helped the raven, and with one
blow takes the head off the snake. When the raven had taken breath, and
saw that the snake was dead, he said, "For thy kindness to me this day,
I will give thee a sight. Come up now on the root of my two wings." The
king's son put his hands about the raven before his wings, and, before
he stopped, he took him over nine Bens, and nine Glens, and nine
Mountain Moors.

"Now," said the raven, "see you that house yonder? Go now to it. It is
a sister of mine that makes her dwelling in it; and I will go bail that
you are welcome. And if she asks you, Were you at the battle of the
birds? say you were. And if she asks, 'Did you see any one like me,'
say you did, but be sure that you meet me to-morrow morning here, in
this place." The king's son got good and right good treatment that
night. Meat of each meat, drink of each drink, warm water to his feet,
and a soft bed for his limbs.

On the next day the raven gave him the same sight over six Bens, and
six Glens, and six Mountain Moors. They saw a bothy far off, but,
though far off, they were soon there. He got good treatment this night,
as before--plenty of meat and drink, and warm water to his feet, and a
soft bed to his limbs--and on the next day it was the same thing, over
three Bens and three Glens, and three Mountain Moors.

On the third morning, instead of seeing the raven as at the other

times, who should meet him but the handsomest lad he ever saw, with
gold rings in his hair, with a bundle in his hand. The king's son asked
this lad if he had seen a big black raven.

Said the lad to him, "You will never see the raven again, for I am that
raven. I was put under spells by a bad druid; it was meeting you that
loosed me, and for that you shall get this bundle. Now," said the lad,
"you must turn back on the self-same steps, and lie a night in each
house as before; but you must not loose the bundle which I gave ye,
till in the place where you would most wish to dwell."

The king's son turned his back to the lad, and his face to his father's
house; and he got lodging from the raven's sisters, just as he got it
when going forward. When he was nearing his father's house he was going
through a close wood. It seemed to him that the bundle was growing
heavy, and he thought he would look what was in it.

When he loosed the bundle he was astonished. In a twinkling he sees the

very grandest place he ever saw. A great castle, and an orchard about
the castle, in which was every kind of fruit and herb. He stood full of
wonder and regret for having loosed the bundle--for it was not in his
power to put it back again--and he would have wished this pretty place
to be in the pretty little green hollow that was opposite his father's
house; but he looked up and saw a great giant coming towards him.

"Bad's the place where you have built the house, king's son," says the
giant.

"Yes, but it is not here I would wish it to be, though it happens to be

here by mishap," says the king's son.

"What's the reward for putting it back in the bundle as it was before?"

"What's the reward you would ask?" says the king's son.

"That you will give me the first son you have when he is seven years of
age," says the giant.

"If I have a son you shall have him," said the king's son.

In a twinkling the giant put each garden, and orchard, and castle in
the bundle as they were before.

"Now," says the giant, "take your own road, and I will take mine; but
mind your promise, and if you forget I will remember."

The king's son took to the road, and at the end of a few days he
reached the place he was fondest of. He loosed the bundle, and the
castle was just as it was before. And when he opened the castle door he
sees the handsomest maiden he ever cast eye upon.

"Advance, king's son," said the pretty maid; "everything is in order

for you, if you will marry me this very day."

"It's I that am willing," said the king's son. And on the same day they
married.

But at the end of a day and seven years, who should be seen coming to
the castle but the giant. The king's son was reminded of his promise to
the giant, and till now he had not told his promise to the queen.

"Leave the matter between me and the giant," says the queen.

"Turn out your son," says the giant; "mind your promise."

"You shall have him," says the king, "when his mother puts him in order
for his journey."

The queen dressed up the cook's son, and she gave him to the giant by
the hand. The giant went away with him; but he had not gone far when he
put a rod in the hand of the little laddie. The giant asked him--

"If thy father had that rod what would he do with it?"

"If my father had that rod he would beat the dogs and the cats, so that
they shouldn't be going near the king's meat," said the little laddie.

"Thou'rt the cook's son," said the giant. He catches him by the two
small ankles and knocks him against the stone that was beside him. The
giant turned back to the castle in rage and madness, and he said that
if they did not send out the king's son to him, the highest stone of
the castle would be the lowest.

Said the queen to the king, "We'll try it yet; the butler's son is of
the same age as our son."

She dressed up the butler's son, and she gives him to the giant by the
hand. The giant had not gone far when he put the rod in his hand.

"If thy father had that rod," says the giant, "what would he do with
it?"

"He would beat the dogs and the cats when they would be coming near the
king's bottles and glasses."

"Thou art the son of the butler," says the giant and dashed his brains
out too. The giant returned in a very great rage and anger. The earth
shook under the sole of his feet, and the castle shook and all that was
in it.

"OUT HERE WITH THY SON," says the giant, "or in a twinkling the stone
that is highest in the dwelling will be the lowest." So they had to
give the king's son to the giant.

When they were gone a little bit from the earth, the giant showed him
the rod that was in his hand and said: "What would thy father do with
this rod if he had it?"

The king's son said: "My father has a braver rod than that."

And the giant asked him, "Where is thy father when he has that brave
rod?"

And the king's son said: "He will be sitting in his kingly chair."

Then the giant understood that he had the right one.

The giant took him to his own house, and he reared him as his own son.
On a day of days when the giant was from home, the lad heard the
sweetest music he ever heard in a room at the top of the giant's house.
At a glance he saw the finest face he had ever seen. She beckoned to
him to come a bit nearer to her, and she said her name was Auburn Mary
but she told him to go this time, but to be sure to be at the same
place about that dead midnight.

And as he promised he did. The giant's daughter was at his side in a

twinkling, and she said, "To-morrow you will get the choice of my two
sisters to marry; but say that you will not take either, but me. My
father wants me to marry the son of the king of the Green City, but I
don't like him." On the morrow the giant took out his three daughters,
and he said:

"Now, son of the king of Tethertown, thou hast not lost by living with
me so long. Thou wilt get to wife one of the two eldest of my
daughters, and with her leave to go home with her the day after the
wedding."

"If you will give me this pretty little one," says the king's son, "I
will take you at your word."

The giant's wrath kindled, and he said: "Before thou gett'st her thou
must do the three things that I ask thee to do."

"Say on," says the king's son.

The giant took him to the byre.

"Now," says the giant, "a hundred cattle are stabled here, and it has
not been cleansed for seven years. I am going from home to-day, and if
this byre is not cleaned before night comes, so clean that a golden
apple will run from end to end of it, not only thou shalt not get my
daughter, but 'tis only a drink of thy fresh, goodly, beautiful blood
that will quench my thirst this night."

He begins cleaning the byre, but he might just as well to keep baling
the great ocean. After midday when sweat was blinding him, the giant's
youngest daughter came where he was, and she said to him:

"You are being punished, king's son."

"I am that," says the king's son.

"Come over," says Auburn Mary, "and lay down your weariness."

"I will do that," says he, "there is but death awaiting me, at any
rate." He sat down near her. He was so tired that he fell asleep beside
her. When he awoke, the giant's daughter was not to be seen, but the
byre was so well cleaned that a golden apple would run from end to end
of it and raise no stain. In comes the giant, and he said:
"Hast thou cleaned the byre, king's son?"

"I have cleaned it," says he.

"Somebody cleaned it," says the giant.

"You did not clean it, at all events," said the king's son.

"Well, well!" says the giant, "since thou wert so active to-day, thou
wilt get to this time to-morrow to thatch this byre with birds' down,
from birds with no two feathers of one colour."

The king's son was on foot before the sun; he caught up his bow and his
quiver of arrows to kill the birds. He took to the moors, but if he
did, the birds were not so easy to take. He was running after them till
the sweat was blinding him. About mid-day who should come but Auburn
Mary.

"You are exhausting yourself, king's son," says she.

"I am," said he.

"There fell but these two blackbirds, and both of one colour."

"Come over and lay down your weariness on this pretty hillock," says
the giant's daughter.

"It's I am willing," said he.

He thought she would aid him this time, too, and he sat down near her,
and he was not long there till he fell asleep.

When he awoke, Auburn Mary was gone. He thought he would go back to the
house, and he sees the byre thatched with feathers. When the giant came
home, he said:

"Hast thou thatched the byre, king's son?"

"I thatched it," says he.

"Somebody thatched it," says the giant.

"You did not thatch it," says the king's son.

"Yes, yes!" says the giant. "Now," says the giant, "there is a fir tree
beside that loch down there, and there is a magpie's nest in its top.
The eggs thou wilt find in the nest. I must have them for my first
meal. Not one must be burst or broken, and there are five in the nest."

Early in the morning the king's son went where the tree was, and that
tree was not hard to hit upon. Its match was not in the whole wood.
From the foot to the first branch was five hundred feet. The king's son
was going all round the tree. She came who was always bringing help to
him.

"You are losing the skin of your hands and feet."

"Ach! I am," says he. "I am no sooner up than down."

"This is no time for stopping," says the giant's daughter. "Now you
must kill me, strip the flesh from my bones, take all those bones
apart, and use them as steps for climbing the tree. When you are
climbing the tree, they will stick to the glass as if they had grown
out of it; but when you are coming down, and have put your foot on each
one, they will drop into your hand when you touch them. Be sure and
stand on each bone, leave none untouched; if you do, it will stay
behind. Put all my flesh into this clean cloth by the side of the
spring at the roots of the tree. When you come to the earth, arrange my
bones together, put the flesh over them, sprinkle it with water from
the spring, and I shall be alive before you. But don't forget a bone of
me on the tree."

"How could I kill you," asked the king's son, "after what you have done
for me?"

"If you won't obey, you and I are done for," said Auburn Mary. "You
must climb the tree, or we are lost; and to climb the tree you must do
as I say." The king's son obeyed. He killed Auburn Mary, cut the flesh
from her body, and unjointed the bones, as she had told him.

As he went up, the king's son put the bones of Auburn Mary's body
against the side of the tree, using them as steps, till he came under
the nest and stood on the last bone.

Then he took the eggs, and coming down, put his foot on every bone,
then took it with him, till he came to the last bone, which was so near
the ground that he failed to touch it with his foot.

He now placed all the bones of Auburn Mary in order again at the side
of the spring, put the flesh on them, sprinkled it with water from the
spring. She rose up before him, and said: "Didn't I tell you not to
leave a bone of my body without stepping on it? Now I am lame for life!
You left my little finger on the tree without touching it, and I have
but nine fingers."

"Now," says she, "go home with the eggs quickly, and you will get me to
marry to-night if you can know me. I and my two sisters will be arrayed
in the same garments, and made like each other, but look at me when my
father says, 'Go to thy wife, king's son;' and you will see a hand
without a little finger."

He gave the eggs to the giant.

"Yes, yes!" says the giant, "be making ready for your marriage."

Then, indeed, there was a wedding, and it _was_ a wedding! Giants and
gentlemen, and the son of the king of the Green City was in the midst
of them. They were married, and the dancing began, that was a dance!
The giant's house was shaking from top to bottom.

But bed time came, and the giant said, "It is time for thee to go to
rest, son of the king of Tethertown; choose thy bride to take with thee
from amidst those."

She put out the hand off which the little finger was, and he caught her
by the hand.

"Thou hast aimed well this time too; but there is no knowing but we may
meet thee another way," said the giant.

But to rest they went. "Now," says she, "sleep not, or else you are a
dead man. We must fly quick, quick, or for certain my father will kill
you."

Out they went, and on the blue grey filly in the stable they mounted.
"Stop a while," says she, "and I will play a trick to the old hero."
She jumped in, and cut an apple into nine shares, and she put two
shares at the head of the bed, and two shares at the foot of the bed,
and two shares at the door of the kitchen, and two shares at the big
door, and one outside the house.

The giant awoke and called, "Are you asleep?"

"Not yet," said the apple that was at the head of the bed.

At the end of a while he called again.

"Not yet," said the apple that was at the foot of the bed.

A while after this he called again: "Are your asleep?"

"Not yet," said the apple at the kitchen door.

The giant called again.

The apple that was at the big door answered.

"You are now going far from me," says the giant.

"Not yet," says the apple that was outside the house.

"You are flying," says the giant. The giant jumped on his feet, and to
the bed he went, but it was cold--empty.

"My own daughter's tricks are trying me," said the giant. "Here's after
them," says he.

At the mouth of day, the giant's daughter said that her father's breath
was burning her back.

"Put your hand, quick," said she, "in the ear of the grey filly, and
whatever you find in it, throw it behind us."

"There is a twig of sloe tree," said he.

"Throw it behind us," said she.

No sooner did he that, than there were twenty miles of blackthorn wood,
so thick that scarce a weasel could go through it.

The giant came headlong, and there he is fleecing his head and neck in
the thorns.

"My own daughter's tricks are here as before," said the giant; "but if
I had my own big axe and wood knife here, I would not be long making a
way through this."
He went home for the big axe and the wood knife, and sure he was not
long on his journey, and he was the boy behind the big axe. He was not
long making a way through the blackthorn.

"I will leave the axe and the wood knife here till I return," says he.

"If you leave 'em, leave 'em," said a hoodie that was in a tree, "we'll
steal 'em, steal 'em."

"If you will do that," says the giant, "I must take them home." He
returned home and left them at the house.

At the heat of day the giant's daughter felt her father's breath
burning her back.

"Put your finger in the filly's ear, and throw behind whatever you find
in it."

He got a splinter of grey stone, and in a twinkling there were twenty

miles, by breadth and height, of great grey rock behind them.

The giant came full pelt, but past the rock he could not go.

"The tricks of my own daughter are the hardest things that ever met
me," says the giant; "but if I had my lever and my mighty mattock, I
would not be long in making my way through this rock also."

There was no help for it, but to turn the chase for them; and he was
the boy to split the stones. He was not long in making a road through
the rock.

"I will leave the tools here, and I will return no more."

"If you leave 'em, leave 'em," says the hoodie, "we will steal 'em,
steal 'em."

"Do that if you will; there is no time to go back."

At the time of breaking the watch, the giant's daughter said that she
felt her father's breath burning her back.

"Look in the filly's ear, king's son, or else we are lost."

He did so, and it was a bladder of water that was in her ear this time.
He threw it behind him and there was a fresh-water loch, twenty miles
in length and breadth, behind them.

The giant came on, but with the speed he had on him, he was in the
middle of the loch, and he went under, and he rose no more.

On the next day the young companions were come in sight of his father's
house. "Now," says she, "my father is drowned, and he won't trouble us
any more; but before we go further," says she, "go you to your father's
house, and tell that you have the likes of me; but let neither man nor
creature kiss you, for if you do, you will not remember that you have
ever seen me."

Every one he met gave him welcome and luck, and he charged his father
and mother not to kiss him; but as mishap was to be, an old greyhound
was indoors, and she knew him, and jumped up to his mouth, and after
that he did not remember the giant's daughter.

She was sitting at the well's side as he left her, but the king's son
was not coming. In the mouth of night she climbed up into a tree of oak
that was beside the well, and she lay in the fork of that tree all
night. A shoemaker had a house near the well, and about mid-day on the
morrow, the shoemaker asked his wife to go for a drink for him out of
the well. When the shoemaker's wife reached the well, and when she saw
the shadow of her that was in the tree, thinking it was her own
shadow--and she never thought till now that she was so handsome--she
gave a cast to the dish that was in her hand, and it was broken on the
ground, and she took herself to the house without vessel or water.

"Where is the water, wife?" said the shoemaker.

"You shambling, contemptible old carle, without grace, I have stayed

too long your water and wood thrall."

"I think, wife, that you have turned crazy. Go you, daughter, quickly,
and fetch a drink for your father."

His daughter went, and in the same way so it happened to her. She never
thought till now that she was so lovable, and she took herself home.

"Up with the drink," said her father.

"You home-spun shoe carle, do you think I am fit to be your thrall?"

The poor shoemaker thought that they had taken a turn in their
understandings, and he went himself to the well. He saw the shadow of
the maiden in the well, and he looked up to the tree, and he sees the
finest woman he ever saw.

"Your seat is wavering, but your face is fair," said the shoemaker.
"Come down, for there is need of you for a short while at my house."

The shoemaker understood that this was the shadow that had driven his
people mad. The shoemaker took her to his house, and he said that he
had but a poor bothy, but that she should get a share of all that was
in it.

One day, the shoemaker had shoes ready, for on that very day the king's
son was to be married. The shoemaker was going to the castle with the
shoes of the young people, and the girl said to the shoemaker, "I would
like to get a sight of the king's son before he marries."

"Come with me," says the shoemaker, "I am well acquainted with the
servants at the castle, and you shall get a sight of the king's son and
all the company."

And when the gentles saw the pretty woman that was here they took her
to the wedding-room, and they filled for her a glass of wine. When she
was going to drink what is in it, a flame went up out of the glass, and
a golden pigeon and a silver pigeon sprang out of it. They were flying
about when three grains of barley fell on the floor. The silver pigeon
sprung, and ate that up.

Said the golden pigeon to him, "If you remembered when I cleared the
byre, you would not eat that without giving me a share."

Again there fell three other grains of barley, and the silver pigeon
sprung, and ate that up as before.

"If you remembered when I thatched the byre, you would not eat that
without giving me my share," says the golden pigeon.

Three other grains fall, and the silver pigeon sprung, and ate that up.

"If you remembered when I harried the magpie's nest, you would not eat
that without giving me my share," says the golden pigeon; "I lost my
little finger bringing it down, and I want it still."

The king's son minded, and he knew who it was that was before him.

"Well," said the king's son to the guests at the feast, "when I was a
little younger than I am now, I lost the key of a casket that I had. I
had a new key made, but after it was brought to me I found the old one.
Now, I'll leave it to any one here to tell me what I am to do. Which of
the keys should I keep?"

"My advice to you," said one of the guests, "is to keep the old key,
for it fits the lock better and you're more used to it."

Then the king's son stood up and said: "I thank you for a wise advice
and an honest word. This is my bride the daughter of the giant who
saved my life at the risk of her own. I'll have her and no other woman."

So the king's son married Auburn Mary and the wedding lasted long and
all were happy. But all I got was butter on a live coal, porridge in a
basket, and they sent me for water to the stream, and the paper shoes
came to an end.

BREWERY OF EGGSHELLS

In Treneglwys there is a certain shepherd's cot known by the name of

Twt y Cymrws because of the strange strife that occurred there. There
once lived there a man and his wife, and they had twins whom the woman
nursed tenderly. One day she was called away to the house of a
neighbour at some distance. She did not much like going and leaving her
little ones all alone in a solitary house, especially as she had heard
tell of the good folk haunting the neighbourhood.

Well, she went and came back as soon as she could, but on her way back
she was frightened to see some old elves of the blue petticoat crossing
her path though it was midday. She rushed home, but found her two
little ones in the cradle and everything seemed as it was before.

But after a time the good people began to suspect that something was
wrong, for the twins didn't grow at all.

The man said: "They're not ours."

The woman said: "Whose else should they be?"

And so arose the great strife so that the neighbours named the cottage
after it. It made the woman very sad, so one evening she made up her
mind to go and see the Wise Man of Llanidloes, for he knew everything
and would advise her what to do.

So she went to Llanidloes and told the case to the Wise Man. Now there
was soon to be a harvest of rye and oats, so the Wise Man said to her,
"When you are getting dinner for the reapers, clear out the shell of a
hen's egg and boil some potage in it, and then take it to the door as
if you meant it as a dinner for the reapers. Then listen if the twins
say anything. If you hear them speaking of things beyond the
understanding of children, go back and take them up and throw them into
the waters of Lake Elvyn. But if you don't hear anything remarkable, do
them no injury."

So when the day of the reap came the woman did all that the Wise Man
ordered, and put the eggshell on the fire and took it off and carried
it to the door, and there she stood and listened. Then she heard one of
the children say to the other:

Acorn before oak I knew,

An egg before a hen,
But I never heard of an eggshell brew
A dinner for harvest men.

So she went back into the house, seized the children and threw them
into the Llyn, and the goblins in their blue trousers came and saved
their dwarfs and the mother had her own children back and so the great
strife ended.

THE LAD WITH THE GOAT-SKIN

Long ago, a poor widow woman lived down near the iron forge, by
Enniscorth, and she was so poor she had no clothes to put on her son;
so she used to fix him in the ash-hole, near the fire, and pile the
warm ashes about him; and according as he grew up, she sunk the pit
deeper. At last, by hook or by crook, she got a goat-skin, and fastened
it round his waist, and he felt quite grand, and took a walk down the
street. So says she to him next morning, "Tom, you thief, you never
done any good yet, and you six foot high, and past nineteen;--take that
rope and bring me a faggot from the wood."

"Never say't twice, mother," says Tom--"here goes."

When he had it gathered and tied, what should come up but a big giant,
nine foot high, and made a lick of a club at him. Well become Tom, he
jumped a-one side, and picked up a ram-pike; and the first crack he
gave the big fellow, he made him kiss the clod.

"If you have e'er a prayer," says Tom, "now's the time to say it,
before I make fragments of you."

"I have no prayers," says the giant; "but if you spare my life I'll
give you that club; and as long as you keep from sin, you'll win every
battle you ever fight with it."
Tom made no bones about letting him off; and as soon as he got the club
in his hands, he sat down on the bresna, and gave it a tap with the
kippeen, and says, "Faggot, I had great trouble gathering you, and run
the risk of my life for you, the least you can do is to carry me home."
And sure enough, the wind o' the word was all it wanted. It went off
through the wood, groaning and crackling, till it came to the widow's
door.

Well, when the sticks were all burned, Tom was sent off again to pick
more; and this time he had to fight with a giant that had two heads on
him. Tom had a little more trouble with him--that's all; and the
prayers he said, was to give Tom a fife; that nobody could help dancing
when he was playing it. Begonies, he made the big faggot dance home,
with himself sitting on it. The next giant was a beautiful boy with
three heads on him. He had neither prayers nor catechism no more nor
the others; and so he gave Tom a bottle of green ointment, that
wouldn't let you be burned, nor scalded, nor wounded. "And now," says
he, "there's no more of us. You may come and gather sticks here till
little Lunacy Day in Harvest, without giant or fairy-man to disturb
you."

Well, now, Tom was prouder nor ten paycocks, and used to take a walk
down street in the heel of the evening; but some o' the little boys had
no more manners than if they were Dublin jackeens, and put out their
tongues at Tom's club and Tom's goat-skin. He didn't like that at all,
and it would be mean to give one of them a clout. At last, what should
come through the town but a kind of a bellman, only it's a big bugle he
had, and a huntsman's cap on his head, and a kind of a painted shirt.
So this--he wasn't a bellman, and I don't know what to call
him--bugleman, maybe, proclaimed that the King of Dublin's daughter was
so melancholy that she didn't give a laugh for seven years, and that
her father would grant her in marriage to whoever could make her laugh
three times.

"That's the very thing for me to try," says Tom; and so, without
burning any more daylight, he kissed his mother, curled his club at the
little boys, and off he set along the yalla highroad to the town of
Dublin.

At last Tom came to one of the city gates, and the guards laughed and
cursed at him instead of letting him in. Tom stood it all for a little
time, but at last one of them--out of fun, as he said--drove his
bayonet half an inch or so into his side. Tom done nothing but take the
fellow by the scruff o' the neck and the waistband of his corduroys,
and fling him into the canal. Some run to pull the fellow out, and
others to let manners into the vulgarian with their swords and daggers;
but a tap from his club sent them headlong into the moat or down on the
stones, and they were soon begging him to stay his hands.

So at last one of them was glad enough to show Tom the way to the
palace-yard; and there was the king, and the queen, and the princess,
in a gallery, looking at all sorts of wrestling, and sword-playing, and
long-dances, and mumming, all to please the princess; but not a smile
came over her handsome face.

Well, they all stopped when they seen the young giant, with his boy's
face, and long black hair, and his short curly beard--for his poor
mother couldn't afford to buy razors--and his great strong arms, and
bare legs, and no covering but the goat-skin that reached from his
waist to his knees. But an envious wizened bit of a fellow, with a red
head, that wished to be married to the princess, and didn't like how
she opened her eyes at Tom, came forward, and asked his business very
snappishly.

"My business," says Tom, says he, "is to make the beautiful princess,
God bless her, laugh three times."

"Do you see all them merry fellows and skilful swordsmen," says the
other, "that could eat you up with a grain of salt, and not a mother's
soul of 'em ever got a laugh from her these seven years?"

So the fellows gathered round Tom, and the bad man aggravated him till
he told them he didn't care a pinch o' snuff for the whole bilin' of
'em; let 'em come on, six at a time, and try what they could do.

The king, who was too far off to hear what they were saying, asked what
did the stranger want.

"He wants," says the red-headed fellow, "to make hares of your best
men."

"Oh!" says the king, "if that's the way, let one of 'em turn out and
try his mettle."

So one stood forward, with sword and pot-lid, and made a cut at Tom. He
struck the fellow's elbow with the club, and up over their heads flew
the sword, and down went the owner of it on the gravel from a thump he
got on the helmet. Another took his place, and another, and another,
and then half a dozen at once, and Tom sent swords, helmets, shields,
and bodies, rolling over and over, and themselves bawling out that they
were kilt, and disabled, and damaged, and rubbing their poor elbows and
hips, and limping away. Tom contrived not to kill any one; and the
princess was so amused, that she let a great sweet laugh out of her
that was heard over all the yard.

"King of Dublin," says Tom, "I've quarter your daughter."

And the king didn't know whether he was glad or sorry, and all the
blood in the princess's heart run into her cheeks.

So there was no more fighting that day, and Tom was invited to dine
with the royal family. Next day, Redhead told Tom of a wolf, the size
of a yearling heifer, that used to be serenading about the walls, and
eating people and cattle; and said what a pleasure it would give the
king to have it killed.

"With all my heart," says Tom; "send a jackeen to show me where he

lives, and we'll see how he behaves to a stranger."

The princess was not well pleased, for Tom looked a different person
with fine clothes and a nice green birredh over his long curly hair;
and besides, he'd got one laugh out of her. However, the king gave his
consent; and in an hour and a half the horrible wolf was walking into
the palace-yard, and Tom a step or two behind, with his club on his
shoulder, just as a shepherd would be walking after a pet lamb.

The king and queen and princess were safe up in their gallery, but the
officers and people of the court that wor padrowling about the great
bawn, when they saw the big baste coming in, gave themselves up, and
began to make for doors and gates; and the wolf licked his chops, as if
he was saying, "Wouldn't I enjoy a breakfast off a couple of yez!"

The king shouted out, "O Tom with the Goat-skin, take away that
terrible wolf, and you must have all my daughter."

But Tom didn't mind him a bit. He pulled out his flute and began to
play like vengeance; and dickens a man or boy in the yard but began
shovelling away heel and toe, and the wolf himself was obliged to get
on his hind legs and dance "Tatther Jack Walsh," along with the rest. A
good deal of the people got inside, and shut the doors, the way the
hairy fellow wouldn't pin them; but Tom kept playing, and the outsiders
kept dancing and shouting, and the wolf kept dancing and roaring with
the pain his legs were giving him; and all the time he had his eyes on
Redhead, who was shut out along with the rest. Wherever Redhead went,
the wolf followed, and kept one eye on him and the other on Tom, to see
if he would give him leave to eat him. But Tom shook his head, and
never stopped the tune, and Redhead never stopped dancing and bawling,
and the wolf dancing and roaring, one leg up and the other down, and he
ready to drop out of his standing from fair tiresomeness.

When the princess seen that there was no fear of any one being kilt,
she was so divarted by the stew that Redhead was in, that she gave
another great laugh; and well become Tom, out he cried, "King of
Dublin, I have two halves of your daughter."

"Oh, halves or alls," says the king, "put away that divel of a wolf,
and we'll see about it."

So Tom put his flute in his pocket, and says he to the baste that was
sittin' on his currabingo ready to faint, "Walk off to your mountain,
my fine fellow, and live like a respectable baste; and if ever I find
you come within seven miles of any town, I'll--"

He said no more, but spit in his fist, and gave a flourish of his club.
It was all the poor divel of a wolf wanted: he put his tail between his
legs, and took to his pumps without looking at man or mortal, and
neither sun, moon, or stars ever saw him in sight of Dublin again.

At dinner every one laughed but the foxy fellow; and sure enough he was
laying out how he'd settle poor Tom next day.

"Well, to be sure!" says he, "King of Dublin, you are in luck. There's
the Danes moidhering us to no end. Deuce run to Lusk wid 'em! and if
any one can save us from 'em, it is this gentleman with the goat-skin.
There is a flail hangin' on the collar-beam, in hell, and neither Dane
nor devil can stand before it."

"So," says Tom to the king, "will you let me have the other half of the
princess if I bring you the flail?"

"No, no," says the princess; "I'd rather never be your wife than see
you in that danger."

But Redhead whispered and nudged Tom about how shabby it would look to
reneague the adventure. So he asked which way he was to go, and Redhead
directed him.
Well, he travelled and travelled, till he came in sight of the walls of
hell; and, bedad, before he knocked at the gates, he rubbed himself
over with the greenish ointment. When he knocked, a hundred little imps
popped their heads out through the bars, and axed him what he wanted.

"I want to speak to the big divel of all," says Tom: "open the gate."

It wasn't long till the gate was thrune open, and the Ould Boy received
Tom with bows and scrapes, and axed his business.

"My business isn't much," says Tom. "I only came for the loan of that
flail that I see hanging on the collar-beam, for the king of Dublin to
give a thrashing to the Danes."

"Well," says the other, "the Danes is much better customers to me; but
since you walked so far I won't refuse. Hand that flail," says he to a
young imp; and he winked the far-off eye at the same time. So, while
some were barring the gates, the young devil climbed up, and took down
the flail that had the handstaff and booltheen both made out of red-hot
iron. The little vagabond was grinning to think how it would burn the
hands o' Tom, but the dickens a burn it made on him, no more nor if it
was a good oak sapling.

"Thankee," says Tom. "Now would you open the gate for a body, and I'll
give you no more trouble."

"Oh, tramp!" says Ould Nick; "is that the way? It is easier getting
inside them gates than getting out again. Take that tool from him, and
give him a dose of the oil of stirrup."

So one fellow put out his claws to seize on the flail, but Tom gave him
such a welt of it on the side of the head that he broke off one of his
horns, and made him roar like a devil as he was. Well, they rushed at
Tom, but he gave them, little and big, such a thrashing as they didn't
forget for a while. At last says the ould thief of all, rubbing his
elbow, "Let the fool out; and woe to whoever lets him in again, great
or small."

So out marched Tom, and away with him, without minding the shouting and
cursing they kept up at him from the tops of the walls; and when he got
home to the big bawn of the palace, there never was such running and
racing as to see himself and the flail. When he had his story told, he
laid down the flail on the stone steps, and bid no one for their lives
to touch it. If the king, and queen, and princess, made much of him
before, they made ten times more of him now; but Redhead, the mean
scruff-hound, stole over, and thought to catch hold of the flail to
make an end of him. His fingers hardly touched it, when he let a roar
out of him as if heaven and earth were coming together, and kept
flinging his arms about and dancing, that it was pitiful to look at
him. Tom run at him as soon as he could rise, caught his hands in his
own two, and rubbed them this way and that, and the burning pain left
them before you could reckon one. Well the poor fellow, between the
pain that was only just gone, and the comfort he was in, had the
comicalest face that you ever see, it was such a mixtherum-gatherum of
laughing and crying. Everybody burst out a laughing--the princess could
not stop no more than the rest; and then says Tom, "Now, ma'am, if
there were fifty halves of you, I hope you'll give me them all."

Well, the princess looked at her father, and by my word, she came over
to Tom, and put her two delicate hands into his two rough ones, and I
wish it was myself was in his shoes that day!

Tom would not bring the flail into the palace. You may be sure no other
body went near it; and when the early risers were passing next morning,
they found two long clefts in the stone, where it was after burning
itself an opening downwards, nobody could tell how far. But a messenger
came in at noon, and said that the Danes were so frightened when they
heard of the flail coming into Dublin, that they got into their ships,
and sailed away.

Well, I suppose, before they were married, Tom got some man, like Pat
Mara of Tomenine, to learn him the "principles of politeness,"
fluxions, gunnery, and fortification, decimal fractions, practice, and
the rule of three direct, the way he'd be able to keep up a
conversation with the royal family. Whether he ever lost his time
learning them sciences, I'm not sure, but it's as sure as fate that his
mother never more saw any want till the end of her days.

MAN OR WOMAN BOY OR GIRL THAT READS WHAT FOLLOWS 3 TIMES SHALL FALL
ASLEEP AN HUNDRED YEARS

JOHN D. BATTEN DREW THIS AUG. 20TH, 1801 GOOD-NIGHT

NOTES AND REFERENCES

It may be as well to give the reader some account of the enormous

extent of the Celtic folk-tales in existence. I reckon these to extend
to 2000, though only about 250 are in print. The former number exceeds
that known in France, Italy, Germany, and Russia, where collection has
been most active, and is only exceeded by the MS. collection of Finnish
folk-tales at Helsingfors, said to exceed 12,000. As will be seen, this
superiority of the Celts is due to the phenomenal and patriotic
activity of one man, the late J. F. Campbell, of Islay, whose _Popular
Tales_ and MS. collections (partly described by Mr. Alfred Nutt in
_Folk-Lore_, i. 369-83) contain references to no less than 1281 tales
(many of them, of course, variants and scraps). Celtic folk-tales,
while more numerous, are also the oldest of the tales of modern
European races; some of them--_e.g._, "Connla," in the present
selection, occurring in the oldest Irish vellums. They include (1)
fairy tales properly so-called--_i.e._, tales or anecdotes _about_
fairies, hobgoblins, &c., told as natural occurrences; (2) hero-tales,
stories of adventure told of national or mythical heroes; (3)
folk-tales proper, describing marvellous adventures of otherwise
unknown heroes, in which there is a defined plot and supernatural
characters (speaking animals, giants, dwarfs, &c.); and finally (4)
drolls, comic anecdotes of feats of stupidity or cunning.

The collection of Celtic folk-tales began in IRELAND as early as 1825,

with T. Crofton Croker's _Fairy Legends and Traditions of the South of
Ireland_. This contained some 38 anecdotes of the first class mentioned
above, anecdotes showing the belief of the Irish peasantry in the
existence of fairies, gnomes, goblins, and the like. The Grimms did
Croker the honour of translating part of his book, under the title of
_Irische Elfenm�rchen_. Among the novelists and tale-writers of the
schools of Miss Edgeworth and Lever folk-tales were occasionally
utilised, as by Carleton in his _Traits and Stories_, by S. Lover in
his _Legends and Stories_, and by G. Griffin in his _Tales of a
Jury-Room_. These all tell their tales in the manner of the stage
Irishman. Chapbooks, _Royal Fairy Tales_ and _Hibernian Tales_, also
contained genuine folk-tales, and attracted Thackeray's attention in
his _Irish Sketch-Book_. The Irish Grimm, however, was Patrick Kennedy,
a Dublin bookseller, who believed in fairies, and in five years (1866-
71) printed about 100 folk- and hero-tales and drolls (classes 2, 3,
and 4 above) in his _Legendary Fictions of the Irish Celts_, 1866,
_Fireside Stories of Ireland_, 1870, and _Bardic Stories of Ireland_,
1871; all three are now unfortunately out of print. He tells his
stories neatly and with spirit, and retains much that is _volkst�mlich_
in his diction. He derived his materials from the English-speaking
peasantry of county Wexford, who changed from Gaelic to English while
story-telling was in full vigour, and therefore carried over the
stories with the change of language. Lady Wylde has told many
folk-tales very effectively in her _Ancient Legends of Ireland_, 1887.
More recently two collectors have published stories gathered from
peasants of the West and North who can only speak Gaelic. These are by
an American gentleman named Curtin, _Myths and Folk-Tales of Ireland_,
1890; while Dr. Douglas Hyde has published in _Beside the Fireside_,
1891, spirited English versions of some of the stories he had published
in the original Irish in his _Leabhar Sgeulaighteachta_, Dublin, 1889.
Miss Maclintoch has a large MS. collection, part of which has appeared
in various periodicals; and Messrs. Larminie and D. Fitzgerald are
known to have much story material in their possession.

But beside these more modern collections there exist in old and middle
Irish a large number of hero-tales (class 2) which formed the staple of
the old _ollahms_ or bards. Of these tales of "cattle-liftings,
elopements, battles, voyages, courtships, caves, lakes, feasts, sieges,
and eruptions," a bard of even the fourth class had to know seven
fifties, presumably one for each day of the year. Sir William Temple
knew of a north-country gentleman of Ireland who was sent to sleep
every evening with a fresh tale from his bard. The _Book of Leinster_,
an Irish vellum of the twelfth century, contains a list of 189 of these
hero-tales, many of which are extant to this day; E. O'Curry gives the
list in the Appendix to his MS. _Materials of Irish History_. Another
list of about 70 is given in the preface to the third volume of the
Ossianic Society's publications. Dr. Joyce published a few of the more
celebrated of these in _Old Celtic Romances_; others appeared in
_Atlantis_ (see notes on "Deirdre"), others in Kennedy's _Bardic
Stories_, mentioned above.

Turning to SCOTLAND, we must put aside Chambers' _Popular Rhymes of

Scotland_, 1842, which contains for the most part folk-tales common
with those of England rather than those peculiar to the Gaelic-speaking
Scots. The first name here in time as in importance is that of J. F.
Campbell, of Islay. His four volumes, _Popular Tales of the West
Highlands_ (Edinburgh, 1860-2, recently republished by the Islay
Association), contain some 120 folk- and hero-tales, told with strict
adherence to the language of the narrators, which is given with a
literal, a rather too literal, English version. This careful accuracy
has given an un-English air to his versions, and has prevented them
attaining their due popularity. What Campbell has published represents
only a tithe of what he collected. At the end of the fourth volume he
gives a list of 791 tales, &c., collected by him or his assistants in
the two years 1859-61; and in his MS. collections at Edinburgh are two
other lists containing 400 more tales. Only a portion of these are in
the Advocates' Library; the rest, if extant, must be in private hands,
though they are distinctly of national importance and interest.

Campbell's influence has been effective of recent years in Scotland.

The _Celtic Magazine_ (vols. xii. and xiii.), while under the
editorship of Mr. MacBain, contained several folk- and hero-tales in
Gaelic, and so did the _Scotch Celtic Review_. These were from the
collections of Messrs. Campbell of Tiree, Carmichael, and K. Mackenzie.
Recently Lord Archibald Campbell has shown laudable interest in the
preservation of Gaelic folk- and hero-tales. Under his auspices a whole
series of handsome volumes, under the general title of _Waifs and
Strays of Celtic Tradition_, has been recently published, four volumes
having already appeared, each accompanied by notes by Mr. Alfred Nutt,
which form the most important aid to the study of Celtic Folk-Tales
since Campbell himself. Those to the second volume in particular (Tales
collected by Rev. D. MacInnes) fill 100 pages, with condensed
information on all aspects of the subject dealt with in the light of
the most recent research in the European folk-tales as well as on
Celtic literature. Thanks to Mr. Nutt, Scotland is just now to the fore
in the collection and study of the British Folk-Tale.

WALES makes a poor show beside Ireland and Scotland. Sikes' _British
Goblins_, and the tales collected by Prof. Rhys in _Y Cymrodor_, vols.
ii.-vi., are mainly of our first-class fairy anecdotes. Borrow, in his
_Wild Wales_, refers to a collection of fables in a journal called _The
Greal_, while the _Cambrian Quarterly Magazine_ for 1830 and 1831
contained a few fairy anecdotes, including a curious version of the
"Brewery of Eggshells" from the Welsh. In the older literature, the
_Iolo MS._, published by the Welsh MS. Society, has a few fables and
apologues, and the charming _Mabinogion_, translated by Lady Guest, has
tales that can trace back to the twelfth century and are on the
border-line between folk-tales and hero-tales.

CORNWALL and MAN are even worse than Wales. Hunt's _Drolls from the
West of England_ has nothing distinctively Celtic, and it is only by a
chance Lhuyd chose a folk-tale as his specimen of Cornish in his
_Archaeologia Britannica_, 1709 (see _Tale of Ivan_). The Manx
folk-tales published, including the most recent by Mr. Moore, in his
_Folk-Lore of the Isle of Man_, 1891, are mainly fairy anecdotes and
legends.

From this survey of the field of Celtic folk-tales it is clear that

Ireland and Scotland provide the lion's share. The interesting thing to
notice is the remarkable similarity of Scotch and Irish folk-tales. The
continuity of language and culture between these two divisions of
Gaeldom has clearly brought about this identity of their folk-tales. As
will be seen from the following notes, the tales found in Scotland can
almost invariably be paralleled by those found in Ireland, and _vice
versa_. This result is a striking confirmation of the general truth
that folk-lores of different countries resemble one another in
proportion to their contiguity and to the continuity of language and
culture between them.

Another point of interest in these Celtic folk-tales is the light they

throw upon the relation of hero-tales and folk-tales (classes 2 and 3
above). Tales told of Finn of Cuchulain, and therefore coming under the
definition of hero-tales, are found elsewhere told of anonymous or
unknown heroes. The question is, were the folk-tales the earliest, and
were they localised and applied to the heroes, or were the heroic sagas
generalised and applied to an unknown [Greek: tis]? All the evidence,
in my opinion, inclines to the former view, which, as applied to Celtic
folk-tales, is of very great literary importance; for it is becoming
more and more recognised, thanks chiefly to the admirable work of Mr.
Alfred Nutt, in his _Studies on the Holy Grail_, that the outburst of
European Romance in the twelfth century was due, in large measure, to
an infusion of Celtic hero-tales into the literature of the
Romance-speaking nations. Now the remarkable thing is, how these hero
tales have lingered on in oral tradition even to the present day. (See
a marked case in "Deirdre.") We may, therefore, hope to see
considerable light thrown on the most characteristic spiritual product
of the Middle Ages, the literature of Romance and the spirit of
chivalry, from the Celtic folk-tales of the present day. Mr. Alfred
Nutt has already shown this to be true of a special section of Romance
literature, that connected with the Holy Grail, and it seems probable
that further study will extend the field of application of this new
method of research.

The Celtic folk-tale again has interest in retaining many traits of

primitive conditions among the early inhabitants of these isles which
are preserved by no other record. Take, for instance, the calm
assumption of polygamy in "Gold Tree and Silver Tree." That represents
a state of feeling that is decidedly pre-Christian. The belief in an
external soul "Life Index," recently monographed by Mr. Frazer in his
"Golden Bough," also finds expression in a couple of the Tales (see
notes on "Sea-Maiden" and "Fair, Brown, and Trembling"), and so with
many other primitive ideas.

Care, however, has to be taken in using folk-tales as evidence for

primitive practice among the nations where they are found. For the
tales may have come from another race--that is, for example, probably
the case with "Gold Tree and Silver Tree" (see Notes). Celtic tales are
of peculiar interest in this connection, as they afford one of the best
fields for studying the problem of diffusion, the most pressing of the
problems of the folk-tales just at present, at least in my opinion. The
Celts are at the furthermost end of Europe. Tales that travelled to
them could go no further and must therefore be the last links in the
chain.

For all these reasons, then, Celtic folk-tales are of high scientific
interest to the folk-lorist, while they yield to none in imaginative
and literary qualities. In any other country of Europe some national
means of recording them would have long ago been adopted. M. Luzel,
_e.g._, was commissioned by the French Minister of Public Instruction
to collect and report on the Breton folk-tales. England, here as
elsewhere without any organised means of scientific research in the
historical and philological sciences, has to depend on the enthusiasm
of a few private individuals for work of national importance. Every
Celt of these islands or in the Gaeldom beyond the sea, and every
Celt-lover among the English-speaking nations, should regard it as one
of the duties of the race to put its traditions on record in the few
years that now remain before they will cease for ever to be living in
the hearts and memories of the humbler members of the race.

In the following Notes I have done as in my _English Fairy Tales_, and

given first, the _sources_ whence I drew the tales, then _parallels_ at
length for the British Isles, with bibliographical references for
parallels abroad, and finally, _remarks_ where the tales seemed to need
them. In these I have not wearied or worried the reader with
conventional tall talk about the Celtic genius and its manifestations
in the folk-tale; on that topic one can only repeat Matthew Arnold when
at his best, in his _Celtic Literature_. Nor have I attempted to deal
with the more general aspects of the study of the Celtic folk-tale. For
these I must refer to Mr. Nutt's series of papers in _The Celtic
Magazine_, vol. xii., or, still better, to the masterly introductions
he is contributing to the series of _Waifs and Strays of Celtic
Tradition_, and to Dr. Hyde's _Beside the Fireside_. In my remarks I
have mainly confined myself to discussing the origin and diffusion of
the various tales, so far as anything definite could be learnt or
conjectured on that subject.

Before proceeding to the Notes, I may "put in," as the lawyers say, a
few summaries of the results reached in them. Of the twenty-six tales,
twelve (i., ii., v., viii., ix., x., xi., xv., xvi., xvii., xix.,
xxiv.) have Gaelic originals; three (vii., xiii., xxv.) are from the
Welsh; one (xxii.) from the now extinct Cornish; one an adaptation of
an English poem founded on a Welsh tradition (xxi., "Gellert"); and the
remaining nine are what may be termed Anglo-Irish. Regarding their
diffusion among the Celts, twelve are both Irish and Scotch (iv., v.,
vi., ix., x., xiv.-xvii., xix., xx., xxiv); one (xxv.) is common to
Irish and Welsh; and one (xxii.) to Irish and Cornish; seven are found
only among the Celts in Ireland (i.-iii., xii., xviii., xxii., xxvi);
two (viii., xi.) among the Scotch; and three (vii., xiii., xxi.) among
the Welsh. Finally, so far as we can ascertain their origin, four (v.,
xvi., xxi., xxii.) are from the East; five (vi., x., xiv., xx., xxv.)
are European drolls; three of the romantic tales seem to have been
imported (vii., ix., xix.); while three others are possibly Celtic
exportations to the Continent (xv., xvii., xxiv.) though the, last may
have previously come thence; the remaining eleven are, as far as known,
original to Celtic lands. Somewhat the same result would come out, I
believe, as the analysis of any representative collection of folk-tales
of any European district.

I. CONNLA AND THE FAIRY MAIDEN.

_Source_.--From the old Irish "Echtra Condla chaim maic Cuind

Chetchathaig" of the _Leabhar na h-Uidhre_ ("Book of the Dun Cow"),
which must have been written before 1106, when its scribe Maelmori
("Servant of Mary") was murdered. The original is given by Windisch in
his _Irish Grammar_, p. 120, also in the _Trans. Kilkenny Archaeol.
Soc._ for 1874. A fragment occurs in a Rawlinson MS., described by Dr.
W. Stokes, _Tripartite Life_, p. xxxvi. I have used the translation of
Prof. Zimmer in his _Keltische Beitr�ge_, ii. (_Zeits. f. deutsches
Altertum_, Bd. xxxiii. 262-4). Dr. Joyce has a somewhat florid version
in, his _Old Celtic Romances_, from which I have borrowed a touch or
two. I have neither extenuated nor added aught but the last sentence of
the Fairy Maiden's last speech. Part of the original is in metrical
form, so that the whole is of the _cante-fable_ species which I believe
to be the original form of the folk-tale (Cf. _Eng. Fairy Tales_,
notes, p. 240, and _infra_, p. 257).

_Parallels_.--Prof. Zimmer's paper contains three other accounts of the

_terra repromissionis_ in the Irish sagas, one of them being the
similar adventure of Cormac the nephew of Connla, or Condla Ruad as he
should be called. The fairy apple of gold occurs in Cormac Mac Art's
visit to the Brug of Manannan (Nutt's _Holy Grail_, 193).
_Remarks_.--Conn the hundred-fighter had the head-kingship of Ireland
123-157 A.D., according to the _Annals of the Four Masters_, i. 105. On
the day of his birth the five great roads from Tara to all parts of
Ireland were completed: one of them from Dublin is still used.
Connaught is said to have been named after him, but this is scarcely
consonant with Joyce's identification with Ptolemy's _Nagnatai_ (_Irish
Local Names_, i. 75). But there can be little doubt of Conn's existence
as a powerful ruler in Ireland in the second century. The historic
existence of Connla seems also to be authenticated by the reference to
him as Conly, the eldest son of Conn, in the Annals of Clonmacnoise. As
Conn was succeeded by his third son, Art Enear, Connla was either slain
or disappeared during his father's lifetime. Under these circumstances
it is not unlikely that our legend grew up within the century after
Conn--_i.e._, during the latter half of the second century.

As regards the present form of it, Prof. Zimmer (_l.c._ 261-2) places
it in the seventh century. It has clearly been touched up by a
Christian hand who introduced the reference to the day of judgment and
to the waning power of the Druids. But nothing turns upon this
interpolation, so that it is likely that even the present form of the
legend is pre-Christian-_i.e._ for Ireland, pre-Patrician, before the
fifth century.

The tale of Connla is thus the earliest fairy tale of modern Europe.
Besides this interest it contains an early account of one of the most
characteristic Celtic conceptions, that of the earthly Paradise, the
Isle of Youth, _Tir-nan-Og_. This has impressed itself on the European
imagination; in the Arthuriad it is represented by the Vale of Avalon,
and as represented in the various Celtic visions of the future life, it
forms one of the main sources of Dante's _Divina Commedia_. It is
possible too, I think, that the Homeric Hesperides and the Fortunate
Isles of the ancients had a Celtic origin (as is well known, the early
place-names of Europe are predominantly Celtic). I have found, I
believe, a reference to the conception in one of the earliest passages
in the classics dealing with the Druids. Lucan, in his _Pharsalia_ (i.
450-8), addresses them in these high terms of reverence:

Et vos barbaricos ritus, moremque sinistrum,

Sacrorum, Druidae, positis repetistis ab armis,
Solis nosse Deos et coeli numera vobis
Aut solis nescire datum; nemora alta remotis
Incolitis lucis. Vobis auctoribus umbrae,
Non tacitas Erebi sedes, Ditisque profundi,
Pallida regna petunt: _regit idem spiritus artus
Orbe alio_: longae, canitis si cognita, vitae
Mors media est.

The passage certainly seems to me to imply a different conception from

the ordinary classical views of the life after death, the dark and
dismal plains of Erebus peopled with ghosts; and the passage I have
italicised would chime in well with the conception of a continuance of
youth (_idem spiritus_) in Tir-nan-Og (_orbe alio_).

One of the most pathetic, beautiful, and typical scenes in Irish legend
is the return of Ossian from Tir-nan-Og, and his interview with St.
Patrick. The old faith and the new, the old order of things and that
which replaced it, meet in two of the most characteristic products of
the Irish imagination (for the Patrick of legend is as much a legendary
figure as Oisin himself). Ossian had gone away to Tir-nan-Og with the
fairy Niamh under very much the same circumstances as Condla Ruad; time
flies in the land of eternal youth, and when Ossian returns, after a
year as he thinks, more than three centuries had passed, and St.
Patrick had just succeeded in introducing the new faith. The contrast
of Past and Present has never been more vividly or beautifully
represented.

II. GULEESH.

_Source_.--From Dr. Douglas Hyde's _Beside the Fire_, 104-28, where it

is a translation from the same author's _Leabhar Sgeulaighteachta_. Dr
Hyde got it from one Shamus O'Hart, a gamekeeper of Frenchpark. One is
curious to know how far the very beautiful landscapes in the story are
due to Dr. Hyde, who confesses to have only taken notes. I have omitted
a journey to Rome, paralleled, as Mr. Nutt has pointed out, by the
similar one of Michael Scott (_Waifs and Strays_, i. 46), and not
bearing on the main lines of the story. I have also dropped a part of
Guleesh's name: in the original he is "Guleesh na guss dhu," Guleesh of
the black feet, because he never washed them; nothing turns on this in
the present form of the story, but one cannot but suspect it was of
importance in the original form.

_Parallels_.--Dr. Hyde refers to two short stories, "Midnight Ride" (to

Rome) and "Stolen Bride," in Lady Wilde's _Ancient Legends_. But the
closest parallel is given by Miss Maclintock's Donegal tale of "Jamie
Freel and the Young Lady," reprinted in Mr. Yeats' _Irish Folk and
Fairy Tales_, 52-9. In the _Hibernian Tales_, "Mann o' Malaghan and the
Fairies," as reported by Thackeray in the _Irish Sketch-Book_, c. xvi.,
begins like "Guleesh."

III. FIELD OF BOLIAUNS.

_Source_.--T. Crofton Croker's _Fairy Legends of the South of Ireland_,

ed. Wright, pp. 135-9. In the original the gnome is a Cluricaune, but
as a friend of Mr. Batten's has recently heard the tale told of a
Lepracaun, I have adopted the better known title.

_Remarks_.--_Lepracaun_ is from the Irish _leith bhrogan_, the

one-shoemaker (_cf_. brogue), according to Dr. Hyde. He is generally
seen (and to this day, too) working at a single shoe, _cf._ Croker's
story "Little Shoe," _l.c._ pp. 142-4. According to a writer in the
_Revue Celtique_, i. 256, the true etymology is _luchor pan_, "little
man." Dr. Joyce also gives the same etymology in _Irish Names and
Places_, i. 183, where he mentions several places named after them.

IV. HORNED WOMEN.

_Source_.--Lady Wilde's _Ancient Legends_, the first story.

_Parallels_.--A similar version was given by Mr. D. Fitzgerald in the
_Revue Celtique_, iv. 181, but without the significant and impressive
horns. He refers to _Cornhill_ for February 1877, and to Campbell's
"Sauntraigh" No. xxii. _Pop. Tales_, ii. 52 4, in which a "woman of
peace" (a fairy) borrows a woman's kettle and returns it with flesh in
it, but at last the woman refuses, and is persecuted by the fairy. I
fail to see much analogy. A much closer one is in Campbell, ii. p. 63,
where fairies are got rid of by shouting "Dunveilg is on fire." The
familiar "lady-bird, lady-bird, fly away home, your house is on fire
and your children at home," will occur to English minds. Another
version in Kennedy's _Legendary Fictions_, p. 164, "Black Stairs on
Fire."

_Remarks_.--Slievenamon is a famous fairy palace in Tipperary according

to Dr. Joyce, _l.c._ i. 178. It was the hill on which Finn stood when
he gave himself as the prize to the Irish maiden who should run up it
quickest. Grainne won him with dire consequences, as all the world
knows or ought to know (Kennedy, _Legend Fict._, 222, "How Fion
selected a Wife").

V. CONAL YELLOWCLAW.

_Source_.--Campbell, _Pop. Tales of West Highlands_, No. v. pp. 105-8,

"Conall Cra Bhuidhe." I have softened the third episode, which is
somewhat too ghastly in the original. I have translated "Cra Bhuide"
Yellowclaw on the strength of Campbell's etymology, _l.c._ p. 158.

_Parallels_.--Campbell's vi. and vii. are two variants showing how

widespread the story is in Gaelic Scotland. It occurs in Ireland where
it has been printed in the chapbook, _Hibernian Tales_, as the "Black
Thief and the Knight of the Glen," the Black Thief being Conall, and
the knight corresponding to the King of Lochlan (it is given in Mr.
Lang's _Red Fairy Book_). Here it attracted the notice of Thackeray,
who gives a good abstract of it in his _Irish Sketch-Book_, ch. xvi. He
thinks it "worthy of the Arabian Nights, as wild and odd as an Eastern
tale." "That fantastical way of bearing testimony to the previous tale
by producing an old woman who says the tale is not only true, but who
was the very old woman who lived in the giant's castle is almost" (why
"almost," Mr. Thackeray?) "a stroke of genius." The incident of the
giant's breath occurs in the story of Koisha Kayn, MacInnes' _Tales_,
i. 241, as well as the Polyphemus one, _ibid._ 265. One-eyed giants are
frequent in Celtic folk-tales (_e.g._ in _The Pursuit of Diarmaid_ and
in the _Mabinogi_ of Owen).

_Remarks._--Thackeray's reference to the "Arabian Nights" is especially

apt, as the tale of Conall is a framework story like _The 1001 Nights_,
the three stories told by Conall being framed, as it were, in a fourth
which is nominally the real story. This method employed by the Indian
story-tellers and from them adopted by Boccaccio and thence into all
European literatures (Chaucer, Queen Margaret, &c.), is generally
thought to be peculiar to the East, and to be ultimately derived from
the Jatakas or Birth Stories of the Buddha who tells his adventures in
former incarnations. Here we find it in Celtdom, and it occurs also in
"The Story-teller at Fault" in this collection, and the story of
_Koisha Kayn_ in MacInnes' _Argyllshire Tales_, a variant of which,
collected but not published by Campbell, has no less than nineteen
tales enclosed in a framework. The question is whether the method was
adopted independently in Ireland, or was due to foreign influences.
Confining ourselves to "Conal Yellowclaw," it seems not unlikely that
the whole story is an importation. For the second episode is clearly
the story of Polyphemus from the Odyssey which was known in Ireland
perhaps as early as the tenth century (see Prof. K. Meyer's edition of
_Merugud Uilix maic Leirtis_, Pref. p. xii). It also crept into the
voyages of Sindbad in the _Arabian Nights_. And as told in the
Highlands it bears comparison even with the Homeric version. As Mr.
Nutt remarks (_Celt. Mag._ xii.) the address of the giant to the buck
is as effective as that of Polyphemus to his ram. The narrator, James
Wilson, was a blind man who would naturally feel the pathos of the
address; "it comes from the heart of the narrator;" says Campbell
(_l.c._, 148), "it is the ornament which his mind hangs on the frame of
the story."

VI. HUDDEN AND DUDDEN.

_Source._--From oral tradition, by the late D. W. Logie, taken down by

Mr. Alfred Nutt.

_Parallels._--Lover has a tale, "Little Fairly," obviously derived from

this folk-tale; and there is another very similar, "Darby Darly."
Another version of our tale is given under the title "Donald and his
Neighbours," in the chapbook _Hibernian Tales_, whence it was reprinted
by Thackeray in his _Irish Sketch-Book_, c. xvi. This has the incident
of the "accidental matricide," on which see Prof. R. K�hler on
Gonzenbach _Sicil. M�hrchen_, ii. 224. No less than four tales of
Campbell are of this type (_Pop. Tales_, ii. 218-31). M. Cosquin, in
his "Contes populaires de Lorraine," the storehouse of "storiology,"
has elaborate excursuses in this class of tales attached to his Nos. x.
and xx. Mr. Clouston discusses it also in his _Pop. Tales_, ii. 229-88.
Both these writers are inclined to trace the chief incidents to India.
It is to be observed that one of the earliest popular drolls in Europe,
_Unibos_, a Latin poem of the eleventh, and perhaps the tenth, century,
has the main outlines of the story, the fraudulent sale of worthless
objects and the escape from the sack trick. The same story occurs in
Straparola, the European earliest collection of folk-tales in the
sixteenth century. On the other hand, the gold sticking to the scales
is familiar to us in _Ali Baba_. (_Cf._ Cosquin, _l.c._, i. 225-6, 229).

_Remarks_.--It is indeed curious to find, as M. Cosquin points out, a

cunning fellow tied in a sack getting out by crying, "I won't marry the
princess," in countries so far apart as Ireland, Sicily (Gonzenbach,
No. 71), Afghanistan (Thorburn, _Bannu_, p. 184), and Jamaica
(_Folk-Lore Record_, iii. 53). It is indeed impossible to think these
are disconnected, and for drolls of this kind a good case has been made
out for the borrowing hypotheses by M. Cosquin and Mr. Clouston. Who
borrowed from whom is another and more difficult question which has to
be judged on its merits in each individual case.

This is a type of Celtic folk-tales which are European in spread, have

analogies with the East, and can only be said to be Celtic by adoption
and by colouring. They form a distinct section of the tales told by the
Celts, and must be represented in any characteristic selection. Other
examples are xi., xv., xx., and perhaps xxii.
VII. SHEPHERD OF MYDDVAI.

_Source_.--Preface to the edition of "The Physicians of Myddvai"; their

prescription-book, from the Red Book of Hergest, published by the Welsh
MS. Society in 1861. The legend is not given in the Red Book, but from
oral tradition by Mr. W. Rees, p. xxi. As this is the first of the
Welsh tales in this book it may be as well to give the reader such
guidance as I can afford him on the intricacies of Welsh pronunciation,
especially with regard to the mysterious _w_'s and _y_'s of Welsh
orthography. For _w_ substitute double _o_, as in "_fool_," and for
_y_, the short _u_ in b_u_t, and as near approach to Cymric speech will
be reached as is possible for the outlander. It maybe added that double
_d_ equals _th_, and double _l_ is something like _Fl_, as Shakespeare
knew in calling his Welsh soldier Fluellen (Llewelyn). Thus "Meddygon
Myddvai" would be _Anglic�_ "Methugon Muthvai."

_Parallels._--Other versions of the legend of the Van Pool are given in

_Cambro-Briton_, ii. 315; W. Sikes, _British Goblins_, p. 40. Mr. E.
Sidney Hartland has discussed these and others in a set of papers
contributed to the first volume of _The Archaeological Review_ (now
incorporated into _Folk-Lore_), the substance of which is now given in
his _Science of Fairy Tales_, 274-332. (See also the references given
in _Revue Celtique_, iv., 187 and 268). Mr. Hartland gives there an
ecumenical collection of parallels to the several incidents that go to
make up our story--(1) The bride-capture of the Swan-Maiden, (2) the
recognition of the bride, (3) the taboo against causeless blows, (4)
doomed to be broken, and (5) disappearance of the Swan-Maiden, with (6)
her return as Guardian Spirit to her descendants. In each case Mr.
Hartland gives what he considers to be the most primitive form of the
incident. With reference to our present tale, he comes to the
conclusion, if I understand him aright, that the lake-maiden was once
regarded as a local divinity. The physicians of Myddvai were historic
personages, renowned for their medical skill for some six centuries,
till the race died out with John Jones, _fl._ 1743. To explain their
skill and uncanny knowledge of herbs, the folk traced them to a
supernatural ancestress, who taught them their craft in a place still
called Pant-y-Meddygon ("Doctors' Dingle"). Their medical knowledge did
not require any such remarkable origin, as Mr. Hartland has shown in a
paper "On Welsh Folk-Medicine," contributed to _Y Cymmrodor_, vol. xii.
On the other hand, the Swan-Maiden type of story is widespread through
the Old World. Mr. Morris' "Land East of the Moon and West of the Sun,"
in _The Earthly Paradise_, is taken from the Norse version. Parallels
are accumulated by the Grimms, ii. 432; K�hler on Gonzenbach, ii. 20;
or Blade, 149; Stokes' _Indian Fairy Tales_, 243, 276; and Messrs.
Jones and Koopf, _Magyar Folk-Tales_, 362-5. It remains to be proved
that one of these versions did not travel to Wales, and become there
localised. We shall see other instances of such localisation or
specialisation of general legends.

VIII. THE SPRIGHTLY TAILOR.

_Source._--_Notes and Queries_ for December 21, 1861; to which it was

communicated by "Cuthbert Bede," the author of _Verdant Green_, who
collected it in Cantyre.

_Parallels_.--Miss Dempster gives the same story in her Sutherland

Collection, No. vii. (referred to by Campbell in his Gaelic list, at
end of vol. iv.); Mrs. John Faed, I am informed by a friend, knows the
Gaelic version, as told by her nurse in her youth. Chambers' "Strange
Visitor," _Pop. Rhymes of Scotland_, 64, of which I gave an Anglicised
version in my _English Fairy Tales_, No. xxxii., is clearly a variant.

_Remarks_.--The Macdonald of Saddell Castle was a very great man

indeed. Once, when dining with the Lord-Lieutenant, an apology was made
to him for placing him so far away from the head of the table. "Where
the Macdonald sits," was the proud response, "there is the head of the
table."

IX. DEIRDRE.

_Source_.--_Celtic Magazine_, xiii. pp. 69, _seq_. I have abridged

somewhat, made the sons of Fergus all faithful instead of two traitors,
and omitted an incident in the house of the wild men called here
"strangers." The original Gaelic was given in the _Transactions of the
Inverness Gaelic Society_ for 1887, p. 241, _seq._, by Mr. Carmichael.
I have inserted Deirdre's "Lament" from the _Book of Leinster_.

_Parallels_.--This is one of the three most sorrowful Tales of Erin,

(the other two, _Children of Lir_ and _Children of Tureen_, are given
in Dr. Joyce's _Old Celtic Romances_), and is a specimen of the old
heroic sagas of elopement, a list of which is given in the _Book of
Leinster_. The "outcast child" is a frequent episode in folk and
hero-tales: an instance occurs in my _English Fairy Tales_, No. xxxv.,
and Prof. K�hler gives many others in _Archiv. f. Slav. Philologie_, i.
288. Mr. Nutt adds tenth century Celtic parallels in _Folk-Lore_, vol.
ii. The wooing of hero by heroine is a characteristic Celtic touch. See
"Connla" here, and other examples given by Mr. Nutt in his notes to
MacInnes' _Tales_. The trees growing from the lovers' graves occurs in
the English ballad of _Lord Lovel_ and has been studied in _M�lusine_.

_Remarks_.--The "Story of Deirdre" is a remarkable instance of the

tenacity of oral tradition among the Celts. It has been preserved in no
less than five versions (or six, including Macpherson's "Darthula")
ranging from the twelfth to the nineteenth century. The earliest is in
the twelfth century, _Book of Leinster_, to be dated about 1140 (edited
in facsimile under the auspices of the Royal Irish Academy, i. 147,
_seq._). Then comes a fifteenth century version, edited and translated
by Dr. Stokes in Windisch's _Irische Texte_ II., ii. 109, _seq._,
"Death of the Sons of Uisnech." Keating in his _History of Ireland_
gave another version in the seventeenth century. The Dublin Gaelic
Society published an eighteenth century version in their _Transactions_
for 1808. And lastly we have the version before us, collected only a
few years ago, yet agreeing in all essential details with the version
of the _Book of Leinster_. Such a record is unique in the history of
oral tradition, outside Ireland, where, however, it is quite a
customary experience in the study of the Finn-saga. It is now
recognised that Macpherson had, or could have had, ample material for
his _rechauff�_ of the Finn or "Fingal" saga. His "Darthula" is a
similar cobbling of our present story. I leave to Celtic specialists
the task of settling the exact relations of these various texts. I
content myself with pointing out the fact that in these latter days of
a seemingly prosaic century in these British Isles there has been
collected from the lips of the folk a heroic story like this of
"Deirdre," full of romantic incidents, told with tender feeling and
considerable literary skill. No other country in Europe, except perhaps
Russia, could provide a parallel to this living on of Romance among the
common folk. Surely it is a bounden duty of those who are in the
position to put on record any such utterances of the folk-imagination
of the Celts before it is too late.

X. MUNACHAR AND MANACHAR.

_Source_.--I have combined the Irish version given by Dr. Hyde in his
_Leabhar Sgeul._, and translated by him for Mr. Yeats' _Irish Folk and
Fairy Tales_, and the Scotch version given in Gaelic and English by
Campbell, No. viii.

_Parallels_.--Two English versions are given in my _Eng. Fairy Tales_,

No. iv., "The Old Woman and her Pig," and xxxiv., "The Cat and the
Mouse," where see notes for other variants in these isles. M. Cosquin,
in his notes to No. xxxiv., of his _Contes de Lorraine_, t. ii. pp.
35-41, has drawn attention to an astonishing number of parallels
scattered through all Europe and the East (_cf._, too, Crane, _Ital.
Pop. Tales_, notes, 372-5). One of the earliest allusions to the jingle
is in _Don Quixote_, pt. 1, c. xvi.: "Y asi como suele decirse _el gato
al rato, et rato � la cuerda, la cuerda al palo_, daba el arriero �
Sancho, Sancho � la moza, la moza � �l, el ventero � la moza." As I
have pointed out, it is used to this day by Bengali women at the end of
each folk-tale they recite (L. B. Day, _Folk-Tales of Bengal_, Pref.).

_Remarks_.--Two ingenious suggestions have been made as to the origin

of this curious jingle, both connecting it with religious ceremonies:
(1) Something very similar occurs in Chaldaic at the end of the Jewish
_Hagada_, or domestic ritual for the Passover night. It has, however,
been shown that this does not occur in early MSS. or editions, and was
only added at the end to amuse the children after the service, and was
therefore only a translation or adaptation of a current German form of
the jingle; (2) M. Basset, in the _Revue des Traditions populaires_,
1890, t. v. p. 549, has suggested that it is a survival of the old
Greek custom at the sacrifice of the Bouphonia for the priest to
contend that _he_ had not slain the sacred beast, the axe declares that
the handle did it, the handle transfers the guilt further, and so on.
This is ingenious, but fails to give any reasonable account of the
diffusion of the jingle in countries which have had no historic
connection with classical Greece.

XI. GOLD TREE AND SILVER TREE.

_Source_.--_Celtic Magazine_, xiii. 213-8, Gaelic and English from Mr.

Kenneth Macleod.
_Parallels_.--Mr. Macleod heard another version in which "Gold Tree"
(anonymous in this variant) is bewitched to kill her father's horse,
dog, and cock. Abroad it is the Grimm's _Schneewittchen_ (No. 53), for
the Continental variants of which see K�hler on Gonzenbach, _Sicil.
M�hrchen_, Nos. 2-4, Grimm's notes on 53, and Crane, _Ital. Pop.
Tales_, 331. No other version is known in the British Isles.

_Remarks_.--It is unlikely, I should say impossible, that this tale,

with the incident of the dormant heroine, should have arisen
independently in the Highlands; it is most likely an importation from
abroad. Yet in it occurs a most "primitive" incident, the bigamous
household of the hero; this is glossed over in Mr. Macleod's other
variant. On the "survival" method of investigation this would possibly
be used as evidence for polygamy in the Highlands. Yet if, as is
probable, the story came from abroad, this trait may have come with it,
and only implies polygamy in the original home of the tale.

XII. KING O'TOOLE AND HIS GOOSE.

_Source_.--S. Lover's _Stories and Legends of the Irish Peasantry_.

_Remarks_.--This is really a moral apologue on the benefits of keeping

your word. Yet it is told with such humour and vigour, that the moral
glides insensibly into the heart.

XIII. THE WOOING OF OLWEN.

_Source_.--The _Mabinogi_ of Kulhwych and Olwen from the translation of

Lady Guest, abridged.

_Parallels_.--Prof. Rhys, _Hibbert Lectures_, p. 486, considers that

our tale is paralleled by Cuchulain's "Wooing of Emer," a translation
of which by Prof. K. Meyer appeared in the _Archaeological Review_,
vol. i. I fail to see much analogy. On the other hand in his _Arthurian
Legend_, p. 41, he rightly compares the tasks set by Yspythadon to
those set to Jason. They are indeed of the familiar type of the Bride
Wager (on which see Grimm-Hunt, i. 399). The incident of the three
animals, old, older, and oldest, has a remarkable resemblance to the
_Tettira Jataka_ (ed. Fausb�ll, No. 37, transl. Rhys Davids, i. p. 310
_seq._) in which the partridge, monkey, and elephant dispute as to
their relative age, and the partridge turns out to have voided the seed
of the Banyan-tree under which they were sheltered, whereas the
elephant only knew it when a mere bush, and the monkey had nibbled the
topmost shoots. This apologue got to England at the end of the twelfth
century as the sixty-ninth fable, "Wolf, Fox, and Dove," of a rhymed
prose collection of "Fox Fables" (_Mishle Shu'alim_), of an Oxford Jew,
Berachyah Nakdan, known in the Records as "Benedict le Puncteur" (see
my _Fables Of Aesop_, i. p. 170). Similar incidents occur in "Jack and
his Snuff-box" in my _English Fairy Tales_, and in Dr. Hyde's "Well of
D'Yerree-in-Dowan." The skilled companions of Kulhwych are common in
European folk-tales (_Cf._ Cosquin, i. 123-5), and especially among the
Celts (see Mr. Nutt's note in MacInnes' _Tales_, 445-8), among whom
they occur very early, but not so early as Lynceus and the other
skilled comrades of the Argonauts.

_Remarks_.--The hunting of the boar Trwyth can be traced back in Welsh

tradition at least as early as the ninth century. For it is referred to
in the following passage of Nennius' _Historia Britonum_ ed. Stevenson,
p: 60, "Est aliud miraculum in regione quae dicitur Buelt [Builth, co.
Brecon] Est ibi cumulus lapidum et unus lapis super-positus super
congestum cum vestigia canis in eo. Quando venatus est porcum Troynt
[_var. lec._ Troit] impressit Cabal, qui erat canis Arthuri militis,
vestigium in lapide et Arthur postea congregavit congestum lapidum sub
lapide in quo erat vestigium canis sui et vocatur Carn Cabal."
Curiously enough there is still a mountain called Carn Cabal in the
district of Builth, south of Rhayader Gwy in Breconshire. Still more
curiously a friend of Lady Guest's found on this a cairn with a stone
two feet long by one foot wide in which there was an indentation 4 in.
x 3 in. x 2 in. which could easily have been mistaken for a paw-print
of a dog, as maybe seen from the engraving given of it (Mabinogion, ed.
1874, p. 269).

The stone and the legend are thus at least one thousand years old.
"There stands the stone to tell if I lie." According to Prof. Rhys
(_Hibbert Lect._ 486-97) the whole story is a mythological one,
Kulhwych's mother being the dawn, the clover blossoms that grow under
Olwen's feet being comparable to the roses that sprung up where
Aphrodite had trod, and Yspyddadon being the incarnation of the sacred
hawthorn. Mabon, again (_i.e._ pp. 21, 28-9), is the Apollo Maponus
discovered in Latin inscriptions at Ainstable in Cumberland and
elsewhere (H�bner, _Corp. Insc. Lat. Brit._ Nos. 218, 332, 1345).
Granting all this, there is nothing to show any mythological
significance in the tale, though there may have been in the names of
the _dramatis personae_. I observe from the proceedings of the recent
Eisteddfod that the bardic name of Mr. W. Abraham, M.P., is 'Mabon.' It
scarcely follows that Mr. Abraham is in receipt of divine honours
nowadays.

XIV. JACK AND HIS COMRADES.

_Source_.--Kennedy's _Legendary Fictions of the Irish Celts_.

_Parallels_.--This is the fullest and most dramatic version I know of

the Grimm's "Town Musicians of Bremen" (No. 27). I have given an
English (American) version in my _English Fairy Tales_, No. 5, in the
notes to which would be found references to other versions known in the
British Isles (_e.g._, Campbell, No. 11) and abroad. _Cf._ remarks on
No. vi.

XV. SHEE AN GANNON AND GRUAGACH GAIRE.

_Source._--Curtin, _Myths and Folk-Lore of Ireland_, p. 114 _seq._ I

have shortened the earlier part of the tale, and introduced into the
latter a few touches from Campbell's story of "Fionn's Enchantment," in
_Revue Celtique_, t. i., 193 _seq._
_Parallels_.--The early part is similar to the beginning of "The
Sea-Maiden" (No. xvii., which see). The latter part is practically the
same as the story of "Fionn's Enchantment," just referred to. It also
occurs in MacInnes' _Tales_, No. iii., "The King of Albainn" (see Mr.
Nutt's notes, 454). The head-crowned spikes are Celtic, _cf._ Mr.
Nutt's notes (MacInnes' _Tales_, 453).

_Remarks_.--Here again we meet the question whether the folk-tale

precedes the hero-tale about Finn or was derived from it, and again the
probability seems that our story has the priority as a folk-tale, and
was afterwards applied to the national hero, Finn. This is confirmed by
the fact that a thirteenth century French romance, _Conte du Graal_,
has much the same incidents, and was probably derived from a similar
folk-tale of the Celts. Indeed, Mr. Nutt is inclined to think that the
original form of our story (which contains a mysterious healing vessel)
is the germ out of which the legend of the Holy Grail was evolved (see
his _Studies in the Holy Grail_, p. 202 _seq._).

XVI. THE STORY-TELLER AT FAULT.

_Source_.--Griffin's _Tales from a Jury-Room_, combined with Campbell,

No. xvii. _c_, "The Slim Swarthy Champion."

_Parallels_.--Campbell gives another variant, _l.c._ i. 318. Dr. Hyde

has an Irish version of Campbell's tale written down in 1762, from
which he gives the incident of the air-ladder (which I have had to
euphemise in my version) in his _Beside the Fireside_, p. 191, and
other passages in his Preface. The most remarkable parallel to this
incident, however, is afforded by the feats of Indian jugglers reported
briefly by Marco Polo, and illustrated with his usual wealth of
learning by the late Sir Henry Yule, in his edition, vol. i. p. 308
_seq._ The accompanying illustration (reduced from Yule) will tell its
own tale: it is taken from the Dutch account of the travels of an
English sailor, E. Melton, _Zeldzaame Reizen_, 1702, p. 468. It tells
the tale in five acts, all included in one sketch. Another instance
quoted by Yule is still more parallel, so to speak. The twenty-third
trick performed by some conjurors before the Emperor Jahangueir
(_Memoirs_, p. 102) is thus described: "They produced a chain of 50
cubits in length, and in my presence threw one end of it towards the
sky, where it remained as if fastened to something in the air. A dog
was then brought forward, and being placed at the lower end of the
chain, immediately ran up, and, reaching the other end, immediately
disappeared in the air. In the same manner a hog, a panther, a lion,
and a tiger were successively sent up the chain." It has been suggested
that the conjurors hypnotise the spectators, and make them believe they
see these things. This is practically the suggestion of a wise
Mohammedan, who is quoted by Yule as saying, "_Wallah!_ 'tis my opinion
there has been neither going up nor coming down; 'tis all hocus-pocus,"
hocus-pocus being presumably the Mohammedan term for hypnotism.

_Remarks_.--Dr. Hyde (_l.c._ Pref. xxix.) thinks our tale cannot be

older than 1362, because of a reference to one O'Connor Sligo which
occurs in all its variants; it is, however, omitted in our somewhat
abridged version. Mr Nutt (_ap._ Campbell, _The Fians_, Introd. xix.)
thinks that this does not prevent a still earlier version having
existed. I should have thought that the existence of so distinctly
Eastern a trick in the tale, and the fact that it is a framework story
(another Eastern characteristic), would imply that it is a rather late
importation, with local allusions superadded (_cf._ notes on "Conal
Yellowclaw," No v.)

The passages in verse from pp 137, 139, and the description of the
Beggarman, pp. 136, 140, are instances of a curious characteristic of
Gaelic folk-tales called "runs." Collections of conventional epithets
are used over and over again to describe the same incident, the
beaching of a boat, sea-faring, travelling and the like, and are
inserted in different tales. These "runs" are often similar in both the
Irish and the Scotch form of the same tale or of the same incident. The
volumes of _Waifs and Strays_ contain numerous examples of these
"runs," which have been indexed in each volume. These "runs" are
another confirmation of my view that the original form of the folk-tale
was that of the _Cante-fable_ (see note on "Connla" and on "Childe
Rowland" in _English Fairy Tales_).

XVII. SEA-MAIDEN.

_Source_.--Campbell, _Pop. Tales_, No. 4. I have omitted the births of

the animal comrades and transposed the carlin to the middle of the
tale. Mr. Batten has considerately idealised the Sea-Maiden in his
frontispiece. When she restores the husband to the wife in one of the
variants, she brings him out of her mouth! "So the sea-maiden put up
his head (_Who do you mean? Out of her mouth to be sure. She had
swallowed him_)."

_Parallels_.--The early part of the story occurs in No. xv., "Shee an

Gannon," and the last part in No. xix., "Fair, Brown, and Trembling"
(both from Curtin), Campbell's No. 1. "The Young King" is much like it;
also MacInnes' No. iv., "Herding of Cruachan" and No. viii., "Lod the
Farmer's Son." The third of Mr. Britten's Irish folk-tales in the
_Folk-Lore Journal_ is a Sea-Maiden story. The story is obviously a
favourite one among the Celts. Yet its main incidents occur with
frequency in Continental folk-tales. Prof. K�hler has collected a
number in his notes on Campbell's Tales in _Orient und Occident_, Bnd.
ii. 115-8. The trial of the sword occurs in the saga of Sigurd, yet it
is also frequent in Celtic saga and folk-tales (see Mr. Nutt's note,
MacInnes' _Tales_, 473, and add. Curtin, 320). The hideous carlin and
her three giant sons is also a common form in Celtic. The external soul
of the Sea-Maiden carried about in an egg, in a trout, in a hoodie, in
a hind, is a remarkable instance of a peculiarly savage conception
which has been studied by Major Temple, _Wide-awake Stories_, 404-5; by
Mr. E. Clodd, in the "Philosophy of Punchkin," in _Folk-Lore Journal_,
vol. ii., and by Mr. Frazer in his _Golden Bough_, vol. ii.

_Remarks_.--As both Prof. Rhys (_Hibbert Lect._, 464) and Mr. Nutt
(MacInnes' _Tales_, 477) have pointed out, practically the same story
(that of Perseus and Andromeda) is told of the Ultonian hero,
Cuchulain, in the _Wooing of Emer_, a tale which occurs in the Book of
Leinster, a MS. of the twelfth century, and was probably copied from
one of the eighth. Unfortunately it is not complete, and the Sea-Maiden
incident is only to be found in a British Museum MS. of about 1300. In
this Cuchulain finds that the daughter of Ruad is to be given as a
tribute to the Fomori, who, according to Prof. Rhys, _Folk-Lore_, ii.
293, have something of the night_mare_ about their etymology. Cuchulain
fights _three_ of them successively, has his wounds bound up by a strip
of the maiden's garment, and then departs. Thereafter many boasted of
having slain the Fomori, but the maiden believed them not till at last
by a stratagem she recognises Cuchulain. I may add to this that in Mr.
Curtin's _Myths_, 330, the threefold trial of the sword is told of
Cuchulain. This would seem to trace our story back to the seventh or
eighth century and certainly to the thirteenth. If so, it is likely
enough that it spread from Ireland through Europe with the Irish
missions (for the wide extent of which see map in Mrs. Bryant's _Celtic
Ireland_). The very letters that have spread through all Europe except
Russia, are to be traced to the script of these Irish monks: why not
certain folk-tales? There is a further question whether the story was
originally told of Cuchulain as a hero-tale and then became
departicularised as a folk-tale, or was the process _vice versa_.
Certainly in the form in which it appears in the _Tochmarc Emer_ it is
not complete, so that here, as elsewhere, we seem to have an instance
of a folk-tale applied to a well-known heroic name, and becoming a
hero-tale or saga.

XVIII. LEGEND OF KNOCKMANY.

_Source_.--W. Carleton, _Traits and Stories of the Irish Peasantry_.

_Parallels_.--Kennedy's "Fion MacCuil and the Scotch Giant," _Legend.

Fict._, 203-5.

_Remarks_.--Though the venerable names of Finn and Cucullin (Cuchulain)

are attached to the heroes of this story, this is probably only to give
an extrinsic interest to it. The two heroes could not have come
together in any early form of their sagas, since Cuchulain's reputed
date is of the first, Finn's of the third century A.D. (_cf._ however,
MacDougall's _Tales_, notes, 272). Besides, the grotesque form of the
legend is enough to remove it from the region of the hero-tale. On the
other hand, there is a distinct reference to Finn's wisdom-tooth, which
presaged the future to him (on this see _Revue Celtique_, v. 201,
Joyce, _Old Celt. Rom._, 434-5, and MacDougall, _l.c._ 274). Cucullin's
power-finger is another instance of the life-index or external soul, on
which see remarks on Sea-Maiden. Mr. Nutt informs me that parodies of
the Irish sagas occur as early as the sixteenth century, and the
present tale may be regarded as a specimen.

XIX. FAIR, BROWN, AND TREMBLING.

_Source_.--Curtin, _Myths, &c., of Ireland, 78 seq._

_Parallels_.--The latter half resembles the second part of the

Sea-Maiden (No. xvii.), which see. The earlier portion is a Cinderella
tale (on which see the late Mr. Ralston's article in _Nineteenth
Century_, Nov. 1879, and Mr. Lang's treatment in his Perrault). Miss
Roalfe Cox is about to publish for the Folk-Lore Society a whole volume
of variants of the Cinderella group of stories, which are remarkably
well represented in these isles, nearly a dozen different versions
being known in England, Ireland, and Scotland.

XX. JACK AND HIS MASTER.

_Source_.--Kennedy, _Fireside Stories of Ireland_, 74-80, "Shan an

Omadhan and his Master."

_Parallels_.--It occurs also in Campbell, No. xlv., "Mac a Rusgaich."

It is a European droll, the wide occurrence of which--"the loss of
temper bet" I should call it--is bibliographised by M. Cosquin, _l.c._
ii. 50 (_cf._ notes on No. vi.).

XXI. BETH GELLERT.

_Source_.--I have paraphrased the well-known poem of Hon. W. R.

Spencer, "Beth G�lert, or the Grave of the Greyhound," first printed
privately as a broadsheet in 1800 when it was composed ("August 11,
1800, Dolymalynllyn" is the colophon). It was published in Spencer's
_Poems_, 1811, pp. 78-86. These dates, it will be seen, are of
importance. Spencer states in a note: "The story of this ballad is
traditionary in a village at the foot of Snowdon where Llewellyn the
Great had a house. The Greyhound named G�lert was given him by his
father-in-law, King John, in the year 1205, and the place to this day
is called Beth-G�lert, or the grave of G�lert." As a matter of fact, no
trace of the tradition in connection with Bedd Gellert can be found
before Spencer's time. It is not mentioned in Leland's _Itinerary_, ed.
Hearne, v. p. 37 ("Beth Kellarth"), in Pennant's _Tour_ (1770), ii.
176, or in Bingley's _Tour in Wales_ (1800). Borrow in his _Wild
Wales_, p. 146, gives the legend, but does not profess to derive it
from local tradition.

_Parallels_.--The only parallel in Celtdom is that noticed by Croker in

his third volume, the legend of Partholan who killed his wife's
greyhound from jealousy: this is found sculptured in stone at Ap Brune,
co. Limerick. As is well known, and has been elaborately discussed by
Mr. Baring-Gould (_Curious Myths of the Middle Ages_, p. 134 _seq._),
and Mr. W. A. Clouston (_Popular Tales and Fictions_, ii. 166, _seq._),
the story of the man who rashly slew the dog (ichneumon, weasel, &c.)
that had saved his babe from death, is one of those which have spread
from East to West. It is indeed, as Mr. Clouston points out, still
current in India, the land of its birth. There is little doubt that it
is originally Buddhistic: the late Prof. S. Beal gave the earliest
known version from the Chinese translation of the _Vinaya Pitaka_ in
the _Academy_ of Nov. 4, 1882. The conception of an animal sacrificing
itself for the sake of others is peculiarly Buddhistic; the "hare in
the moon" is an apotheosis of such a piece of self-sacrifice on the
part of Buddha (_Sasa Jataka_). There are two forms that have reached
the West, the first being that of an animal saving men at the cost of
its own life. I pointed out an early instance of this, quoted by a
Rabbi of the second century, in my _Fables of Aesop_, i. 105. This
concludes with a strangely close parallel to Gellert; "They raised a
cairn over his grave, and the place is still called The Dog's Grave."
The _Culex_ attributed to Virgil seems to be another variant of this.
The second form of the legend is always told as a moral apologue
against precipitate action, and originally occurred in _The Fables of
Bidpai_ in its hundred and one forms, all founded on Buddhistic
originals (_cf._ Benfey, _Pantschatantra_, Einleitung, �201).
[Footnote: It occurs in the same chapter as the story of La Perrette,
which has been traced, after Benfey, by Prof. M. M�ller in his
"Migration of Fables" (_Sel. Essays_, i. 500-74): exactly the same
history applies to Gellert.] Thence, according to Benfey, it was
inserted in the _Book of Sindibad_, another collection of Oriental
Apologues framed on what may be called the Mrs. Potiphar formula. This
came to Europe with the Crusades, and is known in its Western versions
as the _Seven Sages of Rome_. The Gellert story occurs in all the
Oriental and Occidental versions; _e.g._, it is the First Master's
story in Wynkyn de Worde's (ed. G. L. Gomme, for the Villon Society.)
From the _Seven Sages_ it was taken into the particular branch of the
_Gesta Romanorum_ current in England and known as the English _Gesta_,
where it occurs as c. xxxii., "Story of Folliculus." We have thus
traced it to England whence it passed to Wales, where I have discovered
it as the second apologue of "The Fables of Cattwg the Wise," in the
Iolo MS. published by the Welsh MS. Society, p.561, "The man who killed
his Greyhound." (These Fables, Mr. Nutt informs me, are a pseudonymous
production probably of the sixteenth century.) This concludes the
literary route of the Legend of Gellert from India to Wales: Buddhistic
_Vinaya Pitaka--Fables of Bidpai_;--Oriental _Sindibad_;--Occidental
_Seven Sages of Rome_;--"English" (Latin), _Gesta Romanorum_;--Welsh,
_Fables of Cattwg_.

_Remarks_.--We have still to connect the legend with Llewelyn and with
Bedd Gelert. But first it may be desirable to point out why it is
necessary to assume that the legend is a legend and not a fact. The
saving of an infant's life by a dog, and the mistaken slaughter of the
dog, are not such an improbable combination as to make it impossible
that the same event occurred in many places. But what is impossible, in
my opinion, is that such an event should have independently been used
in different places as the typical instance of, and warning against,
rash action. That the Gellert legend, before it was localised, was used
as a moral apologue in Wales is shown by the fact that it occurs among
the Fables of Cattwg, which are all of that character. It was also
utilised as a proverb: "_Yr wy'n edivaru cymmaint a'r Gwr a laddodd ei
Vilgi_" ("I repent as much as the man who slew his greyhound"). The
fable indeed, from this point of view, seems greatly to have attracted
the Welsh mind, perhaps as of especial value to a proverbially
impetuous temperament. Croker (_Fairy Legends of Ireland_, vol. iii. p.
165) points out several places where the legend seems to have been
localised in place-names--two places, called "Gwal y Vilast"
("Greyhound's Couch"), in Carmarthen and Glamorganshire; "Llech y Asp"
("Dog's Stone"), in Cardigan, and another place named in Welsh "Spring
of the Greyhound's Stone." Mr. Baring-Gould mentions that the legend is
told of an ordinary tombstone, with a knight and a greyhound, in
Abergavenny Church; while the Fable of Cattwg is told of a man in
Abergarwan. So widespread and well known was the legend that it was in
Richard III's time adopted as the national crest. In the Warwick Roll,
at the Herald's Office, after giving separate crests for England,
Scotland, and Ireland, that for Wales is given as figured in the
margin, and blazoned "on a coronet in a cradle or, a greyhound argent
for Walys" (see J. R. Planch�, _Twelve Designs for the Costume of
Shakespeare's Richard III._, 1830, frontispiece). If this Roll is
authentic, the popularity of the legend is thrown back into the
fifteenth century. It still remains to explain how and when this
general legend of rash action was localised and specialised at Bedd
Gelert: I believe I have discovered this. There certainly was a local
legend about a dog named Gelert at that place; E. Jones, in the first
edition of his _Musical Relicks of the Welsh Bards_, 1784, p. 40, gives
the following _englyn_ or epigram:

Claddwyd Cylart celfydd (ymlyniad)

Ymlaneau Efionydd
Parod giuio i'w gynydd
Parai'r dydd yr heliai Hydd;

which he Englishes thus:

The remains of famed Cylart, so faithful and good,

The bounds of the cantred conceal;
Whenever the doe or the stag he pursued
His master was sure of a meal.

No reference was made in the first edition to the Gellert legend, but
in the second edition of 1794, p. 75, a note was added telling the
legend, "There is a general tradition in North Wales that a wolf had
entered the house of Prince Llewellyn. Soon after the Prince returned
home, and, going into the nursery, he met his dog _Kill-hart_, all
bloody and wagging his tail at him; Prince Llewellyn, on entering the
room found the cradle where his child lay overturned, and the floor
flowing with blood; imagining that the greyhound had killed the child,
he immediately drew his sword and stabbed it; then, turning up the
cradle, found under it the child alive, and the wolf dead. This so
grieved the Prince, that he erected a tomb over his faithful dog's
grave; where afterwards the parish church was built and goes by that
name--_Bedd Cilhart_, or the grave of Kill-hart, in _Carnarvonshire_.
From this incident is elicited a very common Welsh proverb [that given
above which occurs also in 'The Fables of Cattwg;' it will be observed
that it is quite indefinite.]" "Prince Llewellyn ab Jorwerth married
Joan, [natural] daughter of King John, by _Agatha_, daughter of Robert
Ferrers, Earl of Derby; and the dog was a present to the prince from
his father-in-law about the year 1205." It was clearly from this note
that the Hon. Mr. Spencer got his account; oral tradition does not
indulge in dates _Anno Domini_. The application of the general legend
of "the man who slew his greyhound" to the dog Cylart, was due to the
learning of E. Jones, author of the _Musical Relicks_. I am convinced
of this, for by a lucky chance I am enabled to give the real legend
about Cylart, which is thus given in Carlisle's _Topographical
Dictionary of Wales_, s.v., "Bedd Celert," published in 1811, the date
of publication of Mr. Spencer's _Poems_. "Its name, according to
tradition, implies _The Grave of Celert_, a Greyhound which belonged to
Llywelyn, the last Prince of Wales: and a large Rock is still pointed
out as the monument of this celebrated Dog, being on the spot where it
was found dead, together with the stag which it had pursued from
Carnarvon," which is thirteen miles distant. The cairn was thus a
monument of a "record" run of a greyhound: the _englyn_ quoted by Jones
is suitable enough for this, while quite inadequate to record the later
legendary exploits of G�lert. Jones found an _englyn_ devoted to _an_
exploit of a dog named Cylart, and chose to interpret it in his second
edition, 1794, as _the_ exploit of a greyhound with which all the world
(in Wales) were acquainted. Mr. Spencer took the legend from Jones (the
reference to the date 1205 proves that), enshrined it in his somewhat
_banal_ verses, which were lucky enough to be copied into several
reading-books, and thus became known to all English-speaking folk.
It remains only to explain why Jones connected the legend with
Llewelyn. Llewelyn had local connection with Bedd Gellert, which was
the seat of an Augustinian abbey, one of the oldest in Wales. An
inspeximus of Edward I. given in Dugdale, _Monast. Angl._, ed. pr. ii.
100a, quotes as the earliest charter of the abbey "Cartam Lewelin,
magni." The name of the abbey was "Beth Kellarth"; the name is thus
given by Leland, _l.c._, and as late as 1794 an engraving at the
British Museum is entitled "Beth Kelert," while Carlisle gives it as
"Beth Celert." The place was thus named after the abbey, not after the
cairn or rock. This is confirmed by the fact of which Prof. Rhys had
informed me, that the collocation of letters _rt_ is un-Welsh. Under
these circumstances it is not impossible, I think, that the earlier
legend of the marvellous run of "Cylart" from Carnarvon was due to the
etymologising fancy of some English-speaking Welshman who interpreted
the name as Killhart, so that the simpler legend would be only a
folk-etymology.

But whether Kellarth, Kelert, Cylart, G�lert or Gellert ever existed

and ran a hart from Carnarvon to Bedd Gellert or no, there can be
little doubt after the preceding that he was not the original hero of
the fable of "the man that slew his greyhound," which came to Wales
from Buddhistic India through channels which are perfectly traceable.
It was Edward Jones who first raised him to that proud position, and
William Spencer who securely installed him there, probably for all
time. The legend is now firmly established at Bedd Gellert. There is
said to be an ancient air, "Bedd Gelert," "as sung by the Ancient
Britons"; it is given in a pamphlet published at Carnarvon in the
"fifties," entitled _Gellert's Grave; or, Llewellyn's Rashness: a
Ballad, by the Hon. W. R. Spencer, to which is added that ancient Welsh
air, "Bedd Gelert," as sung by the Ancient Britons_. The air is from R.
Roberts' "Collection of Welsh Airs," but what connection it has with
the legend I have been unable to ascertain. This is probably another
case of adapting one tradition to another. It is almost impossible to
distinguish palaeozoic and cainozoic strata in oral tradition.
According to Murray's _Guide to N. Wales_, p. 125, the only authority
for the cairn now shown is that of the landlord of the Goat Inn, "who
felt compelled by the cravings of tourists to invent a grave." Some old
men at Bedd Gellert, Prof. Rhys informs me, are ready to testify that
they saw the cairn laid. They might almost have been present at the
birth of the legend, which, if my affiliation of it is correct, is not
yet quite 100 years old.

XXII. STORY OF IVAN.

_Source_.--Lluyd, _Archaeologia Britannia_, 1707, the first comparative

Celtic grammar and the finest piece of work in comparative philology
hitherto done in England, contains this tale as a specimen of Cornish
then still spoken in Cornwall. I have used the English version
contained in _Blackwood's Magazine_ as long ago as May 1818. I have
taken the third counsel from the Irish version, as the original is not
suited _virginibus puerisque_, though harmless enough in itself.

_Parallels_.--Lover has a tale, _The Three Advices_. It occurs also in

modern Cornwall _ap._ Hunt, _Drolls of West of England_, 344, "The
Tinner of Chyamor." Borrow, _Wild Wales_, 41, has a reference which
seems to imply that the story had crystallised into a Welsh proverb.
Curiously enough, it forms the chief episode of the so-called "Irish
Odyssey" ("_Merugud Uilix maiec Leirtis_"--"Wandering of Ulysses
M'Laertes"). It was derived, in all probability, from the _Gesta
Romanorum_, c. 103, where two of the three pieces of advice are "Avoid
a byeway," "Beware of a house where the housewife is younger than her
husband." It is likely enough that this chapter, like others of the
_Gesta_, came from the East, for it is found in some versions of "The
Forty Viziers," and in the _Turkish Tales_ (see Oesterley's parallels
and _Gesta_, ed. Swan and Hooper, note 9).

XXIII. ANDREW COFFEY.

_Source_.--From the late D. W. Logie, written down by Mr. Alfred Nutt.

_Parallels_.--Dr. Hyde's "Teig O'Kane and the Corpse," and Kennedy's

"Cauth Morrisy," _Legend. Fict._, 158, are practically the same.

_Remarks_.--No collection of Celtic Folk-Tales would be representative

that did not contain some specimen of the gruesome. The most effective
ghoul story in existence is Lover's "Brown Man."

XXIV. BATTLE OF BIRDS.

_Source_.--Campbell (_Pop. Tales, W. Highlands_, No. ii.), with touches

from the seventh variant and others, including the casket and key
finish, from Curtin's "Son of the King of Erin" (_Myths, &c., 32
seq._). I have also added a specimen of the humorous end pieces added
by Gaelic story-tellers; on these tags see an interesting note in
MacDougall's _Tales_, note on p. 112. I have found some difficulty in
dealing with Campbell's excessive use of the second person singular,
"If thou thouest him some two or three times, 'tis well," but beyond
that it is wearisome. Practically, I have reserved _thou_ for the
speech of giants, who may be supposed to be somewhat old-fashioned. I
fear, however, I have not been quite consistent, though the _you's_
addressed to the apple-pips are grammatically correct as applied to the
pair of lovers.

_Parallels_.--Besides the eight versions given or abstracted by

Campbell and Mr. Curtin's, there is Carleton's "Three Tasks," Dr.
Hyde's "Son of Branduf" (MS.); there is the First Tale of MacInnes
(where see Mr. Nutt's elaborate notes, 431-43), two in the _Celtic
Magazine_, vol. xii., "Grey Norris from Warland" (_Folk-Lore Journ._ i.
316), and Mr. Lang's Morayshire Tale, "Nicht Nought Nothing" (see _Eng.
Fairy Tales_, No. vii.), no less than sixteen variants found among the
Celts. It must have occurred early among them. Mr. Nutt found the
feather-thatch incident in the _Agallamh na Senoraib_ ("Discourse of
Elders"), which is at least as old as the fifteenth century. Yet the
story is to be found throughout the Indo-European world, as is shown by
Prof. K�hler's elaborate list of parallels attached to Mr. Lang's
variant in _Revue Celtique_, iii. 374; and Mr. Lang, in his _Custom and
Myth_ ("A far travelled Tale"), has given a number of parallels from
savage sources. And strangest of all, the story is practically the same
as the classical myth of Jason and Medea.

_Remarks_.--Mr. Nutt, in his discussion of the tale (MacInnes, _Tales_

441), makes the interesting suggestion that the obstacles to pursuit,
the forest, the mountain, and the river, exactly represent the boundary
of the old Teutonic Hades, so that the story was originally one of the
Descent to Hell. Altogether it seems likely that it is one of the
oldest folk-tales in existence, and belonged to the story-store of the
original Aryans, whoever they were, was passed by them with their
language on to the Hellenes and perhaps to the Indians, was developed
in its modern form in Scandinavia (where its best representative "The
Master Maid" of Asbj�rnsen is still found), was passed by them to the
Celts and possibly was transmitted by these latter to other parts of
Europe, perhaps by early Irish monks (see notes on "Sea-Maiden"). The
spread in the Buddhistic world, and thence to the South Seas and
Madagascar, would be secondary from India. I hope to have another
occasion for dealing with this most interesting of all folk-tales in
the detail it deserves.

XXV. BREWERY OF EGGSHELLS.

_Source_.--From the _Cambrian Quarterly Magazine_, 1830, vol. ii. p.

86; it is stated to be literally translated from the Welsh.

_Parallels_.--Another variant from Glamorganshire is given in Y

Cymmrodor, vi. 209. Croker has the story under the title I have given
the Welsh one in his _Fairy Legends_, 41. Mr. Hartland, in his _Science
of Fairy Tales_, 113-6, gives the European parallels.

XXVI. LAD WITH THE GOAT SKIN.

_Source_.--Kennedy, _Legendary Fictions_, pp. 23-31. The Adventures of

"Gilla na Chreck an Gour'."

_Parallels_.--"The Lad with the Skin Coverings" is a popular Celtic

figure, _cf._ MacDougall's Third Tale, MacInnes' Second, and a
reference in Campbell, iii. 147. According to Mr. Nutt (_Holy Grail_,
134), he is the original of Parzival. But the adventures in these tales
are not the "cure by laughing" incident which forms the centre of our
tale, and is Indo-European in extent (_cf._ references in _English
Fairy Tales_, notes to No. xxvii.). "The smith who made hell too hot
for him is Sisyphus," says Mr. Lang (Introd. to Grimm, p. xiii.); in
Ireland he is Billy Dawson (Carleton, _Three Wishes_). In the
Finn-Saga, Conan harries hell, as readers of _Waverley_ may remember
"'Claw for claw, and devil take the shortest nails,' as Conan said to
the Devil" (_cf._ Campbell, _The Fians_, 73, and notes, 283).
Red-haired men in Ireland and elsewhere are always rogues (see Mr.
Nutt's references, MacInnes' _Tales_, 477; to which add the case in
"Lough Neagh," Yeats, _Irish Folk-Tales_, p. 210).
End of Project Gutenberg's Celtic Fairy Tales, by Joseph Jacobs (coll. & ed.)

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The Project Gutenberg EBook of Hero-Myths & Legends of the British Race, by
Maud Isabel Ebbutt

This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or
re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org

Title: Hero-Myths & Legends of the British Race

Author: Maud Isabel Ebbutt

Release Date: May 17, 2008 [EBook #25502]

Language: English

Character set encoding: UTF-8

*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK HERO-MYTHS ***

Produced by Ted Garvin, Sam W. and the Online Distributed

Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net

Transcriber's Note

The Glossary and Index includes a pronunciation of the Anglo-Saxon

names in the text. These include some characters with a macron (straight
line) above, and some with a breve (u-shaped symbol) above. Also used
is the accute accent (�). If these do not display properly, you may need
to adjust your font settings.
 HERO-MYTHS & LEGENDS
OF THE BRITISH RACE

BY
M. I. EBBUTT M. A.

WITH FIFTY-ONE FULL-PAGE ILLUSTRATIONS BY

J. H. F. BACON A.R.A. BYAM SHAW

W. H. MARGETSON R.I. GERTRUDE
DEMAIN HAMMOND AND OTHERS

[Illustration]

GEORGE G. HARRAP & COMPANY LTD.

LONDON CALCUTTA SYDNEY

[Illustration: Robin Hood and the Black Monk

William Sewell

[_Page 331_]]

_First published August 1910_

_by GEORGE G. HARRAP & CO._
_39-41 Parker Street, Kingsway, London, W.C.2_

_Reprinted: October 1910_

_September 1911_
_December 1914_
_May 1916_
_December 1917_
_February 1920_
_June 1924_

_Printed in Great Britain at THE BALLANTYNE PRESS by_

SPOTTISWOODE, BALLANTYNE & CO. LTD.
_Colchester, London & Eton_

TO

MISS JULIA KENNEDY

IN TOKEN OF THE ADMIRATION

AND AFFECTION OF AN
 OLD PUPIL
THIS BOOK IS DEDICATED

PREFACE

In refashioning, for the pleasure of readers of the twentieth century,

these versions of ancient tales which have given pleasure to
story-lovers of all centuries from the eighth onward, I feel that some
explanation of my choice is necessary. Men's conceptions of the heroic
change with changing years, and vary with each individual mind; hence
it often happens that one person sees in a legend only the central
heroism, while another sees only the inartistic details of medi�val
life which tend to disguise and warp the heroic quality.

It may be that to some people the heroes I have chosen do not seem
heroic, but there is no doubt that to the age and generation which
wrote or sang of them they appeared real heroes, worthy of remembrance
and celebration, and it has been my object to come as close as
possible to the medi�val mind, with its elementary conceptions of
honour, loyalty, devotion, and duty. I have therefore altered the
tales as little as I could, and have tried to put them as fairly as
possible before modern readers, bearing in mind the altered conditions
of things and of intellects to-day.

In the work of selecting and retelling these stories I have to

acknowledge with most hearty thanks the help and advice of Mr. F. E.
Bumby, B.A., of the University College, Nottingham, who has been
throughout a most kind and candid censor or critic. His help has been
in every way invaluable. I have also to acknowledge the generous
permission given me by Mr. W. B. Yeats to write in prose the story of
his beautiful play, "The Countess Cathleen," and to adorn it with
quotations from that play.

The poetical quotations are attributed to the authors from whose

works they are taken wherever it is possible. When medi�val passages
occur which are not thus attributed they are my own versions from the
original medi�val poems.

M. I. EBBUTT

TANGLEWOOD
BARNT GREEN
_July 1910_

CONTENTS

CHAP. PAGE
INTRODUCTION xvii

I. BEOWULF 1
 II. THE DREAM OF MAXEN WLEDIG 42

III. THE STORY OF CONSTANTINE AND ELENE 50

IV. THE COMPASSION OF CONSTANTINE 63

V. HAVELOK THE DANE 73

VI. HOWARD THE HALT 95

VII. ROLAND, THE HERO OF EARLY FRANCE 119

VIII. THE COUNTESS CATHLEEN 156

IX. CUCHULAIN, THE CHAMPION OF IRELAND 184

X. THE TALE OF GAMELYN 204

XI. WILLIAM OF CLOUDESLEE 225

XII. BLACK COLIN OF LOCH AWE 248

XIII. THE MARRIAGE OF SIR GAWAYNE 265

XIV. KING HORN 286

XV. ROBIN HOOD 314

XVI. HEREWARD THE WAKE 334

GLOSSARY AND INDEX 353

LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS

PAGE
Robin Hood and the Black Monk
(_William Sewell_) _Frontispiece_

_To face page_

"The demon of evil, with his fierce ravening, greedily
grasped them"
(_J. H. F. Bacon, A.R.A._) 4

Beowulf replies haughtily to Hunferth

(_J. H. F. Bacon, A.R.A._) 12

Beowulf finds the head of Aschere

(_J. H. F. Bacon, A.R.A._) 22

Beowulf shears off the head of Grendel

(_J. H. F. Bacon, A.R.A._) 26

The death of Beowulf

(_J. H. F. Bacon, A.R.A._) 40
The dream of the Emperor
(_Byam Shaw_) 46

The Queen's dilemma

(_Byam Shaw_) 60

They filled the great vessel of silver with pure water

(_Byam Shaw_) 70

"Havelok sat up surprised"

(_J. H. F. Bacon, A.R.A._) 78

"Havelok again overthrew the porters"

(_J. H. F. Bacon, A.R.A._) 82

"With great joy they fell on their knees"

(_J. H. F. Bacon, A.R.A._) 88

Olaf and Sigrid

(_J. H. F. Bacon, A.R.A._) 98

Howard leaves the house of Thorbiorn

(_J. H. F. Bacon, A.R.A._) 106

"The silver rolled in all directions from his cloak"

(_J. H. F. Bacon, A.R.A._) 110

"Thorbiorn lifted the huge stone"

(_J. H. F. Bacon, A.R.A._) 116

Charlemagne
(_Stella Langdale_) 120

"Here sits Charles the King"

(_Byam Shaw_) 124

"Ganelon rode away"

(_Byam Shaw_) 130

"Charlemagne heard it again"

(_Byam Shaw_) 144

Aude the Fair

(_Evelyn Paul_) 154

"Day by day Cathleen went among them"

(_W. H. Margetson, R.I._) 162

The peasant's story

(_W. H. Margetson, R.I._) 172

"Thieves have broken into the treasure-chamber"

(_W. H. Margetson, R.I._) 176

"Cathleen signed the bond"

(_W. H. Margetson, R.I._) 180

"All three drove furiously towards Cruachan"

(_W. H. Margetson, R.I._) 190
"Three monstrous cats were let into the room"
(_W. H. Margetson, R.I._) 192

"The dragon sank towards him, opening its terrible jaws"

(_W. H. Margetson, R.I._) 196

"The body of Uath arose"

(_W. H. Margetson, R.I._) 200

"Go and do your own baking!"

(_W. H. Margetson, R.I._) 206

"Lords, for Christ's sake help poor Gamelyn out of prison!"

(_W. H. Margetson, R.I._) 214

"Then cheer thee, Adam"

(_W. H. Margetson, R.I._) 218

"Come from the seat of justice!"

(_W. H. Margetson, R.I._) 222

"William continued his wonderful archery"

(_Patten Wilson_) 232

Adam Bell writes the letter

(_Patten Wilson_) 234

The fight at the gate

(_Patten Wilson_) 238

William of Cloudeslee and his son

(_Patten Wilson_) 244

"Wait for me seven years, dear wife"

(_Byam Shaw_) 252

"The King blew a loud note on his bugle"

(_W. H. Margetson, R.I._) 268

"Now you have released me from the spell completely"

(_W. H. Margetson, R.I._) 282

Queen Godhild prays ever for her son Horn

(_Patten Wilson_) 288

Horn kills the Saracen Leader

(_Patten Wilson_) 298

Horn and his followers disguised as minstrels

(_Patten Wilson_) 312

"Little John caught the horse by the bridle"

(_Patten Wilson_) 316

"I have no money worth offering"

(_Patten Wilson_) 320

"Sir Richard knelt in courteous salutation"

 (_Patten Wilson_) 324

"Much shot the monk to the heart"

(_Patten Wilson_) 330

"Her pleading won relief for them"

(_Gertrude Demain Hammond, R.I._) 334

Alftruda
(_Gertrude Demain Hammond, R.I._) 340

Hereward and the Princess

(_Gertrude Demain Hammond, R.I._) 344

Hereward and Sigtryg

(_Gertrude Demain Hammond, R.I._) 348

INTRODUCTION

The writer who would tell again for people of the twentieth century
the legends and stories that delighted the folk of the thirteenth and
fourteenth centuries finds himself confronted with a vast mass of
material ready to his hand. Unless he exercises a wise discrimination
and has some system of selection, he becomes lost in the mazes of as
enchanted a land,

"Where Truth and Dream walk hand in hand,"[1]

as ever bewildered knights of old in days of romance. Down all the

dimly lighted pathways of medi�val literature mystical figures beckon
him in every direction; fairies, goblins, witches, knights and ladies
and giants entice him, and unless, like Theseus of old, he follows
closely his guiding clue, he will find that he reaches no goal,
attains to no clear vision, achieves no quest. He will remain
spell-bound, captivated by the Middle Ages--

"The life, the delight, and the sorrow

Of troublous and chivalrous years
That knew not of night nor of morrow,
Of hopes or of fears.
The wars and the woes and the glories
That quicken, and lighten, and rain
From the clouds of its chronicled stories
The passion, the pride, and the pain."[2]

Such a golden clue to guide the modern seeker through the labyrinths
of the medi�val mind is that which I have tried to suggest in the
title "_Hero_-Myths and Legends of the British Race"--the pursuit and
representation of the ideal hero as the mind of Britain and of early
and medi�val England imagined him, together with the study of the
characteristics which made this or that particular person, mythical or
legendary, a hero to the century which sang or wrote about him. The
interest goes deeper when we study, not merely

"Old heroes who could grandly do

 As they could greatly dare,"[3]

but

"Heroes of our island breed

And men and women of our British birth."[4]

"Hero-worship endures for ever while man endures," wrote Thomas

Carlyle, and this fidelity of men to their admiration for great heroes
is one of the surest tokens by which we can judge of their own
character. Such as the hero is, such will his worshippers be; and the
men who idolised Robin Hood will be found to have been men who were
themselves in revolt against oppressive law, or who, finding law
powerless to prevent tyranny, glorified the lawless punishment of
wrongs and the bold denunciation of perverted justice. The warriors
who listened to the saga of Beowulf looked on physical prowess as the
best of all heroic qualities, and the Normans who admired Roland saw
in him the ideal of feudal loyalty. To every age, and to every nation,
there is a peculiar ideal of heroism, and in the popular legends of
each age this ideal may be found.

Again, these legends give not only the hero as he seemed to his age;
they also show the social life, the virtues and vices, the
superstitions and beliefs, of earlier ages embedded in the tradition,
as fossils are found in the uplifted strata of some ancient ocean-bed.
They have ceased to live; but they remain, tokens of a life long past.
So in the hero-legends of our nation we may find traces of the
thoughts and religions of our ancestors many centuries ago; traces
which lie close to one another in these romances, telling of the
nations who came to these Islands of the West, settled, were conquered
and driven away to make room for other races whose supremacy has been
as brief, till all these superimposed races have blended into one, to
form the British nation, the most widespread race of modern times. For

"Britain's might and Britain's right

And the brunt of British spears"[5]

are not the boast of the English race alone. No man in England now can
boast of unmixed descent, but must perforce trace his family back
through many a marriage of Frank, and Norman, and Saxon, and Dane, and
Roman, and Celt, and even Iberian, back to prehistoric man--

"Scot and Celt and Norman and Dane,

With the Northman's sinew and heart and brain,
And the Northman's courage for blessing or bane,
Are England's heroes too."[6]

When Tennyson sang his greeting at the coming of Alexandra,

"Saxon or Dane or Norman we,

Teuton or Celt or whatever we be,"

he was only recognising a truth which no boast of pure birth can

cover--the truth that the modern Englishman is a compound of many
races, with many characteristics; and if we would understand him, we
must seek the clue to the riddle in early England and Scotland and
Ireland and Wales, while even France adds her share of enlightenment
towards the solution of the riddle.
 "The Saxon force, the Celtic fire,
These are thy manhood's heritage."[7]

Britain, as far as we can trace men in our island, was first inhabited
by cave-men, who have left no history at all. In the course of ages
they passed away before the Iberians or Ivernians, who came from the
east, and bore a striking resemblance to the Basques. It may be that
some Mongolian tribe, wandering west, drawn by the instinct which has
driven most race-migrations westward, sent offshoots north and
south--one to brave the dangers of the sea and inhabit Britain and
Ireland, one to cross the Pyrenees and remain sheltered in their deep
ravines; or it may be that Basques from the Pyrenees, daring the
storms of the Bay of Biscay in their frail coracles, ventured to the
shores of Britain. Short and dark were these sturdy voyagers,
harsh-featured and long-headed, worshipping the powers of Nature with
mysterious and cruel rites of human sacrifice, holding beliefs in
totems and ancestor-worship and in the superiority of high descent
claimed through the mother to that claimed through the father. When
the stronger and more civilised Celt came he drove before him these
little dark men, he enslaved their survivors or wedded their women,
and in his turn fell into slavery to the cruel Druidic religion of his
subjects. To these Iberians, and to the Celtic dread of them, we
probably owe all the stories of dwarfs, goblins, elves, and
earth-gnomes which fill our fairy-tale books; and if we examine
carefully the descriptions of the abodes of these beings we shall find
them not inconsistent with the earth-dwellings, caves, circle huts, or
even with the burial mounds, of the Iberian race.

The race that followed the Iberians, and drove them out or subdued
them, so that they served as slaves where they had once ruled as
lords, was the proud Aryan Celtic race. Of different tribes, Gaels,
Brythons, and Belg�, they were all one in spirit, and one in physical
feature.

Tall, blue-eyed, with fair or red hair, they overpowered in every way
the diminutive Iberians, and their tattooing, while it gave them a
name which has often been mistaken for a national designation (Picts,
or painted men), made them dreadful to their enemies in battle, and
ferocious-looking even in time of peace. Their civilisation was of a
much higher type than that of the Iberians; their weapons, their
war-chariots, their mode of life and their treatment of women, are all
so closely similar to that of the Greeks of Homer that a theory has
been advanced and ably defended, that the Homeric Greeks were really
invading Celts--Gaelic or Gaulish tribes from the north of Europe. If
it indeed be so, we owe to the Celts a debt of imperishable culture
and civilisation. To them belongs more especially, in our national
amalgam, the passion for the past, the ardent patriotism, the longing
for spiritual beauty, which raises and relieves the Saxon materialism.

"Though fallen the state of Erin and changed the Scottish land,
Though small the power of Mona, though unwaked Llewellyn's band,
Though Ambrose Merlin's prophecies are held as idle tales,
Though Iona's ruined cloisters are swept by northern gales,
One in name and in fame
Are the sea-divided Gaels.

"In Northern Spain and Italy our brethren also dwell,

And brave are the traditions of their fathers that they tell;
The Eagle or the Crescent in the dawn of history pales
 Before the advancing banners of the great Rome-conquering Gaels:
One in name and in fame
Are the sea-divided Gaels."[8]

It is almost impossible to overestimate the value of the Celtic

contribution to our national literature and character: the race that
gave us Ossian, and Finn, and Cuchulain, that sang of the sorrowful
love and doom of Deirdre, that told of the pursuit of Diarmit and
Grania, till every dolmen and cromlech in Ireland was associated with
these lovers; the race that preserved for us

"That grey king whose name, a ghost,

Streams like a cloud, man-shaped, from mountain-peak
And cleaves to cairn and cromlech still,"[9]

the King Arthur whose Arthur's Seat overhangs Edinburgh, whose

presence haunts the Lakes, and Wales, and Cornwall, and the forests of
Brittany; the race that held up for us the image of the Holy
Grail--that race can claim no small share in the moulding of the
modern Briton.

The Celt, however, had his day of supremacy and passed: the Roman
crushed his power of initiative and made him helpless and dependent,
and the Teuton, whether as Saxon, Angle, Frisian, or Jute, dwelt in
his homes and ruled as slaves the former owners of the land. These
new-comers were not physically unlike the Celts whom they
dispossessed. Tall and fair, grey-eyed and sinewy, the Teuton was a
hardier, more sturdy warrior than the Celt: he had not spent centuries
of quiet settlement and imitative civilisation under the �gis of
Imperial Rome: he had not learnt to love the arts of peace and he
cultivated none but those of war; he was by choice a warrior and a
sailor, a wanderer to other lands, a plougher of the desolate places
of the "vasty deep," yet withal a lover of home, who trod at times,
with bitter longing for his native land, the thorny paths of exile. To
him physical cowardice was the unforgivable sin, next to treachery to
his lord; for the loyalty of thane to his chieftain was a very deep
and abiding reality to the Anglo-Saxon warrior, and in the early poems
of our English race, love for "his dear lord, his chieftain-friend,"
takes the place of that love of woman which other races felt and
expressed. A quiet death bed was the worst end to a man's life, in the
Anglo-Saxon's creed; it was "a cow's death," to be shunned by every
means in a man's power; while a death in fight, victor or vanquished,
was a worthy finish to a warrior's life. There was no fear of death
itself in the English hero's mind, nor of Fate; the former was the
inevitable,

"Seeing that Death, a necessary end,

Will come when it will come,"[10]

and the latter a goddess whose decrees must needs be obeyed with proud
submission, but not with meek acceptance. Perhaps there was little of
spiritual insight in the minds of these Angles and Saxons, little love
of beauty, little care for the amenities of life; but they had a
sturdy loyalty, an uprightness, a brave disregard of death in the
cause of duty, which we can still recognise in modern Englishmen. To
the Saxon belong the tales where

"The warrior kings,

In height and prowess more than human, strive
 Again for glory, while the golden lyre
Is ever sounding in heroic ears
Heroic hymns."[11]

When the English (Anglo-Saxons, as we generally call them) had settled

down in England, had united their warring tribes, and developed a
somewhat centralised government, their whole national existence was
imperilled by the incursions of the Danes. Kindred folk to the
Anglo-Saxons were these Danes, these Vikings from Christiania Wik,
these Northmen from Norway or Iceland, whose fame went before them,
and the dread of whom inspired the petition in the old Litany of the
Church, "From the fury of the Northmen, good Lord, deliver us!" Their
fair hair and blue or grey eyes, their tall and muscular frames, bore
testimony to their kinship with the races they harried and plundered,
but their spirit was different from that of the conquered Teutonic
tribes. The Viking _loved_ the sea; it was his summer home, his field
of war and profit. To go "a-summer-harrying" was the usual employment
of the true Viking, and in the winter only could he enjoy domestic
life and the pleasures of the family circle. The rapturous fight with
the elements, in which the Northman lived and moved and had his being,
gave him a strain of ruthless cruelty unlike anything in the more
peaceful Anglo-Saxon character: his disregard of death for himself led
to a certain callousness with regard to human life, and to a certain
enjoyment in inflicting physical anguish. There was an element of Red
Indian ruthlessness in the Viking, which looms large in the story of
the years of Norse ascendancy over Western Europe. Yet there was also
a power of bold and daring action, of reckless valour, of rapid
conception and execution, which contrasted strongly with the slower
and more placid temperament of the Anglo-Saxon, and to this Danish
strain modern Englishmen probably owe the power of initiative, the
love of adventure, and the daring action which have made England the
greatest colonising nation on the earth. The Danish, Norse, or Viking
element spread far and wide in medi�val Europe--Iceland, Normandy
(Northman's Land), the Isle of Man, the Hebrides, the east of
Ireland, the Danelagh of East Anglia, and the Cumberland dales all
show traces of the conquering Danish race; and raider after raider
came to England and stayed, until half of our island was Danish, and
even our royal family became for a time one with the royal line of
Denmark. The acceptance of Christianity by the Danes in England when
Guthrum was baptized rendered much more easy their amalgamation with
the English; but it was not so in Ireland, where the Round Towers
still stand to show (as some authorities hold) how the terrified
native Irish sheltered from the Danish fury which nearly destroyed the
whole fabric of Irish Christianity. The legends of Ireland, too, are
full of the terror of the men of "Lochlann," which is generally taken
to mean Norway; and the great coast cities of Ireland--Dublin, Cork,
Waterford, Wexford, and others--were so entirely Danish that only the
decisive battle of Clontarf, in which the saintly and victorious Brian
Boru was slain, saved Ireland to Christendom and curbed the power of
the heathen invaders.

A second wave of Norse invasion swept over England at the Norman

Conquest, and for a time submerged the native English population. The
chivalrous Norman knights who followed William of Normandy's sacred
banner, whether from religious zeal or desire of plunder, were as
truly Vikings by race as were the Danes who settled in the Danelagh.
The days when Rolf (Rollo, or Rou), the Viking chief, won Normandy
were not yet so long gone by that the fierce piratical instincts of
his followers had ceased to influence their descendants: piety and
learning, feudal law and custom, had made some impression upon the
character of the Norman, but at heart he was still a Northman. The
Norman barons fought for their independence against Duke William with
all the determination of those Norse chiefs who would not acknowledge
the overlordship of Harold Fairhair, but fled to colonise Iceland when
he made himself King of Norway. The seafaring instincts which drove
the Vikings to harry other lands in like manner drove the Normans to
piratical plundering up and down the English Channel, and, when they
had settled in England, led to continual sea-fights in the Channel
between English and French, hardy Kentish and Norman, or Cornish and
Breton, sailors, with a common strain of fighting blood, and a common
love of the sea.

The Norman Conquest of England was but one instance of Norman

activity: Sicily, Italy, Constantinople, even Antioch, and the Holy
Land itself, showed in time Norman states, Norman laws, Norman
civilisation, and all alike felt the impulse of Norman energy and
inspiration. England lay ready to hand for Norman invasion--the hope
of peaceable succession to the saintly Edward the Confessor had to be
abandoned by William; the gradual permeation of sluggish England with
Norman earls, churchmen, courtiers, had been comprehended and checked
by Earl Godwin and his sons (themselves of Danish race); but there
still remained the way of open war and an appeal to religious zeal;
and this way William took. There was genius as well as statesmanship
in the idea of combining a personal claim to the throne held by Harold
the usurper with a crusading summons against the schismatic and
heretical English, who refused obedience to the true successor of St.
Peter. The success of the idea was its justification: the success of
the expedition proved the need that England had of some new leaven to
energise the sluggish temperament of her sons. The Norman Conquest not
only revived and quickened, but unified and solidified the English
nation. The tyranny of the Norman nobles, held in check at first only
by the tyranny of the Norman king, was the factor in medi�val English
life that made for a national consciousness; it also helped the
appreciation of the heroism of revolt against tyranny which is seen in
Hereward the Wake, in Robin Hood, in William of Cloudeslee, and in
many other English hero-rebels; but it gradually led men to a
realization of their own rights as Englishmen. When all men alike felt
themselves sons of England, the days were past when Norman and Saxon
were aliens to each other, and Norman robber soon became as truly
English as Danish viking, Anglo-Saxon seafarer, or Celtic settler.
Then the full value of the Norman infusion was seen in quicker
intellectual apprehension, nimbler wit, a keener sense of reverence, a
more spiritual piety, a more refined courtesy, and a more enlightened
perception of the value of law. The materialism of the original Saxon
race was successively modified by many influences, and not least of
these was the Norman Conquest.

From the Norman Conquest onward England has welcomed men of many
nations--French, Flemings, Germans, Dutch: men brought by war, by
trade, by love of adventure, by religion; traders, refugees, exiles,
all have found in her a hospitable shelter and a second home, and all
have come to love the "grey old mother" that counted them among her
sons and grew to think them her own in very truth.

Geographically, also, we must recognise the admixture of races in our

islands. The farthest western borders show most strongly the type of
man whom we can imagine the Iberian to have been: Western Ireland, the
Hebrides, Central and South Wales, and Cornwall are still inhabited by
folk of Iberian descent. The blue-eyed Celt yet dwells in the
Highlands and the greater part of Wales and the Marches--Hereford and
Shropshire, and as far as Worcestershire and Cheshire; still the
Dales of Cumberland, the Fen Country, East Anglia, and the Isle of Man
show traces of Danish blood, speech, manners, and customs; still the
slow, stolid Saxon inhabits the lands south of the Thames from Sussex
to Hampshire and Dorset. The Angle has settled permanently over the
Lowlands of Scotland, with the Celt along the western fringe, and
Flemish blood shows its traces in Pembroke on the one side ("Little
England beyond Wales") and in Norfolk on the other.

With all these nations, all these natures, amalgamated in our own, it
is no wonder that the literature of our isles contains many different
ideals of heroism, changing according to nationality and epoch. Thus
the physical valour of Beowulf is not the same quality as the valour
of Havelok the Dane, though both are heroes of the strong arm; and the
chivalry of Diarmit is not the same as the chivalry of Roland. Again,
religion has its share in changing the ideals of a nation, and
Constantine, the warrior of the Early English poem of "Elene," is far
from being the same in character as the tender-hearted Constantine of
"moral Gower's" apocryphal tale. The law-abiding nature of the
earliest heroes, whose obedience to their king and their priest was
absolute, differs almost entirely from the lawlessness of Gamelyn and
Robin Hood, both of whom set church and king at defiance, and even
account it a merit to revolt from the rule of both. It follows from
this that we shall find our chosen heroes of very different types and
characters; but we shall recognise that each represented to his own
age an ideal of heroism, which that age loved sufficiently to put into
literature, and perpetuate by the best means in its power. Of many
another hero besides Arthur--of Barbarossa, of Hiawatha, even of
Napoleon--has the tradition grown that he is not dead, but has passed
away into the deathless land, whence he shall come again in his own
time. As Tennyson has sung,

"Great bards of him will sing

Hereafter; and dark sayings from of old
Ranging and ringing through the minds of men,
And echoed by old folk beside their fires
For comfort after their wage-work is done,
Speak of the King."

FOOTNOTES:

[1] Lightfoot.

[2] Swinburne.

[3] Gerald Massey.

[4] J. R. Denning.

[5] W. W. Campbell.

[6] _Ibid._

[7] C. Roberts.

[8] T. Darcy McGee.

[9] Tennyson.

[10] Shakespeare, _Julius C�sar_.

[11] Tennyson.

CHAPTER I: BEOWULF

Introduction

The figure which meets us as we enter on the study of Heroes of the

British Race is one which appeals to us in a very special way, since
he is the one hero in whose legend we may see the ideals of our
English forefathers before they left their Continental home to settle
in this island. Opinions may differ as to the date at which the poem
of "Beowulf" was written, the place in which it was localised, and the
religion of the poet who combined the floating legends into one epic
whole, but all must accept the poem as embodying the life and feelings
of our Forefathers who dwelt in North Germany on the shores of the
North Sea and of the Baltic. The life depicted, the characters
portrayed, the events described, are such as a simple warrior race
would cherish in tradition and legend as relics of the life lived by
their ancestors in what doubtless seemed to them the Golden Age.
Perhaps stories of a divine Beowa, hero and ancestor of the English,
became merged in other myths of sun-hero and marsh-demon, but in any
case the stories are now crystallized around one central human figure,
who may even be considered an historical hero, Beowulf, the thane of
Hygelac, King of the Geats. It is this grand primitive hero who
embodies the ideal of English heroism. Bold to rashness for himself,
prudent for his comrades, daring, resourceful, knowing no fear, loyal
to his king and his kinsmen, generous in war and in peace,
self-sacrificing, Beowulf stands for all that is best in manhood in an
age of strife. It is fitting that our first British hero should be
physically and mentally strong, brave to seek danger and brave to look
on death and Fate undaunted, one whose life is a struggle against
evil forces, and whose death comes in a glorious victory over the
powers of evil, a victory gained for the sake of others to whom
Beowulf feels that he owes protection and devotion.

The Story. The Coming and Passing of Scyld

Once, long ago, the Danish land owned the sway of a mighty monarch,
Scyld Scefing, the founder of a great dynasty, the Scyldings. This
great king Scyld had come to Denmark in a mysterious manner, since no
man knew whence he sprang. As a babe he drifted to the Danish shore in
a vessel loaded with treasures; but no man was with him, and there was
no token to show his kindred and race. When Scyld grew up he increased
the power of Denmark and enlarged her borders; his fame spread far and
wide among men, and his glory shone undimmed until the day when, full
of years and honours, he died, leaving the throne securely established
in his family. Then the sorrowing Danes restored him to the mysterious
ocean from which he had come to them. Choosing their goodliest ship,
they laid within it the corpse of their departed king, and heaped
around him all their best and choicest treasures, until the venerable
countenance of Scyld looked to heaven from a bed of gold and jewels;
then they set up, high above his head, his glorious gold-wrought
banner, and left him alone in state. The vessel was loosed from the
shore where the mourning Danes bewailed their departing king, and
drifted slowly away to the unknown west from which Scyld had sailed to
his now sorrowing people; they watched until it was lost in the
shadows of night and distance, but no man under heaven knoweth what
shore now holds the vanished Scyld. The descendants of Scyld ruled and
prospered till the days of his great-grandson Hrothgar, one of a
family of four, who can all be identified historically with various
Danish kings and princes.

Hrothgar's Hall

Hrothgar was a mighty warrior and conqueror, who won glory in battle,
and whose fame spread wide among men, so that nobly born warriors, his
kinsmen, were glad to serve as his bodyguard and to fight for him
loyally in strife. So great was Hrothgar's power that he longed for
some outward sign of the magnificence of his sway; he determined to
build a great hall, in which he could hold feasts and banquets, and
could entertain his warriors and thanes, and visitors from afar. The
hall rose speedily, vast, gloriously adorned, a great meeting-place
for men; for Hrothgar had summoned all his people to the work, and the
walls towered up high and majestic, ending in pinnacles and gables
resembling the antlers of a stag. At the great feast which Hrothgar
gave first in his new home the minstrels chanted the glory of the
hall, "Heorot," "The Hart," as the king named it; Hrothgar's desire
was well fulfilled, that he should build the most magnificent of
banquet-halls. Proud were the mighty warriors who feasted within it,
and proud the heart of the king, who from his high seat on the da�s
saw his brave thanes carousing at the long tables below him, and the
lofty rafters of the hall rising black into the darkness.

Grendel

Day by day the feasting continued, until its noise and the festal joy
of its revellers aroused a mighty enemy, Grendel, the loathsome
fen-monster. This monstrous being, half-man, half-fiend, dwelt in the
fens near the hill on which Heorot stood. Terrible was he, dangerous
to men, of extraordinary strength, human in shape but gigantic of
stature, covered with a green horny skin, on which the sword would not
bite. His race, all sea-monsters, giants, goblins, and evil demons,
were offspring of Cain, outcasts from the mercy of the Most High,
hostile to the human race; and Grendel was one of mankind's most
bitter enemies; hence his hatred of the joyous shouts from Heorot, and
his determination to stop the feasting.

"This the dire mighty fiend, he who in darkness dwelt,

Suffered with hatred fierce, that every day and night
He heard the festal shouts loud in the lofty hall;
Sound of harp echoed there, and gleeman's sweet song.
Thus they lived joyously, fearing no angry foe
Until the hellish fiend wrought them great woe.
Grendel that ghost was called, grisly and terrible,
Who, hateful wanderer, dwelt in the moorlands,
The fens and wild fastnesses; the wretch for a while abode
 In homes of the giant-race, since God had cast him out.
When night on the earth fell, Grendel departed
To visit the lofty hall, now that the warlike Danes
After the gladsome feast nightly slept in it.
A fair troop of warrior-thanes guarding it found he;
Heedlessly sleeping, they recked not of sorrow.
The demon of evil, the grim wight unholy,
With his fierce ravening, greedily grasped them,
Seized in their slumbering thirty right manly thanes;
Thence he withdrew again, proud of his lifeless prey,
Home to his hiding-place, bearing his booty,
In peace to devour it."

[Illustration: "The demon of evil, with his fierce ravening, greedily

grasped them"]

When dawn broke, and the Danes from their dwellings around the hall
entered Heorot, great was the lamentation, and dire the dismay, for
thirty noble champions had vanished, and the blood-stained tracks of
the monster showed but too well the fate that had overtaken them.
Hrothgar's grief was profound, for he had lost thirty of his dearly
loved bodyguard, and he himself was too old to wage a conflict against
the foe--a foe who repeated night by night his awful deeds, in
spite of all that valour could do to save the Danes from his terrible
enmity. At last no champion would face the monster, and the Danes, in
despair, deserted the glorious hall of which they had been so proud.
Useless stood the best of dwellings, for none dared remain in it, but
every evening the Danes left it after their feast, and slept
elsewhere. This affliction endured for twelve years, and all that time
the beautiful hall of Heorot stood empty when darkness was upon it. By
night the dire fiend visited it in search of prey, and in the morning
his footsteps showed that his deadly enmity was not yet appeased, but
that any effort to use the hall at night would bring down his fatal
wrath on the careless sleepers.

Far and wide spread the tidings of this terrible oppression, and many
champions came from afar to offer King Hrothgar their aid, but none
was heroic enough to conquer the monster, and many a mighty warrior
lost his life in a vain struggle against Grendel. At length even these
bold adventurers ceased to come; Grendel remained master of Heorot,
and the Danes settled down in misery under the bondage of a perpetual
nightly terror, while Hrothgar grew old in helpless longing for
strength to rescue his people from their foe.

Beowulf

Meanwhile there had come to manhood and full strength a hero destined
to make his name famous for mighty deeds of valour throughout the
whole of the Teutonic North. In the realm of the Geats (G�taland, in
the south of Sweden) ruled King Hygelac, a mighty ruler who was
ambitious enough to aim at conquering his neighbours on the mainland
of Germany. His only sister, daughter of the dead king Hrethel, had
married a great noble, Ecgtheow, and they had one son, Beowulf, who
from the age of seven was brought up at the Geatish court. The boy was
a lad of great stature and handsome appearance, with fair locks and
gallant bearing; but he greatly disappointed his grandfather, King
Hrethel, by his sluggish character. Beowulf as a youth had been
despised by all for his sloth and his unwarlike disposition; his
good-nature and his rarely stirred wrath made others look upon him
with scorn, and the mighty stature to which he grew brought him
nothing but scoffs and sneers and insults in the banquet-hall when the
royal feasts were held. Yet wise men might have seen the promise of
great strength in his powerful sinews and his mighty hands, and the
signs of great force of character in the glance of his clear blue eyes
and the fierceness of his anger when he was once aroused. At least
once already Beowulf had distinguished himself in a great feat--a
swimming-match with a famous champion, Breca, who had been beaten in
the contest. For this and other victories, and for the bodily strength
which gave Beowulf's hand-grip the force of thirty men, the hero was
already famed when the news of Grendel's ravages reached Geatland.
Beowulf, eager to try his strength against the monster, and burning to
add to his fame, asked and obtained permission from his uncle, King
Hygelac, to seek the stricken Danish king and offer his help against
Grendel; then, choosing fourteen loyal comrades and kinsfolk, he took
a cheerful farewell of the Geatish royal family and sailed for
Denmark.

Thus it happened that one day the Warden of the Coast, riding on his
round along the Danish shores, saw from the white cliffs a strange
war-vessel running in to shore. Her banners were unknown to him, her
crew were strangers and all in war-array, and as the Warden watched
them they ran the ship into a small creek among the mountainous
cliffs, made her fast to a rock with stout cables, and then landed and
put themselves in readiness for a march. Though there were fifteen of
the strangers and the Warden was alone, he showed no hesitation, but,
riding boldly down into their midst, loudly demanded:

"What are ye warlike men wielding bright weapons,

Wearing grey corslets and boar-adorned helmets,
Who o'er the water-paths come with your foaming keel
Ploughing the ocean surge? I was appointed
Warden of Denmark's shores; watch hold I by the wave
That on this Danish coast no deadly enemy
Leading troops over sea should land to injure.
None have here landed yet more frankly coming
Than this fair company: and yet ye answer not
The password of warriors, and customs of kinsmen.
Ne'er have mine eyes beheld a mightier warrior,
An earl more lordly, than is he, the chief of you;
He is no common man; if looks belie him not,
He is a hero bold, worthily weaponed.
Anon must I know of you kindred and country,
Lest ye as spies should go free on our Danish soil.
Now ye men from afar, sailing the surging sea,
Have heard my earnest thought: best is a quick reply,
That I may swiftly know whence ye have hither come."

So the aged Warden sat on his horse, gazing attentively on the faces
of the fifteen strangers, but watching most carefully the countenance
of the leader; for the mighty stature, the clear glance of command,
the goodly armour, and the lordly air of Beowulf left no doubt as to
who was the chieftain of that little band. When the questions had been
asked the leader of the new-comers moved forward till his mighty
figure stood beside the Warden's horse, and as he gazed up into the
old man's eyes he answered: "We are warriors of the Geats, members of
King Hygelac's bodyguard. My father, well known among men of wisdom,
was named Ecgtheow, a wise counsellor who died full of years and
famous for his wisdom, leaving a memory dear to all good men."

"We come to seek thy king Healfdene's glorious son,

Thy nation's noble lord, with friendly mind.
Be thou a guardian good to us strangers here!
We have an errand grave to the great Danish king,
Nor will I hidden hold what I intend!
Thou canst tell if it is truth (as we lately heard)
That some dire enemy, deadly in evil deed,
Cometh in dark of night, sateth his secret hate,
Worketh through fearsome awe, slaughter and shame.
I can give Hrothgar bold counsel to conquer him,
How he with valiant mind Grendel may vanquish,
If he would ever lose torment of burning care,
If bliss shall bloom again and woe shall vanish."

The aged Warden replied: "Every bold warrior of noble mind must
recognise the distinction between words and deeds. I judge by thy
speech that you are all friends to our Danish king; therefore I bid
you go forward, in warlike array, and I myself will guide you to King
Hrothgar; I will also bid my men draw your vessel up the beach, and
make her fast with a barricade of oars against any high tide. Safe she
shall be until again she bears you to your own land. May your
expedition prove successful."

Thus speaking, he turned his horse's head and led the way up the steep
cliff paths, while the Geats followed him, resplendent in shining
armour, with boar-crests on their helmets, shields and spears in their
hands, and mighty swords hanging in their belts: a goodly band were
they, as they strode boldly after the Warden. Anon there appeared a
roughly trodden path, which soon became a stone-paved road, and the
way led on to where the great hall, Heorot, towered aloft, gleaming
white in the sun; very glorious it seemed, with its pinnacled gables
and its carved beams and rafters, and the Geats gazed at it with
admiration as the Warden of the Coast said: "Yonder stands our
monarch's hall, and your way lies clear before you. May the All-Father
keep you safe in the conflict! Now it is time for me to return; I go
to guard our shores from every foe."

Hrothgar and Beowulf

The little band of Geats, in their shining war-gear, strode along the
stone-paved street, their ring-mail sounding as they went, until they
reached the door of Heorot; and there, setting down their broad
shields and their keen spears against the wall, they prepared to enter
as peaceful guests the great hall of King Hrothgar. Wulfgar, one of
Hrothgar's nobles, met them at the door and asked whence such a
splendid band of warlike strangers, so well armed and so worthily
equipped, had come. Their heroic bearing betokened some noble
enterprise. Beowulf answered: "We are Hygelac's chosen friends and
companions, and I am Beowulf. To King Hrothgar, thy master, will I
tell mine errand, if the son of Healfdene will allow us to approach
him."

Wulfgar, impressed by the words and bearing of the hero, replied: "I
will announce thy coming to my lord, and bring back his answer"; and
then made his way up the hall to the high seat where Hrothgar sat on
the da�s amidst his bodyguard of picked champions. Bowing
respectfully, he said:

"Here are come travelling over the sea-expanse,

Journeying from afar, heroes of Geatland.
Beowulf is the name of their chief warrior.
This is their prayer, my lord, that they may speak with thee;
Do not thou give them a hasty refusal!
Do not deny them the gladness of converse!
They in their war-gear seem worthy of men's respect.
Noble their chieftain seems, he who the warriors
Hither has guided."

At these words the aged king aroused himself from the sad reverie into
which he had fallen and answered: "I knew him as a boy. Beowulf is the
son of Ecgtheow, who wedded the daughter of the Geat King Hrethel. His
fame has come hither before him; seafarers have told me that he has
the might of thirty men in his hand-grip. Great joy it is to know of
his coming, for he may save us from the terror of Grendel. If he
succeeds in this, great treasures will I bestow upon him. Hasten;
bring in hither Beowulf and his kindred thanes, and bid them welcome
to the Danish folk!"

Wulfgar hurried down the hall to the place where Beowulf stood with
his little band; he led them gladly to the high seat, so that they
stood opposite to Hrothgar, who looked keenly at the well-equipped
troop, and kindly at its leader. A striking figure was Beowulf as he
stood there in his gleaming ring-mail, with the mighty sword by his
side. It was, however, but a minute that Hrothgar looked in silence,
for with respectful greeting Beowulf spoke:

"Hail to thee, Hrothgar King! Beowulf am I,

Hygelac's kinsman and loyal companion.
Great deeds of valour wrought I in my youth.
To me in my native land Grendel's ill-doing
Came as an oft-heard tale told by our sailors.
They say that this bright hall, noblest of buildings,
Standeth to every man idle and useless
After the evening-light fails in the heavens.
Thus, Hrothgar, ancient king, all my friends urged me,
Warriors and prudent thanes, that I should seek thee,
Since they themselves had known my might in battle.
Now I will beg of thee, lord of the glorious Danes,
Prince of the Scylding race, Folk-lord most friendly,
Warden of warriors, only one boon.
Do not deny it me, since I have come from far;
I with my men alone, this troop of heroes good,
Would without help from thee cleanse thy great hall!
Oft have I also heard that the fierce monster
Through his mad recklessness scorns to use weapons;
Therefore will I forego (so may King Hygelac,
My friendly lord and king, find in me pleasure)
That I should bear my sword and my broad yellow shield
Into the conflict: with my hand-grip alone
I 'gainst the foe will strive, and struggle for my life--
He shall endure God's doom whom death shall bear away.
I know that he thinketh in this hall of conflict
Fearless to eat me, if he can compass it,
As he has oft devoured heroes of Denmark.
Then thou wilt not need my head to hide away,
 Grendel will have me all mangled and gory;
Away will he carry, if death then shall take me,
My body with gore stained will he think to feast on,
On his lone track will bear it and joyously eat it,
And mark with my life-blood his lair in the moorland;
Nor more for my welfare wilt thou need to care then.
Send thou to Hygelac, if strife shall take me,
That best of byrnies which my breast guardeth,
Brightest of war-weeds, the work of Smith Weland,
Left me by Hrethel. Ever Wyrd has her way."

The aged King Hrothgar, who had listened attentively while the hero
spoke of his plans and of his possible fate, now greeted him saying:
"Thou hast sought my court for honour and for friendship's sake, O
Beowulf: thou hast remembered the ancient alliance between Ecgtheow,
thy father, and myself, when I shielded him, a fugitive, from the
wrath of the Wilfings, paid them the due wergild for his crime, and
took his oath of loyalty to myself. Long ago that time is; Ecgtheow is
dead, and I am old and in misery. It were too long now to tell of all
the woe that Grendel has wrought, but this I may say, that many a
hero has boasted of the great valour he would display in strife with
the monster, and has awaited his coming in this hall; in the morning
there has been no trace of each hero but the dark blood-stains on
benches and tables. How many times has that happened! But sit down now
to the banquet and tell thy plans, if such be thy will."

Thereupon room was made for the Geat warriors on the long benches, and
Beowulf sat in the place of honour opposite to the king: great respect
was shown to him, and all men looked with wonder on this mighty hero,
whose courage led him to hazard this terrible combat. Great carved
horns of ale were borne to Beowulf and his men, savoury meat was
placed before them, and while they ate and drank the minstrels played
and sang to the harp the deeds of men of old. The mirth of the feast
was redoubled now men hoped that a deliverer had come indeed.

The Quarrel

Among all the Danes who were rejoicing over Beowulf's coming there was
one whose heart was sad and his brow gloomy--one thane whom jealousy
urged to hate any man more distinguished than himself. Hunferth, King
Hrothgar's orator and speech-maker, from his official post at
Hrothgar's feet watched Beowulf with scornful and jealous eyes. He
waited until a pause came in the clamour of the feast, and suddenly
spoke, coldly and contemptuously: "Art thou that Beowulf who strove
against Breca, the son of Beanstan, when ye two held a swimming
contest in the ocean and risked your lives in the deep waters? In vain
all your friends urged you to forbear--ye would go on the hazardous
journey; ye plunged in, buffeting the wintry waves through the
rising storm. Seven days and nights ye toiled, but Breca overcame
thee: he had greater strength and courage. Him the ocean bore to
shore, and thence he sought his native land, and the fair city where
he ruled as lord and chieftain. Fully he performed his boast against
thee. So I now look for a worse issue for thee, for thou wilt find
Grendel fiercer in battle than was Breca, if thou darest await him
this night."

Beowulf's brow flushed with anger as he replied haughtily: "Much hast

thou spoken, friend Hunferth, concerning Breca and our swimming
contest; but belike thou art drunken, for wrongly hast thou told the
tale. A youthful folly of ours it was, when we two boasted and
challenged each other to risk our lives in the ocean; that indeed we
did. Naked swords we bore in our hands as we swam, to defend ourselves
against the sea-monsters, and we floated together, neither
outdistancing the other, for five days, when a storm drove us apart.
Cold were the surging waves, bitter the north wind, rough was the
swelling flood, under the darkening shades of night. Yet this was not
the worst: the sea-monsters, excited by the raging tempest, rushed at
me with their deadly tusks and bore me to the abyss. Well was it then
for me that I wore my well-woven ring-mail, and had my keen sword in
hand; with point and edge I fought the deadly beasts, and killed them.
Many a time the hosts of monsters bore me to the ocean-bottom, but I
slew numbers among them, and thus we battled all the night, until in
the morning came light from the east, and I could see the windy cliffs
along the shore, and the bodies of the slain sea-beasts floating on
the surge. Nine there were of them, for Wyrd is gracious to the man
who is valiant and unafraid. Never have I heard of a sterner
conflict, nor a more unhappy warrior lost in the waters; yet I saved
my life, and landed on the shores of Finland. Breca wrought not so
mightily as I, nor have I heard of such warlike deeds on thy part,
even though thou, O Hunferth, didst murder thy brothers and nearest
kinsmen.

"Truly I say to thee, O son of Ecglaf bold,

Grendel the grisly fiend ne'er dared have wrought
So many miseries, such shame and anguish dire,
To thy lord, Hrothgar old, in his bright Heorot,
Hadst thou shown valiant mood, sturdy and battle-fierce,
As thou now boastest."

[Illustration: Beowulf replies haughtily to Hunferth]

Very wroth was Hunferth over the reminder of his former wrongdoing and
the implied accusation of cowardice, but he had brought it on himself
by his unwise belittling of Beowulf's feat, and the applause of both
Danes and Geats showed him that he dared no further attack the
champion; he had to endure in silence Beowulf's boast that he and his
Geats would that night await Grendel in the hall, and surprise him
terribly, since the fiend had ceased to expect any resistance from the
warlike Danes. The feast continued, with laughter and melody, with
song and boast, until the door from the women's bower, in the upper
end of the hall, opened suddenly, and Hrothgar's wife, the fair and
gracious Queen Wealhtheow, entered. The tumult lulled for a short
space, and the queen, pouring mead into a goblet, presented it to her
husband; joyfully he received and drank it. Then she poured mead or
ale for each man, and in due course came to Beowulf, as to the guest
of honour. Gratefully Wealhtheow greeted the lordly hero, and thanked
him for the friendship which brought him to Denmark to risk his life
against Grendel. Beowulf, rising respectfully and taking the cup from
the queen's hand, said with dignity:

"This I considered well when I the ocean sought,

Sailed in the sea-vessel with my brave warriors,
That I alone would win thy folk's deliverance,
Or in the fight would fall fast in the demon's grip.
Needs must I now perform knightly deeds in this hall,
Or here must meet my doom in darksome night."
Well pleased, Queen Wealhtheow went to sit beside her lord, where her
gracious smile cheered the assembly. Then the clamour of the feast was
renewed, until Hrothgar at length gave the signal for retiring.
Indeed, it was necessary to leave Heorot when darkness fell, for the
fiend came each night when sunlight faded. So the whole assembly
arose, each man bade his comrades "Good night," and the Danes
dispersed; but Hrothgar addressed Beowulf half joyfully, half sadly,
saying:

"Never before have I since I held spear and shield

Given o'er to any man this mighty Danish hall,
Save now to thee alone. Keep thou and well defend
This best of banquet-halls. Show forth thy hero-strength,
Call up thy bravery, watch for the enemy!
Thou shalt not lack gifts of worth if thou alive remain
Winner in this dire strife."

Thus Hrothgar departed, to seek slumber in a less dangerous abode,

where, greatly troubled in mind, he awaited the dawn with almost
hopeless expectation, and Beowulf and his men prepared themselves for
the perils of the night.

Beowulf and Grendel

The fourteen champions of the Geats now made ready for sleep; but
while the others lay down in their armour, with weapons by their
sides, Beowulf took off his mail, unbelted his sword, unhelmed
himself, and gave his sword to a thane to bear away. For, as he said
to his men, "I will strive against this fiend weaponless. With no
armour, since he wears none, will I wrestle with him, and try to
overcome him. I will conquer, if I win, by my hand-grip alone; and the
All-Father shall judge between us, and grant the victory to whom He
will."

The Geats then lay down--brave men who slept calmly, though they knew
they were risking their lives, for none of them expected to see the
light of day again, or to revisit their native land: they had heard,
too, much during the feast of the slaughter which Grendel had wrought.
So night came, the voices of men grew silent, and the darkness
shrouded all alike--calm sleepers, anxious watchers, and the deadly,
creeping foe.

When everything was still Grendel came. From the fen-fastnesses, by

marshy tracts, through mists and swamp-born fogs, the hideous monster
made his way to the house he hated so bitterly. Grendel strode fiercely
to the door of Heorot, and would fain have opened it as usual, but it
was locked and bolted. Then the fiend's wrath was roused; he grasped
the door with his mighty hands and burst it in. As he entered he seemed
to fill the hall with his monstrous shadow, and from his eyes shone a
green and uncanny light, which showed him a troop of warriors lying
asleep in their war-gear; it seemed that all slept, and the fiend did
not notice that one man half rose, leaning on his elbow and peering
keenly into the gloom. Grendel hastily put forth his terrible scaly
hand and seized one hapless sleeper. Tearing him limb from limb, so
swiftly that his cry of agony was unheard, he drank the warm blood and
devoured the flesh; then, excited by the hideous food, he reached forth
again. Great was Grendel's amazement to find that his hand was seized
in a grasp such as he had never felt before, and to know that he had
at last found an antagonist whom even he must fight warily. Beowulf
sprang from his couch as the terrible claws of the monster fell upon
him, and wrestled with Grendel in the darkness and gloom of the
unlighted hall, where the flicker of the fire had died down to a dim
glow in the dull embers. That was a dreadful struggle, as the
combatants, in deadly conflict, swayed up and down the hall,
overturning tables and benches, trampling underfoot dishes and goblets
in the darkling wrestle for life. The men of the Geats felt for their
weapons, but they could not see the combatants distinctly, though they
heard the panting and the trampling movements, and occasionally caught
a gleam from the fiend's eyes as his face was turned towards them. When
they struck their weapons glanced harmlessly off Grendel's scaly hide.
The struggle continued for some time, and the hall was an utter wreck
within, when Grendel, worsted for once, tried to break away and rush
out into the night; but Beowulf held him fast in the grip which no man
on earth could equal or endure, and the monster writhed in anguish as
he vainly strove to free himself--vainly, for Beowulf would not loose
his grip. Suddenly, with one great cry, Grendel wrenched himself free,
and staggered to the door, leaving behind a terrible blood-trail, for
his arm and shoulder were torn off and left in the victor's grasp. So
the monster fled wailing over the moors to his home in the gloomy mere,
and Beowulf sank panting on a shattered seat, scarce believing in his
victory, until his men gathered round, bringing a lighted torch, by the
flaring gleam of which the green, scaly arm of Grendel looked ghastly
and threatening. But the monster had fled, and after such a wound as
the loss of his arm and shoulder must surely die; therefore the Geats
raised a shout of triumph, and then took the hateful trophy and
fastened it high up on the roof of the hall, that all who entered might
see the token of victory and recognise that the Geat hero had performed
his boast, that he would conquer with no weapon, but by the strength of
his hands alone.

In the morning many a warrior came to Heorot to learn the events of

the night, and all saw the grisly trophy, praised Beowulf's might and
courage, and followed with eager curiosity the blood-stained track of
the fleeing demon till it came to the brink of the gloomy lake, where
it disappeared, though the waters were stained with gore, and boiled
and surged with endless commotion. There on the shore the Danes
rejoiced over the death of their enemy, and returned to Heorot
care-free and glad at heart. Meanwhile Beowulf and his Geats stayed in
Heorot, for Hrothgar had not yet come to receive an account of their
night-watch. Throughout the day there was feasting and rejoicing, with
horse-races, and wrestling, and manly contests of skill and endurance;
or the Danes collected around the bard as he chanted the glory of
Sigmund and his son Fitela. Then came King Hrothgar himself, with his
queen and her maiden train, and they paused to gaze with horror on the
dreadful trophy, and to turn with gratitude to the hero who had
delivered them from this evil spirit. Hrothgar said: "Thanks be to the
All-Father for this happy sight! Much sorrow have I endured at the
hands of Grendel, many warriors have I lost, many uncounted years of
misery have I lived, but now my woe has an end! Now a youth has
performed, with his unaided strength, what all we could not compass
with our craft! Well might thy father, O Beowulf, rejoice in thy fame!
Well may thy mother, if she yet lives, praise the All-Father for the
noble son she bore! A son indeed shalt thou be to me in love, and
nothing thou desirest shalt thou lack, that I can give thee. Often
have I rewarded less heroic deeds with great gifts, and to thee I can
deny nothing."
Beowulf answered: "We have performed our boast, O King, and have
driven away the enemy. I intended to force him down on one of the
beds, and to deprive him of his life by mere strength of my hand-grip,
but in this I did not succeed, for Grendel escaped from the hall. Yet
he left here with me his hand, his arm, and shoulder as a token of his
presence, and as the ransom with which he bought off the rest of his
loathsome body; yet none the longer will he live thereby, since he
bears with him so deadly a wound."

Then the hall was cleared of the traces of the conflict and hasty
preparation was made for a splendid banquet. There was joy in Heorot.
The Danes assembled once again free from fear in their splendid hall,
the walls were hung with gold-wrought embroideries and hangings of
costly stuffs, while richly chased goblets shone on the long tables,
and men's tongues waxed loud as they discussed and described the
heroic struggle of the night before. Beowulf and King Hrothgar sat on
the high seats opposite to each other, and their men, Danes and Geats,
sitting side by side, shouted and cheered and drank deeply to the fame
of Beowulf. The minstrels sang of the Fight in Finnsburg and the deeds
of Finn and Hn�f, of Hengest and Queen Hildeburh. Long was the chant,
and it roused the national pride of the Danes to hear of the victory
of their Danish forefathers over Finn of the Frisians; and merrily the
banquet went forward, gladdened still more by the presence of Queen
Wealhtheow. Now Hrothgar showed his lavish generosity and his
thankfulness by the gifts with which he loaded the Geat chief; and not
only Beowulf, but every man of the little troop. Beowulf received a
gold-embroidered banner, a magnificent sword, helmet, and corslet, a
goblet of gold, and eight fleet steeds. On the back of the best was
strapped a cunningly wrought saddle, Hrothgar's own, with gold
ornaments. When the Geat hero had thanked the king fittingly, Queen
Wealhtheow arose from her seat, and, lifting the great drinking-cup,
offered it to her lord, saying:

"Take thou this goblet, my lord and my ruler,

O giver of treasure, O gold-friend of heroes,
And speak to the Geats fair speeches of kindness,
Be mirthful and joyous, for so should a man be!
To the Geats be gracious, mindful of presents
Now that from far and near thou hast firm peace!
Tidings have come to me that thou for son wilt take
This mighty warrior who has cleansed Heorot,
Brightest of banquet-halls! Enjoy while thou mayest
These manifold pleasures, and leave to thy kinsmen
Thy lands and thy lordships when thou must journey forth
To meet thy death."

Turning to Beowulf, the queen said: "Enjoy thy reward, O dear Beowulf,
while thou canst, and live noble and blessed! Keep well thy widespread
fame, and be a friend to my sons in time to come, should they ever
need a protector." Then she gave him two golden armlets, set with
jewels, costly rings, a corslet of chain-mail and a wonderful jewelled
collar of exquisite ancient workmanship, and, bidding them continue
their feasting, with her maidens she left the hall. The feast went on
till Hrothgar also departed to his dwelling, and left the Danes, now
secure and careless, to prepare their beds, place each warrior's
shield at the head, and go to sleep in their armour ready for an
alarm. Meanwhile Beowulf and the Geats were joyfully escorted to
another lodging, where they slept soundly without disturbance.
Grendel's Mother

In the darkness of the night an avenger came to Heorot, came in

silence and mystery as Grendel had done, with thoughts of murder and
hatred raging in her heart. Grendel had gone home to die, but his
mother, a fiend scarcely less terrible than her son, yet lived to
avenge his death. She arose from her dwelling in the gloomy lake,
followed the fen paths and moorland ways to Heorot, and opened the
door. There was a horrible panic when her presence became known, and
men ran hither and thither vainly seeking to attack her; yet there was
less terror among them than before when they saw the figure of a
horrible woman. In spite of all, the monster seized Aschere, one of
King Hrothgar's thanes, and bore him away to the fens, leaving a house
of lamentation where men had feasted so joyously a few hours before.
The news was brought to King Hrothgar, who bitterly lamented the loss
of his wisest and dearest counsellor, and bade them call Beowulf to
him, since he alone could help in this extremity. When Beowulf stood
before the king he courteously inquired if his rest had been peaceful.
Hrothgar answered mournfully: "Ask me not of peace, for care is
renewed in Heorot. Dead is Aschere, my best counsellor and friend, the
truest of comrades in fight and in council. Such as Aschere was should
a true vassal be! A deadly fiend has slain him in Heorot, and I know
not whither she has carried his lifeless body. This is doubtless her
vengeance for thy slaying of Grendel; he is dead, and his kinswoman
has come to avenge him."

"I have heard it reported by some of my people

That they have looked on two such unearthly ones,
Huge-bodied march-striders holding the moor wastes;
One of them seemed to be shaped like a woman,
Her fellow in exile bore semblance of manhood,
Though huger his stature than man ever grew to:
In years that are long gone by Grendel they named him,
But know not his father nor aught of his kindred.
Thus these dire monsters dwell in the secret lands,
Haunt the hills loved by wolves, the windy nesses,
Dangerous marshy paths, where the dark moorland stream
'Neath the o'erhanging cliffs downwards departeth,
Sinks in the sombre earth. Not far remote from us
Standeth the gloomy mere, round whose shores cluster
Groves with their branches mossed, hoary with lichens grey
A wood firmly rooted o'ershadows the water.
There is a wonder seen nightly by wanderers,
Flame in the waterflood: liveth there none of men
Ancient or wise enough to know its bottom.
Though the poor stag may be hard by the hounds pursued,
Though he may seek the wood, chased by his cruel foes,
Yet will he yield his life to hunters on the brink
Ere he will hide his head in the dark waters.
'Tis an uncanny place. Thence the surge swelleth up
Dark to the heavens above, when the wind stirreth oft
Terrible driving storms, till the air darkens,
The skies fall to weeping."

Then Hrothgar burst forth in uncontrollable emotion: "O Beowulf, help

us if thou canst! Help is only to be found in thee. But yet thou
knowest not the dangerous place thou must needs explore if thou seek
the fiend in her den. I will richly reward thy valour if thou
returnest alive from this hazardous journey."

Beowulf was touched by the sorrow of the grey-haired king, and

replied:

"Grieve not, O prudent King! Better it is for each

That he avenge his friend, than that he mourn him much.
Each man must undergo death at the end of life.
Let him win while he may warlike fame in the world!
That is best after death for the slain warrior."

"Arise, my lord; let us scan the track left by the monster, for I
promise thee I will never lose it, wheresoever it may lead me. Only
have patience yet for this one day of misery, as I am sure thou wilt."

Hrothgar sprang up joyously, almost youthfully, and ordered his horse

to be saddled; then, with Beowulf beside him, and a mixed throng of
Geats and Danes following, he rode away towards the home of the
monsters, the dread lake which all men shunned. The blood-stained
tracks were easy to see, and the avengers moved on swiftly till they
came to the edge of the mere, and there, with grief and horror, saw
the head of Aschere lying on the bank.

[Illustration: Beowulf finds the head of Aschere]

"The lake boiled with blood, with hot welling gore;

The warriors gazed awe-struck, and the dread horn sang
From time to time fiercely eager defiance.
The warriors sat down there, and saw on the water
The sea-dragons swimming to search the abysses.
They saw on the steep nesses sea-monsters lying,
Snakes and weird creatures: these madly shot away
Wrathful and venomous when the sound smote their ears,
The blast of the war-horn."

As Beowulf stood on the shore and watched the uncouth sea-creatures,

serpents, nicors, monstrous beasts of all kinds, he suddenly drew his
bow and shot one of them to the heart. The rest darted furiously away,
and the thanes were able to drag the carcase of the slain beast on
shore, where they surveyed it with wonder.

The Fight with Grendel's Mother

Meanwhile Beowulf had made ready for his task. He trusted to his
well-woven mail, the corslet fitting closely to his body and
protecting his breast, the shining helm guarding his head, bright with
the boar-image on the crest, and the mighty sword Hrunting, which
Hunferth, his jealousy forgotten in admiration, pressed on the
adventurous hero.

"That sword was called Hrunting, an ancient heritage.

Steel was the blade itself, tempered with poison-twigs,
Hardened with battle-blood: never in fight it failed
Any who wielded it, when he would wage a strife
In the dire battlefield, folk-moot of enemies."

When Beowulf stood ready with naked sword in hand, he turned and
looked at his loyal followers, his friendly hosts, the grey old King
Hrothgar, the sun and the green earth, which he might never see again;
but it was with no trace of weakness or fear that he spoke:

"Forget not, O noble kinsman of Healfdene,

Illustrious ruler, gold-friend of warriors,
What we two settled when we spake together,
If I for thy safety should end here my life-days,
That thou wouldst be to me, though dead, as a father.
Be to my kindred thanes, my battle-comrades,
A worthy protector should death o'ertake me.
Do thou, dear Hrothgar, send all these treasures here
Which thou hast given me, to my king, Hygelac.
Then may the Geat king, brave son of Hrethel dead,
See by the gold and gems, know by the treasures there,
That I found a generous lord, whom I loved in my life.
Give thou to Hunferth too my wondrous old weapon,
The sword with its graven blade; let the right valiant man
Have the keen war-blade: I will win fame with his,
With Hrunting, noble brand, or death shall take me."

Beowulf dived downward, as it seemed to him, for the space of a day

ere he could perceive the floor of that sinister lake, and all that
time he had to fight the sea-beasts, for they, attacking him with tusk
and horn, strove to break his ring-mail, but in vain. As Beowulf came
near the bottom he felt himself seized in long, scaly arms of gigantic
strength. The fierce claws of the wolfish sea-woman strove eagerly to
reach his heart through his mail, but in vain; so the she-wolf of the
waters, a being awful and loathsome, bore him to her abode, rushing
through thick clusters of horrible sea-beasts.

"The hero now noticed he was in some hostile hall,

Where him the water-stream no whit might injure,
Nor for the sheltering roof the rush of the raging flood
Ever could touch him. He saw the strange flickering flame,
Weird lights in the water, shining with livid sheen:
He saw, too, the ocean-wolf, the hateful sea-woman."

Terrible and almost superhuman was the contest which now followed: the
awful sea-woman flung Beowulf down on his back and stabbed at him with
point and edge of her broad knife, seeking some vulnerable point; but
the good corslet resisted all her efforts, and Beowulf, exerting his
mighty force, overthrew her and sprang to his feet. Angered beyond
measure, he brandished the flaming sword Hrunting, and flashed one
great blow at her head which would have killed her had her scales and
hair been vulnerable; but alas! the edge of the blade turned on her
scaly hide, and the blow failed. Wrathfully Beowulf cast aside the
useless sword, and determined to trust once again to his hand-grip.
Grendel's mother now felt, in her turn, the deadly power of Beowulf's
grasp, and was borne to the ground; but the struggle continued long,
for Beowulf was weaponless, since the sword failed in its work. Yet
some weapon he must have.

"So he gazed at the walls, saw there a glorious sword,

An old brand gigantic, trusty in point and edge,
An heirloom of heroes; that was the best of blades,
Splendid and stately, the forging of giants;
But it was huger than any of human race
Could bear to battle-strife, save Beowulf only."
This mighty sword, a relic of earlier and greater races, brought new
hope to Beowulf. Springing up, he snatched it from the wall and swung
it fiercely round his head. The blow fell with crushing force on the
neck of the sea-woman, the dread wolf of the abyss, and broke the
bones. Dead the monster sank to the ground, and Beowulf, standing
erect, saw at his feet the lifeless carcase of his foe. The hero still
grasped his sword and looked warily along the walls of the
water-dwelling, lest some other foe should emerge from its recesses;
but as he gazed Beowulf saw his former foe, Grendel, lying dead on a
bed in some inner hall. He strode thither, and, seizing the corpse by
the hideous coiled locks, shore off the head to carry to earth again.
The poisonous hot blood of the monster melted the blade of the mighty
sword, and nothing remained but the hilt, wrought with curious
ornaments and signs of old time. This hilt and Grendel's head were all
that Beowulf carried off from the water-fiends' dwelling; and laden
with these the hero sprang up through the now clear and sparkling
water.

[Illustration: Beowulf shears off the head of Grendel]

Meanwhile the Danes and Geats had waited long for his reappearance.
When the afternoon was well advanced the Danes departed sadly,
lamenting the hero's death, for they concluded no man could have
survived so long beneath the waters; but his loyal Geats sat there
still gazing sadly at the waves, and hoping against all hope that
Beowulf would reappear. At length they saw changes in the mere--the
blood boiling upwards in the lake, the quenching of the unholy light,
then the flight of the sea-monsters and a gradual clearing of the
waters, through which at last they could see their lord uprising. How
gladly they greeted him! What awe and wonder seized them as they
surveyed his dreadful booty, the ghastly head of Grendel and the
massive hilt of the gigantic sword! How eagerly they listened to his
story, and how they vied with one another for the glory of bearing his
armour, his spoils, and his weapons back over the moorlands and the
fens to Heorot. It was a proud and glad troop that followed Beowulf
into the hall, and up through the startled throng until they laid down
before the feet of King Hrothgar the hideous head of his dead foe, and
Beowulf, raising his voice that all might hear above the buzz and hum
of the great banquet-hall, thus addressed the king:

"Lo! we this sea-booty, O wise son of Healfdene,

Lord of the Scyldings, have brought for thy pleasure,
In token of triumph, as thou here seest.
From harm have I hardly escaped with my life,
The war under water sustained I with trouble,
The conflict was almost decided against me,
If God had not guarded me! Nought could I conquer
With Hrunting in battle, though 'tis a doughty blade.
But the gods granted me that I saw suddenly
Hanging high in the hall a bright brand gigantic:
So seized I and swung it that in the strife I slew
The lords of the dwelling. The mighty blade melted fast
In the hot boiling blood, the poisonous battle-gore;
But the hilt have I here borne from the hostile hall.
I have avenged the crime, the death of the Danish folk,
As it behov�d me. Now can I promise thee
That thou in Heorot care-free mayest slumber
With all thy warrior-troop and all thy kindred thanes,
The young and the aged: thou needst not fear for them
 Death from these mortal foes, as thou of yore hast done."

King Hrothgar was now more delighted than ever at the return of his
friend and the slaughter of his foes. He gazed in delight and wonder
at the gory head of the monster, and the gigantic hilt of the weapon
which struck it off. Then, taking the glorious hilt, and scanning
eagerly the runes which showed its history, as the tumult stilled in
the hall, and all men listened for his speech, he broke out: "Lo! this
may any man say, who maintains truth and right among his people, that
good though he may be this hero is even better! Thy glory is
widespread, Beowulf my friend, among thine own and many other nations,
for thou hast fulfilled all things by patience and prudence. I will
surely perform what I promised thee, as we agreed before; and I
foretell of thee that thou wilt be long a help and protection to thy
people."

King Hrothgar spoke long and eloquently while all men listened, for he
reminded them of mighty warriors of old who had not won such glorious
fame, and warned them against pride and lack of generosity and
self-seeking; and then, ending with thanks and fresh gifts to Beowulf,
he bade the feast continue with increased jubilation. The tumultuous
rejoicing lasted till darkness settled on the land, and when it ended
all retired to rest free from fear, since no more fiendish monsters
would break in upon their slumbers; gladly and peacefully the night
passed, and with the morn came Beowulf's resolve to return to his king
and his native land.

When Beowulf had come to this decision he went to Hrothgar and said:

"Now we sea-voyagers come hither from afar

Must utter our intent to seek King Hygelac.
Here were we well received, well hast thou treated us.
If on this earth I can do more to win thy love,
O prince of warriors, than I have wrought as yet,
Here stand I ready now weapons to wield for thee.
If I shall ever hear o'er the encircling flood
That any neighbouring foes threaten thy nation's fall,
As Grendel grim before, swift will I bring to thee
Thousands of noble thanes, heroes to help thee.
I know of Hygelac, King of the Geat folk,
That he will strengthen me (though he is young in years)
In words and warlike deeds to bear my warrior-spear
Over the ocean surge, when arms would serve thy need,
Swift to thine aid. If thy son Hrethric young
Comes to the Geat court, there to gain skill in arms,
Then will he surely find many friends waiting him:
Better in distant lands learneth by journeying
He who is valiant."

Hrothgar was greatly moved by the words of the Geat hero and his
promise of future help. He wondered to find such wisdom in so young a
warrior, and felt that the Geats could never choose a better king if
battle should cut off the son of Hygelac, and he renewed his assurance
of continual friendship between the two countries and of enduring
personal affection. Finally, with fresh gifts of treasure and with
tears of regret Hrothgar embraced Beowulf and bade him go speedily to
his ship, since a friend's yearning could not retain him longer from
his native land. So the little troop of Geats with their gifts and
treasures marched proudly to their vessel and sailed away to Geatland,
their dragon-prowed ship laden with armour and jewels and steeds,
tokens of remembrance and thanks from the grateful Danes.

Beowulf's Return

Blithe-hearted were the voyagers, and gaily the ship danced over the
waves, as the Geats strained their eyes towards the cliffs of their
home and the well-known shores of their country. When their vessel
approached the land the coast-warden came hurrying to greet them, for
he had watched the ocean day and night for the return of the valiant
wanderers. Gladly he welcomed them, and bade his underlings help to
bear their spoils up to the royal palace, where King Hygelac, himself
young and valiant, awaited his victorious kinsman, with his beauteous
queen, Hygd, beside him. Then came Beowulf, treading proudly the rocky
paths to the royal abode, for messengers had gone in advance to
announce to the king his nephew's success, and a banquet was being
prepared, where Beowulf would sit beside his royal kinsman.

Once more there was a splendid feast, with tumultuous rejoicing. Again
a queenly hand--that of the beauteous Hygd--poured out the first bowl
in which to celebrate the safe return of the victorious hero. And now
the wonderful story of the slaying of the fen-fiends must be told.

Beowulf was called upon to describe again his perils and his
victories, and told in glowing language of the grisly monsters and the
desperate combats, and of the boundless gratitude and splendid
generosity of the Danish king, and of his prophecy of lasting
friendship between the Danes and the Geats. Then he concluded:

"Thus that great nation's king lived in all noble deeds.

Of guerdon I failed not, of meed for my valour,
But the wise son of Healfdene gave to me treasures great,
Gifts to my heart's desire. These now I bring to thee,
Offer them lovingly: now are my loyalty
And service due to thee, O hero-king, alone!
Near kinsmen have I few but thee, O Hygelac!"

As the hero showed the treasures with which Hrothgar had rewarded his
courage, he distributed them generously among his kinsmen and friends,
giving his priceless jewelled collar to Queen Hygd, and his best steed
to King Hygelac, as a true vassal and kinsman should. So Beowulf
resumed his place as Hygelac's chief warrior and champion, and settled
down among his own people.

Fifty Years After

When half a century had passed away, great and sorrowful changes had
taken place in the two kingdoms of Denmark and Geatland. Hrothgar was
dead, and had been succeeded by his son Hrethric, and Hygelac had been
slain in a warlike expedition against the Hetware. In this expedition
Beowulf had accompanied Hygelac, and had done all a warrior could do
to save his kinsman and his king. When he saw his master slain he had
fought his way through the encircling foes to the sea-shore, where,
though sorely wounded, he flung himself into the sea and swam back to
Geatland. There he had told Queen Hygd of the untimely death of her
husband, and had called on her to assume the regency of the kingdom
for her young son Heardred. Queen Hygd called an assembly of the
Geats, and there, with the full consent of the nation, offered the
crown to Beowulf, the wisest counsellor and bravest hero among them;
but he refused to accept it, and so swayed the Geats by his eloquence
and his loyalty that they unanimously raised Heardred to the throne,
with Beowulf as his guardian and protector. When in later years
Heardred also fell before an enemy, Beowulf was again chosen king, and
as he was now the next of kin he accepted the throne, and ruled long
and gloriously over Geatland. His fame as a warrior kept his country
free from invasion, and his wisdom as a statesman increased its
prosperity and happiness; whilst the vengeance he took for his
kinsman's death fulfilled all ideals of family and feudal duty held by
the men of his time. Beowulf, in fact, became an ideal king, as he was
an ideal warrior and hero, and he closed his life by an ideal act of
self-sacrifice for the good of his people.

Beowulf and the Fire-Dragon

In the fiftieth year of Beowulf's reign a great terror fell upon the
land: terror of a monstrous fire-dragon, who flew forth by night from
his den in the rocks, lighting up the blackness with his blazing
breath, and burning houses and homesteads, men and cattle, with the
flames from his mouth. The glare from his fiery scales was like the
dawn-glow in the sky, but his passage left behind it every night a
trail of black, charred desolation to confront the rising sun. Yet the
dragon's wrath was in some way justified, since he had been robbed,
and could not trace the thief. Centuries before Beowulf's lifetime a
mighty family of heroes had gathered together, by feats of arms, and
by long inheritance, an immense treasure of cups and goblets, of
necklaces and rings, of swords and helmets and armour, cunningly
wrought by magic spells; they had joyed in their cherished hoard for
long years, until all had died but one, and he survived solitary,
miserable, brooding over the fate of the dearly loved treasure. At
last he caused his servants to make a strong fastness in the rocks,
with cunningly devised entrances, known only to himself, and thither,
with great toil and labour of aged limbs, he carried and hid the
precious treasure. As he sadly regarded it, and thought of its future
fate, he cried aloud:

"Hold thou now fast, O earth, now men no longer can,

The treasure of mighty earls. From thee brave men won it
In days that are long gone by, but slaughter seized on them,
Death fiercely vanquished them, each of my warriors,
Each one of my people, who closed their life-days here
After the joy of earth. None have I sword to wield
Or bring me the goblet, the richly wrought vessel.
All the true heroes have elsewhere departed!
Now must the gilded helm lose its adornments,
For those who polished it sleep in the gloomy grave,
Those who made ready erst war-gear of warriors.
Likewise the battle-sark which in the fight endured
Bites of the keen-edged blades midst the loud crash of shields
Rusts, with its wearer dead. Nor may the woven mail
After the chieftain's death wide with a champion rove.
Gone is the joy of harp, gone is the music's mirth.
Now the hawk goodly-winged hovers not through the hall,
Nor the swift-footed mare tramples the castle court:
Baleful death far has sent all living tribes of men."
When this solitary survivor of the ancient race died his hoard
remained alone, unknown, untouched, until at length the fiery dragon,
seeking a shelter among the rocks, found the hidden way to the cave,
and, creeping within, discovered the lofty inner chamber and the
wondrous hoard. For three hundred winters he brooded over it
unchallenged, and then one day a hunted fugitive, fleeing from the
fury of an avenging chieftain, in like manner found the cave, and the
dragon sleeping on his gold. Terrified almost to death, the fugitive
eagerly seized a marvellously wrought chalice and bore it stealthily
away, feeling sure that such an offering would appease his lord's
wrath and atone for his offence. But when the dragon awoke he
discovered that he had been robbed, and his keen scent assured him
that some one of mankind was the thief. As he could not at once see
the robber, he crept around the outside of the barrow snuffing eagerly
to find traces of the spoiler, but it was in vain; then, growing more
wrathful, he flew over the inhabited country, shedding fiery death
from his glowing scales and flaming breath, while no man dared to face
this flying horror of the night.

The news came to Beowulf that his folk were suffering and dying, and
that no warrior dared to risk his life in an effort to deliver the
land from this deadly devastation; and although he was now an aged man
he decided to attack the fire-drake. Beowulf knew that he would not be
able to come to hand-grips with this foe as he had done with Grendel
and his mother: the fiery breath of this dragon was far too deadly,
and he must trust to armour for protection. He commanded men to make
a shield entirely of iron, for he knew that the usual shield of
linden-wood would be instantly burnt up in the dragon's flaming
breath. He then chose with care eleven warriors, picked men of his own
bodyguard, to accompany him in this dangerous quest. They compelled
the unhappy fugitive whose theft had begun the trouble to act as their
guide, and thus they marched to the lonely spot where the dragon's
barrow stood close to the sea-shore. The guide went unwillingly, but
was forced thereto by his lord, because he alone knew the way.

Beowulf Faces Death

When the little party reached the place they halted for a time, and
Beowulf sat down meditating sadly on his past life, and on the chances
of this great conflict which he was about to begin. When he had
striven with Grendel, when he had fought against the Hetware, he had
been confident of victory and full of joyous self-reliance, but now
things were changed. Beowulf was an old man, and there hung over him a
sad foreboding that this would be his last fight, and that he would
rid the land of no more monsters. Wyrd seemed to threaten him, and a
sense of coming woe lay heavy on his heart as he spoke to his little
troop: "Many great fights I had in my youth. How well I remember them
all! I was only seven years old when King Hrethel took me to bring up,
and loved me as dearly as his own sons, Herebeald, Hathcyn, or my own
dear lord Hygelac. Great was our grief when Hathcyn, hunting in the
forest, slew all unwittingly his elder brother: greater than ordinary
sorrow, because we could not avenge him on the murderer! It would have
given no joy to Hrethel to see his second son killed disgracefully as
a murderer! So we endured the pain till King Hrethel died, borne down
by his bitter loss, and I wept for my protector, my kinsman. Then
Hathcyn died also, slain by the Swedes, and my dear lord Hygelac came
to the throne: he was gracious to me, a giver of weapons, a generous
distributor of treasure, and I repaid him as much as I could in battle
against his foes. Daghrefn, the Frankish warrior who slew my king, I
sent to his doom with my deadly hand-grip: he, at least, should not
show my lord's armour as trophy of his prowess. But this fight is
different: here I must use both point and edge, as I was not wont in
my youth: but here too will I, old though I be, work deeds of valour.
I will not give way the space of one foot, but will meet him here in
his own abode and make all my boasting good. Abide ye here, ye
warriors, for this is not your expedition, nor the work of any man but
me alone; wait till ye know which is triumphant, for I will win the
gold and save my people, or death shall take me." So saying he raised
his great shield, and, unaccompanied, set his face to the dark
entrance, where a stream, boiling with strange heat, flowed forth from
the cave; so hot was the air that he stood, unable to advance far for
the suffocating steam and smoke. Angered by his impotence, Beowulf
raised his voice and shouted a furious defiance to the awesome
guardian of the barrow. Thus aroused, the dragon sprang up, roaring
hideously and flapping his glowing wings together; out from the
recesses of the barrow came his fiery breath, and then followed the
terrible beast himself. Coiling and writhing he came, with head
raised, and scales of burnished blue and green, glowing with inner
heat; from his nostrils rushed two streams of fiery breath, and his
flaming eyes shot flashes of consuming fire. He half flew, half sprang
at Beowulf. But the hero did not retreat one step. His bright sword
flashed in the air as he wounded the beast, but not mortally, striking
a mighty blow on his scaly head. The guardian of the hoard writhed and
was stunned for a moment, and then sprang at Beowulf, sending forth so
dense a cloud of flaming breath that the hero stood in a mist of fire.
So terrible was the heat that the iron shield glowed red-hot and the
ring-mail on the hero's limbs seared him as a furnace, and his breast
swelled with the keen pain: so terrible was the fiery cloud that the
Geats, seated some distance away, turned and fled, seeking the cool
shelter of the neighbouring woods, and left their heroic lord to
suffer and die alone.

Beowulf's Death

Among the cowardly Geats, however, there was one who thought it
shameful to flee--Wiglaf, the son of Weohstan. He was young, but a
brave warrior, to whom Beowulf had shown honour, and on whom he had
showered gifts, for he was a kinsman, and had proved himself worthy.
Now he showed that Beowulf's favour had been justified, for he seized
his shield, of yellow linden-wood, took his ancient sword in hand, and
prepared to rush to Beowulf's aid. With bitter words he reproached his
cowardly comrades, saying: "I remember how we boasted, as we sat in
the mead hall and drank the foaming ale, as we took gladly the gold
and jewels which our king lavished upon us, that we would repay him
for all his gifts, if ever such need there were! Now is the need come
upon him, and we are here! Beowulf chose us from all his bodyguard to
help him in this mighty struggle, and we have betrayed and deserted
him, and left him alone against a terrible foe. Now the day has come
when our lord should see our valour, and we flee from his side! Up,
let us go and aid him, even while the grim battle-flame flares around
him. God knows that I would rather risk my body in the fiery cloud
than stay here while my king fights and dies! Not such disloyalty has
Beowulf deserved through his long reign that he should stand alone in
the death-struggle. He and I will die together, or side by side will
we conquer." The youthful warrior tried in vain to rouse the courage
of his companions: they trembled, and would not move. So Wiglaf,
holding on high his shield, plunged into the fiery cloud and moved
towards his king, crying aloud: "Beowulf, my dear lord, let not thy
glory be dimmed. Achieve this last deed of valour, as thou didst
promise in days of yore, that thy fame should not fall, and I will aid
thee."

The sound of another voice roused the dragon to greater fury, and
again came the fiery cloud, burning up like straw Wiglaf's linden
shield, and torturing both warriors as they stood behind the iron
shield with their heated armour. But they fought on manfully, and
Beowulf, gathering up his strength, struck the dragon such a blow on
the head that his ancient sword was shivered to fragments. The dragon,
enraged, now flew at Beowulf and seized him by the neck with his
poisonous fangs, so that the blood gushed out in streams, and ran down
his corslet. Wiglaf was filled with grief and horror at this dreadful
sight, and, leaving the protection of Beowulf's iron shield, dashed
forth at the dragon, piercing the scaly body in a vital part. At once
the fire began to fade away, and Beowulf, mastering his anguish, drew
his broad knife, and with a last effort cut the hideous reptile
asunder. Then the agony of the envenomed wound came upon him, and his
limbs burnt and ached with intolerable pain. In growing distress he
staggered to a rough ancient seat, carved out of the rock, hard by
the door of the barrow. There he sank down, and Wiglaf laved his brow
with water from the little stream, which boiled and steamed no longer.
Then Beowulf partially recovered himself, and said: "Now I bequeath to
thee, my son, the armour which I also inherited. Fifty years have I
ruled this people in peace, so that none of my neighbours durst attack
us. I have endured and toiled much on this earth, have held my own
justly, have pursued none with crafty hatred, nor sworn unjust oaths.
At all this may I rejoice now that I lie mortally wounded. Do thou, O
dear Wiglaf, bring forth quickly from the cave the treasures for which
I lose my life, that I may see them and be glad in my nation's wealth
ere I die."

Thereupon Wiglaf entered the barrow, and was dazed by the bewildering
hoard of costly treasures. Filling his arms with such a load as he
could carry, he hastened out of the barrow, fearing even then to find
his lord dead. Then he flung down the treasures--magic armour,
dwarf-wrought swords, carved goblets, flashing gems, and a golden
standard--at Beowulf's feet, so that the ancient hero's dying gaze
could fall on the hoard he had won for his people. But Beowulf was now
so near death that he swooned away, till Wiglaf again flung water over
him, and the dying champion roused himself to say, as he grasped his
kinsman's hand and looked at the glittering heap before him:

"I thank God eternal, the great King of Glory,

For the vast treasures which I here gaze upon,
That I ere my death-day might for my people
Win so great wealth. Since I have given my life,
Thou must now look to the needs of the nation;
Here dwell I no longer, for Destiny calleth me!
Bid thou my warriors after my funeral pyre
Build me a burial-cairn high on the sea-cliff's head;
It shall for memory tower up on Hronesness,
So that the seafarers Beowulf's Barrow
Henceforth shall name it, they who drive far and wide
Over the mighty flood their foamy keels.
Thou art the last of all the kindred of Wagmund!
Wyrd has swept all my kin, all the brave chiefs away!
 Now must I follow them!"

These last words spoken, Beowulf fell back, and his soul passed away,
to meet the joy reserved for all true and steadfast spirits. The hero
was dead, but amid his grief Wiglaf yet remembered that the dire
monster too lay dead, and the folk were delivered from the horrible
plague, though at terrible cost! Wiglaf, as he mourned over his dead
lord, resolved that no man should joy in the treasures for which so
grievous a price had been paid--the cowards who deserted their king
should help to lay the treasures in his grave and bury them far from
human use and profit. Accordingly, when the ten faithless dastards
ventured out from the shelter of the wood, and came shamefacedly to
the place where Wiglaf sat, sorrowing, at the head of dead Beowulf, he
stilled their cries of grief with one wave of the hand, which had
still been vainly striving to arouse his king by gentle touch, and,
gazing scornfully at them, he cried: "Lo! well may a truthful man say,
seeing you here, safely in the war-gear and ornaments which our dead
hero gave you, that Beowulf did but throw away his generous gifts,
since all he bought with them was treachery and cowardice in the day
of battle! No need had Beowulf to boast of his warriors in time of
danger! Yet he alone avenged his people and conquered the fiend--I
could help him but little in the fray, though I did what I could: all
too few champions thronged round our hero when his need was sorest.
Now are all the joys of love and loyalty ended; now is all prosperity
gone from our nation, when foreign princes hear of your flight and
the shameless deed of this day. Better is death to every man than a
life of shame!"

[Illustration: The death of Beowulf]

The Geats stood silent, abashed before the keen and deserved
reproaches of the young hero, and they lamented the livelong day. None
left the shore and their lord's dead corpse; but one man who rode over
the cliff near by saw the mournful little band, with Beowulf dead in
the midst. This warrior galloped away to tell the people, saying: "Now
is our ruler, the lord of the Geats, stretched dead on the plain,
stricken by the dragon which lies dead beside him; and at his head
sits Wiglaf, son of Weohstan, lamenting his royal kinsman. Now is the
joy and prosperity of our folk vanished! Now shall our enemies make
raids upon us, for we have none to withstand them! But let us hasten
to bury our king, to bear him royally to his grave, with mourning and
tears of woe." These unhappy tidings roused the Geats, and they
hastened to see if it were really true, and found all as the messenger
had said, and wondered at the mighty dragon and the glorious hoard of
gold. They feared the monster and coveted the treasure, but all felt
that the command now lay with Wiglaf. At last Wiglaf roused himself
from his silent grief and said: "O men of the Geats, I am not to blame
that our king lies here lifeless. He would fight the dragon and win
the treasure; and these he has done, though he lost his life therein;
yea, and I aided him all that I might, though it was but little I
could do. Now our dear lord Beowulf bade me greet you from him, and
bid you to make for him, after his funeral pyre, a great and mighty
cairn, even as he was the most glorious of men in his lifetime. Bring
ye all the treasures, bring quickly a bier, and place thereon our
king's corpse, and let us bear our dear lord to Hronesness, where
his funeral fire shall be kindled, and his burial cairn built."

The Geats, bitterly grieving, fulfilled Wiglaf's commands. They

gathered wood for the fire, and piled it on the cliff-head; then eight
chosen ones brought thither the treasures, and threw the dragon's body
over the cliff into the sea; then a wain, hung with shields, was
brought to bear the corpse of Beowulf to Hronesness, where it was
solemnly laid on the funeral pile and consumed to ashes.

"There then the Weder Geats wrought for their ruler dead
A cairn on the ocean cliff widespread and lofty,
Visible far and near by vessels' wandering crews.
They built in ten days' space the hero's monument,
And wrought with shining swords the earthen rampart wall,
So that the wisest men worthy might deem it.
Then in that cairn they placed necklets and rings and gems
Which from the dragon's hoard brave men had taken.
Back to the earth they gave treasures of ancient folk,
Gold to the gloomy mould, where it now lieth
Useless to sons of men as it e'er was of yore.
Then round the mound there rode twelve manly warriors,
Chanting their bitter grief, singing the hero dead,
Mourning their noble king in fitting words of woe!
They praised his courage high and his proud, valiant deeds,
Honoured him worthily, as it is meet for men
Duly to praise in words their friendly lord and king
When his soul wanders forth far from its fleshly home.
So all the Geat chiefs, Beowulf's bodyguard,
Wept for their leader's fall: sang in their loud laments
That he of earthly kings mildest to all men was,
Gentlest, most gracious, most keen to win glory."

CHAPTER II: THE DREAM OF MAXEN WLEDIG

The Position of Constantine

It would seem that the Emperor Constantine the Great loomed very large
in the eyes of medi�val England. Even in Anglo-Saxon times many
legends clustered round his name, so that Cynewulf, the religious poet
of early England, wrote the poem of "Elene" mainly on the subject of
his conversion. The story of the Vision of the Holy Cross with the
inscription _In hoc signo vinces_ was inspiring to a poet to whom the
heathen were a living reality, not a distant abstraction; and
Constantine's generosity to the Church of Rome and its bishop
Sylvester added another element of attraction to his character in the
medi�val mind. It is hardly surprising that other legends of his
conversion and generosity should have sprung up, which differ entirely
from the earlier and more authentic record. Thus "the moral Gower" has
preserved for us an alternative legend of the cause of Constantine's
conversion, which forms a good illustration of the virtue of pity in
the "Confessio Amantis." Whence this later legend sprang we have no
knowledge, for nothing in the known history of Constantine warrants
our regarding him as a disciple of mercy, but its existence shows that
the medi�val mind was busied with his personality. Another most
interesting proof of his importance to Britain is given in the
following legend of "The Dream of Maxen Wledig," preserved in the
"Mabinogion." This belongs to the Welsh patriotic legends, and tends
to glorify the marriage of the British Princess Helena with the Roman
emperor, by representing it as preordained by Fate. The fact that the
hero of the Welsh saga is the Emperor Maxentius instead of
Constantius detracts little from the interest of the legend, which is
only one instance of the well-known theme of the lover led by dream,
or vision, or magic glass to the home and heart of the beloved.

The Emperor Maxen Wledig

The Emperor Maxen Wledig was the most powerful occupant of the throne
of the C�sars who had ever ruled Europe from the City of the Seven
Hills. He was the most handsome man in his dominions, tall and strong
and skilled in all manly exercises; withal he was gracious and
friendly to all his vassals and tributary kings, so that he was
universally beloved. One day he announced his wish to go hunting, and
was accompanied on his expedition down the Tiber valley by thirty-two
vassal kings, with whom he enjoyed the sport heartily. At noon the
heat was intense, they were far from Rome, and all were weary. The
emperor proposed a halt, and they dismounted to take rest. Maxen lay
down to sleep with his head on a shield, and soldiers and attendants
stood around making a shelter for him from the sun's rays by a roof of
shields hung on their spears. Thus he fell into a sleep so deep that
none dared to awake him. Hours passed by, and still he slumbered, and
still his whole retinue waited impatiently for his awakening. At
length, when the evening shadows began to lie long and black on the
ground, their impatience found vent in little restless movements of
hounds chafing in their leashes, of spears clashing, of shields
dropping from the weariness of their holders, and horses neighing and
prancing; and then Maxen Wledig awoke suddenly with a start. "Ah, why
did you arouse me?" he asked sadly. "Lord, your dinner hour is long
past--did you not know?" they said. He shook his head mournfully, but
said no word, and, mounting his horse, turned it and rode in unbroken
silence back to Rome, with his head sunk on his breast. Behind him
rode in dismay his retinue of kings and tributaries, who knew nothing
of the cause of his sorrowful mood.

The Emperor's Malady

From that day the emperor was changed, changed utterly. He rode no
more, he hunted no more, he paid no heed to the business of the
empire, but remained in seclusion in his own apartments and slept. The
court banquets continued without him, music and song he refused to
hear, and though in his sleep he smiled and was happy, when he awoke
his melancholy could not be cheered or his gloom lightened. When this
condition of things had continued for more than a week it was
determined that the emperor must be aroused from this dreadful state
of apathy, and his groom of the chamber, a noble Roman of very high
rank--indeed, a king, under the emperor--resolved to make the
endeavour.

"My lord," said he, "I have evil tidings for you. The people of Rome
are beginning to murmur against you, because of the change that has
come over you. They say that you are bewitched, that they can get no
answers or decisions from you, and all the affairs of the empire go to
wrack and ruin while you sleep and take no heed. You have ceased to be
their emperor, they say, and they will cease to be loyal to you."

The Dream of the Emperor

Then Maxen Wledig roused himself and said to the noble: "Call hither
my wisest senators and councillors, and I will explain the cause of my
melancholy, and perhaps they will be able to give me relief."
Accordingly the senators came together, and the emperor ascended his
throne, looking so mournful that the whole Senate grieved for him, and
feared lest death should speedily overtake him. He began to address
them thus:

"Senators and Sages of Rome, I have heard that my people murmur

against me, and will rebel if I do not arouse myself. A terrible fate
has fallen upon me, and I see no way of escape from my misery, unless
ye can find one. It is now more than a week since I went hunting with
my court, and when I was wearied I dismounted and slept. In my sleep I
dreamt, and a vision cast its spell upon me, so that I feel no
happiness unless I am sleeping, and seem to live only in my dreams. I
thought I was hunting along the Tiber valley, lost my courtiers, and
rode to the head of the valley alone. There the river flowed forth
from a great mountain, which looked to me the highest in the world;
but I ascended it, and found beyond fair and fertile plains, far
vaster than any in our Italy, with mighty rivers flowing through the
lovely country to the sea. I followed the course of the greatest
river, and reached its mouth, where a noble port stood on the shores
of a sea unknown to me. In the harbour lay a fleet of well-appointed
ships, and one of these was most beautifully adorned, its planks
covered with gold or silver, and its sails of silk. As a gangway of
carved ivory led to the deck, I crossed it and entered the vessel,
which immediately sailed out of the harbour into the ocean. The voyage
was not of long duration, for we soon came to land in a wondrously
beautiful island, with scenery of varied loveliness. This island I
traversed, led by some secret guidance, till I reached its farthest
shore, broken by cliffs and precipices and mountain ranges, while
between the mountains and the sea I saw a fair and fruitful land
traversed by a silvery, winding river, with a castle at its mouth. My
longing drew me to the castle, and when I came to the gate I entered,
for the dwelling stood open to every man, and such a hall as was
therein I have never seen for splendour, even in Imperial Rome. The
walls were covered with gold, set with precious gems, the seats were
of gold and the tables of silver, and two fair youths, whom I saw
playing chess, used pieces of gold on a board of silver. Their attire
was of black satin embroidered with gold, and golden circlets were on
their brows. I gazed at the youths for a moment, and next became aware
of an aged man sitting near them. His carved ivory seat was adorned
with golden eagles, the token of Imperial Rome; his ornaments on arms
and hands and neck were of bright gold, and he was carving fresh
chessmen from a rod of solid gold. Beside him sat, on a golden chair,
a maiden (the loveliest in the whole world she seemed, and still
seems, to me). White was her inner dress under a golden overdress, her
crown of gold adorned with rubies and pearls, and a golden girdle
encircled her slender waist. The beauty of her face won my love in
that moment, and I knelt and said: 'Hail, Empress of Rome!' but as she
bent forward from her seat to greet me I awoke. Now I have no peace
and no joy except in sleep, for in dreams I always see my lady, and in
dreams we love each other and are happy; therefore in dreams will I
live, unless ye can find some way to satisfy my longing while I wake."

[Illustration: The dream of the Emperor]

The Quest for the Maiden

The senators were at first greatly amazed, and then one of them said:
"My lord, will you not send out messengers to seek throughout all your
lands for the maiden in the castle? Let each group of messengers
search for one year, and return at the end of the year with
tidings. So shall you live in good hope of success from year to year."
The messengers were sent out accordingly, with wands in their hands
and a sleeve tied on each cap, in token of peace and of an embassy;
but though they searched with all diligence, after three years three
separate embassies had brought back no news of the mysterious land and
the beauteous maiden.

Then the groom of the chamber said to Maxen Wledig: "My lord, will you
not go forth to hunt, as on the day when you dreamt this enthralling
dream?" To this the emperor agreed, and rode to the place in the
valley where he had slept. "Here," he said, "my dream began, and I
seemed to follow the river to its source." Then the groom of the
chamber said: "Will you not send messengers to the river's source, my
lord, and bid them follow the track of your dream?" Accordingly
thirteen messengers were sent, who followed the river up until it
issued from the highest mountain they had ever seen. "Behold our
emperor's dream!" they exclaimed, and they ascended the mountain, and
descended the other side into a most beautiful and fertile plain, as
Maxen Wledig had seen in his dream. Following the greatest river of
all (probably the Rhine), the ambassadors reached the great seaport on
the North Sea, and found the fleet waiting with one vessel larger than
all the others; and they entered the ship and were carried to the fair
island of Britain. Here they journeyed westward, and came to the
mountainous land of Snowdon, whence they could see the sacred isle of
Mona (Anglesey) and the fertile land of Arvon lying between the
mountains and the sea. "This," said the messengers, "is the land of
our master's dream, and in yon fair castle we shall find the maiden
whom our emperor loves."

The Finding of the Maiden

So they went through the lovely land of Arvon to the castle of

Caernarvon, and in that lordly fortress was the great hall, with the
two youths playing chess, the venerable man carving chessmen, and the
maiden in her chair of gold. When the ambassadors saw the fair
Princess Helena they fell on their knees before her and said: "Empress
of Rome, all hail!" But Helena half rose from her seat in anger as she
said: "What does this mockery mean? You seem to be men of gentle
breeding, and you wear the badge of messengers: whence comes it, then,
that ye mock me thus?" But the ambassadors calmed her anger, saying:
"Be not wroth, lady: this is no mockery, for the Emperor of Rome, the
great lord Maxen Wledig, has seen you in a dream, and he has sworn to
wed none but you. Which, therefore, will you choose, to accompany us
to Rome, and there be made empress, or to wait here until the emperor
can come to you?" The princess thought deeply for a time, and then
replied: "I would not be too credulous, or too hard of belief. If the
emperor loves me and would wed me, let him find me in my father's
house, and make me his bride in my own home."

The Dream Realized

After this the thirteen envoys departed, and returned to the emperor
in such haste that when their horses failed they gave no heed, but
took others and pressed on. When they reached Rome and informed Maxen
Wledig of the success of their mission he at once gathered his army
and marched across Europe towards Britain. When the Roman emperor had
crossed the sea he conquered Britain from Beli the son of Manogan,
and made his way to Arvon. On entering the castle he saw first the two
youths, Kynon and Adeon, playing chess, then their father, Eudav, the
son of Caradoc, and then his beloved, the beauteous Helena, daughter
of Eudav. "Empress of Rome, all hail!" Maxen Wledig said; and the
princess bent forward in her chair and kissed him, for she knew he was
her destined husband. The next day they were wedded, and the Emperor
Maxen Wledig gave Helena as dowry all Britain for her father, the son
of the gallant Caradoc, and for herself three castles, Caernarvon,
Caerlleon, and Caermarthen, where she dwelt in turn; and in one of
them was born her son Constantine, the only British-born Emperor of
Rome. To this day in Wales the old Roman roads that connected Helena's
three castles are known as "Sarn Helen."

CHAPTER III: THE STORY OF CONSTANTINE AND ELENE

The Greatness of Constantine Provokes Attack

In the year 312, the sixth year after Constantine had become emperor,
the Roman Empire had increased on every hand, for Constantine was a
mighty leader in war, a gracious and friendly lord in peace; he was a
true king and ruler, a protector of all men. So mightily did he
prosper that his enemies assembled great armies against him, and a
confederation to overthrow him was made by the terrible Huns, the
famous Goths, the brave Franks, and the warlike Hugas. This powerful
confederation sent against Constantine an overwhelming army of Huns,
whose numbers seemed to be countless, and yet the Hunnish leaders
feared, when they knew that the emperor himself led the small Roman
host.

The Eve of the Battle

The night before the battle Constantine lay sadly in the midst of his
army, watching the stars, and dreading the result of the next day's
conflict; for his warriors were few compared with the Hunnish
multitude, and even Roman discipline and devotion might not win the
day against the mad fury of the barbarous Huns. At last, wearied out,
the emperor slept, and a vision came to him in his sleep. He seemed to
see, standing by him, a beautiful shining form, a man more glorious
than the sons of men, who, as Constantine sprang up ready helmed for
war, addressed him by name. The darkness of night fled before the
heavenly light that shone from the angel, and the messenger said:

"O Constantinus, the Ruler of Angels,

The Lord of all glory, the Master of heaven's hosts,
Claims from thee homage. Be not thou affrighted,
Though armies of aliens array them for battle,
Though terrible warriors threaten fierce conflict.
Look thou to the sky, to the throne of His glory;
 There seest thou surely the symbol of conquest."

_Elene._

Vision of the Cross

Constantine looked up as the angel bade him, and saw, hovering in the
air, a cross, splendid, glorious, adorned with gems and shining with
heavenly light. On its wood letters were engraved, gleaming with
unearthly radiance:

"With this shalt thou conquer the foe in the conflict,

And with it shalt hurl back the host of the heathen."

_Elene._

Constantine is Cheered

Constantine read these words with awe and gladness, for indeed he knew
not what deity had thus favoured him, but he would not reject the help
of the Unknown God; so he bowed his head in reverence, and when he
looked again the cross and the angel had disappeared, and around him
as he woke was the greyness of the rising dawn. The emperor summoned
to his tent two soldiers from the troops, and bade them make a cross
of wood to bear before the army. This they did, greatly marvelling,
and Constantine called a standard-bearer, to whom he gave charge to
bear forward the Standard of the Cross where the danger was greatest
and the battle most fierce.

The Morning of Battle

When the day broke, and the two armies could see each other, both
hosts arrayed themselves for battle, in serried ranks of armed
warriors, shouting their war-cries.

"Loud sang the trumpets to stern-minded foemen

The dewy-winged eagle watched them march onward,
The horny-billed raven rejoiced in the battle-play,
The sly wolf, the forest-thief, soon saw his heart's desire
As the fierce warriors rushed at each other.
Great was the shield-breaking, loud was the clamour,
Hard were the hand-blows, and dire was the downfall,
When first the heroes felt the keen arrow-shower.
Soon did the Roman host fall on the death-doomed Huns,
Thrust forth their deadly spears over the yellow shields,
Broke with their battle-glaives breasts of the foemen."

_Elene._

The Cross is Raised

Then, when the battle was at its height, and the Romans knew not
whether they would conquer or die fighting to the last, the
standard-bearer raised the Cross, the token of promised victory,
before all the host, and sang the chant of triumph. Onward he marched,
and the Roman host followed him, pressing on resistless as the surging
waves. The Huns, bewildered by the strange rally, and dreading the
mysterious sign of some mighty god, rolled back, at first slowly, and
then more and more quickly, till sullen retreat became panic rout, and
they broke and fled. Multitudes were cut down as they fled, other
multitudes were swept away by the devouring Danube as they tried to
cross its current; some, half dead, reached the other side, and saved
their lives in fortresses, guarding the steep cliffs beyond the
Danube. Few, very few they were who ever saw their native land again.

There was great rejoicing in the Roman army and in the Roman camp when
Constantine returned in triumph with the wondrous Cross borne before
him. He passed on to the city, and the people of Rome gazed with awe
on the token of the Unknown God who had saved their city, but none
would say who that God might be.

A Council Summoned

The emperor summoned a great council of all the wisest men in Rome,
and when all were met he raised the Standard of the Cross in the midst
and said:

"Can any man tell me, by spells or by ancient lore,

Who is the gracious God, giver of victory,
Who came in His glory, with the Cross for His token,
Who rescued my people and gave me the victory,
Scattered my foemen and put the fierce Huns to flight,
Showed me in heaven His sign of deliverance,
The loveliest Cross of light, gleaming in glory?"

_Elene._

At first no man could give him any answer--perhaps none dared--till

after a long silence the wisest of all arose and said he had heard
that the Cross was the sign of Christ the King of Heaven, and that the
knowledge of His way was only revealed to men in baptism. When strict
search was made some Christians were found, who preached the way of
life to Constantine, and rejoiced that they might tell before men, of
the life and death, the Resurrection and Ascension of Jesus Christ,
who redeemed mankind from the bonds of evil; and then Constantine,
being fully instructed and convinced, was baptized and became the
first Christian emperor.

Constantine Desires to Find our Saviour's Cross

Constantine's heart, however, was too full of love for his new Lord to
let him rest satisfied without some visible token of Christ's sojourn
on earth. He longed to have, to keep for his own, one thing at least
which Jesus had touched during His life, and his thoughts turned
chiefly to that Cross which had been to himself both the sign of
triumph and the guide to the way of life. Thus he again called
together his Christian teachers, and inquired more closely where
Christ had suffered.

"In Jud�a, outside the walls of Jerusalem, He died on the Cross," they
told him.
"Then there, near that city, so blest and so curst, we must seek His
precious Cross," cried Constantine.

Summons his Mother Elene

Forthwith he summoned from Britain his mother the British Princess

Elene, and when she had been taught the truth, had been converted and
baptized, he told her of his heart's desire, and begged her to journey
to Jerusalem and seek the sacred Cross.

Elene herself, when she heard Constantine's words, was filled with
wonder, and said: "Dear son, thy words have greatly rejoiced my heart,
for know that I, too, have seen a vision, and would gladly seek the
Holy Cross, where it lies hidden from the eyes of men."

Elene's Vision

"Now will I tell thee the brightest of visions,

Dreamt at the midnight when men lay in slumber.
Hovering in heaven saw I a radiant Cross,
Gloriously gold-adorned, shining in splendour;
Starry gems shone on it at the four corners,
Flashed from the shoulder-span five gleaming jewels.
Angels surrounded it, guarding it gladly.
Yet in its loveliness sad was that Cross to see,
For 'neath the gold and gems fast blood flowed from it,
Till it was all defiled with the dark drops."

_Dream of the Rood._

In this dream of Elene's the Cross spoke to her, and told her of the
sad fate which had made of that hapless tree the Cross on which the
Redeemer of mankind had released the souls of men from evil, on which
He had spread out His arms to embrace mankind, had bowed His head,
weary with the strife, and had given up His soul. All creation wept
that hour, for Christ was on the Cross.

"Yet His friends came to him, left not His corpse alone,
Took down the Mighty King from His sharp sufferings--
Humbly I bowed myself down to the hands of men.
Sadly they laid Him down in His dark rock-hewn grave,
Sadly they sang for Him dirges for death-doomed ones,
Sadly they left Him there as His fair corpse grew cold.
We, the three Crosses, stood mournful in loneliness,
Till evil-thinking men felled us all three to ground,
Sank us deep into earth, sealed us from sight of man."

_Dream of the Rood._

She Undertakes the Quest

As Constantine had been guided by the heavenly vision of the True

Cross, so now Elene would journey to the land of the Jews and find the
reality of that Holy Cross. Her will and that of her son were one in
this matter, so that before long the whole city resounded with the
bustle and clamour of preparation, for Elene was to travel with the
pomp and retinue befitting the mother of the Emperor of Rome.

"There by the Wendel Sea stood the wave-horses.

Proudly the plunging ships sought out the ocean path.
Line followed after line of the tall brine-ploughs.
Forth went the water-steeds o'er the sea-serpent's road
Bright shields on the bulwarks oft broke the foaming surge.
Ne'er saw I lady lead such a fair following!"

_Elene._

She Comes to Jud�a

Queen Elene had a prosperous voyage, and, after touching at the land
of the Greeks, reached in due time the country of Jud�a, and so, with
good hope came to Jerusalem. There, in the emperor's name, she
summoned to an assembly all the oldest and wisest Jews, a congregation
of a thousand venerable rabbis, learned in all the books of the Law
and the Prophets and proud that they were the Chosen People in a world
of heathens, aliens from the True God. These she addressed at first
with a blending of flattery and reproach--flattery for the Chosen
People, reproach for their perversity of wickedness--and, finally,
peremptorily demanded an answer to any question she might ask of them.
The Jews withdrew and deliberated sadly whether they durst refuse the
request of so mighty a person as the emperor's mother, and, deciding
that they durst not, returned to the hall where Elene sat in splendour
on her throne and announced their readiness to reply to all her
questions. Elene, however, bade them first lessen their numbers. They
chose five hundred to reply for them, and on these she poured such
bitter reproaches that they at last exclaimed:

"Lady, we learnt of yore laws of the Hebrew folk

Which all our fathers learnt from the true ark of God.
Lady, we know not now why thou thus blamest us;
How has the Jewish race done grievous wrong to thee?"

_Elene._

She Cross-questions the Rabbis

Elene only replied: "Go ye away, and choose out from among these five
hundred those whose wisdom is great enough to show them without delay
the answer to all things I require"; and again they left her presence.
When they were alone, one of them, named Judas, said "I know what
this queen requires: she will demand to know from us where the Cross
is concealed on which the Lord of the Christians was crucified; but if
we tell this secret I know well that the Jews will cease to bear rule
on the earth, and our holy scriptures will be forgotten. For my
grandfather Zacch�us, as he lay dying, bade me confess the truth if
ever man should inquire concerning the Holy Tree; and when I asked how
our nation had failed to recognise the Holy and Just One, he told me
that he had always withdrawn himself from the evil deeds of his
generation, and their leaders had been blinded by their own
unrighteousness, and had slain the Lord of Glory. And he ended:

"'Thus I and my father secretly held the Faith.

Now warn I thee, my son, speak not thou mockingly
 Of the true Son of God reigning in glory:
For whom my Stephen died, and the Apostle Paul.'

_Elene._

"Now," said Judas, "since things are so, decide ye what we shall
reveal, or what conceal, if this queen asks us."

One Appointed to Answer her

The other elders replied: "Do what seems to thee best, since thou
alone knowest this. Never have we heard of these strange secrets. Do
thou according to thy great wisdom."

While they still deliberated came the heralds with silver trumpets,
which they blew, proclaiming aloud:

"The mighty Queen calls you, O men, to the Council,

That she may hear from you of your decision.
Great is the need ye have of all your wisdom."

_Elene._

Slowly and reluctantly the Jewish rabbis returned to the

council-chamber, and listened to Elene as she plied them with
questions about the ancient prophecies and the death of Christ; but to
all her inquiries they professed entire ignorance, until, in her
wrath, the queen threatened them with death by fire. Then they led
forward Judas, saying: "He can reveal the mysteries of Fate, for he is
of noble race, the son of a prophet. He will tell thee truth, O Queen,
as thy soul loveth." Thus Elene let the other Jews go in peace, and
took Judas for a hostage.

She Threatens him

Now Elene greeted Judas and said:

"Lo, thou perverse one, two things lie before thee,

Or death or life for thee: choose which thou wilt."

_Elene._

Judas replied to her, since he could not escape:

"If the starved wanderer lost on the barren moors

Sees both a stone and bread, easily in his reach,
Which, O Queen, thinkest thou he will reject?"

_Elene._

Thereupon Elene said: "If thou wouldst dwell in heaven with the
angels, reveal to me where the True Cross lies hidden." Now Judas was
very sad, for his choice lay between death and the revealing of the
fateful secret, but he still tried to evade giving an answer,
protesting that too long a time had passed for the secret to be known.
Elene retorted that the Trojan War was a still more ancient story, and
yet was still well known; but Judas replied that men are bound to
remember the valiant deeds of nations; he himself had never even heard
the story of which she spoke. This obstinacy angered the queen
greatly, and she demanded to be taken at once to the hill of Calvary,
that she might purify it, for the sake of Him who died there; but
Judas only repeated:

"I know not the place, nor aught of that field."

_Elene._

Queen Elene was yet more enraged by his stubborn denials, and
determined to obtain by force an answer to her questions. Calling her
servants, she bade them thrust Judas into a deep dry cistern, where he
lay, starving, bound hand and foot, for seven nights and days. On the
seventh day his stubborn spirit yielded, and Judas lifted up his voice
and called aloud, saying:

"Now I beseech you all by the great God of heaven

That you will lift me up out of this misery.
I will tell all I know of that True Holy Cross,
Now I no longer can hide it for heavy pain.
Hunger has daunted me through all these dreary days.
Foolish was I of yore; late I confess it."

_Elene._

He Guides her to Calvary

The message was brought to Elene where she waited to hear tidings, and
she bade her servants lift the weakened Judas from the dark pit; then
they led him, half dead with hunger, out of the city to the hill of
Calvary. There Judas prayed to the God whom he now feared and
worshipped for a sign, some token to guide them in their search for
the Holy Cross. As he prayed a sweet-smelling vapour, curling upwards
like the incense-wreaths around the altar, rose to the skies from the
summit of the hill. The sign was manifest to all, and Judas gave
thanks to God for His great mercy; then, bidding the wondering
soldiers help him, he began to dig. By this time all men knew what
they sought, and each wished to uncover the holy relic, so that all
dug with great zeal, until, under twenty feet of earth, they
uncovered three crosses, so well preserved that they lay in the earth
just as the Jews had hidden them.

Three Crosses Found

Judas and all rejoiced greatly at this marvel, and, reverently raising
the three crosses, they bore them into the city, and laid them at the
feet of Queen Elene, whose first rapture of joy was speedily turned to
perplexity as she realised that she knew not which was that sacred
Cross on which the King of Angels had suffered. "For," she said, "two
thieves were crucified with him." But even Judas could not clear her
doubts.

"Lo we have heard of this from all the holy books,

That there were with him two in His deep anguish.
They hung in death by Him; He was Himself the third.
Heaven was all darkened o'er at that dread moment.
 Say, if thou rightly canst, which of these crosses
Is that blest Tree of Fate which bore the Heaven's King."

_Elene._

[Illustration: The Queen's dilemma]

A Miracle to Reveal our Saviour's Cross

Judas, however, suggested that the crosses should be carried to the

midst of the city, and that they should pray for another miracle to
reveal the truth. This was done at dawn, and the triumphant band of
Christians raised hymns of prayer and praise until the ninth hour;
then came a mighty crowd bearing a young man lifeless on his bier. At
Judas's command they laid down the bier, and he, praying to God,
solemnly raised in turn each of the crosses and held it above the dead
man's head. Lifeless still he lay as Judas raised the first two, but
when he held above the corpse the third, the True Cross, the dead man
arose instantly, body and soul reunited, one in praising God, and the
whole multitude broke out into shouts of thanksgiving to the Lord
of Hosts, and the sacred relic was restored to the loving care of the
queen.

The Nails Sought for

Nevertheless Elene's longing was still unsatisfied. She called Judas

(whose new name in baptism was Cyriacus) and begged him to fulfil her
desires, and to pray to God that she might find the nails which had
pierced the Lord of Life, where they lay hidden from men in the ground
of Calvary. Leading her out of the town, Cyriacus again prayed on
Mount Calvary that God would send forth a token and reveal the secret.
As he prayed there came from heaven a leaping flame, brighter than the
sun, which touched the surface of the ground here and there, and
kindled in each place a tiny star. When they dug at the spots where
the stars shone they found each nail shining visibly and casting a
radiance of its own in the dark earth. So Elene had obtained her
heart's desire, and had now the True Cross and the Holy Nails.

Good News Brought to Constantine

Word of his mother's success was sent to the Emperor Constantine, and
he was asked what should be done with these glorious relics. He bade
Elene build in Jerusalem a glorious church, and make therein a
beautiful shrine of silver, where the Holy Cross should be guarded for
all generations by priests who should watch it day and night. This was
done, but the nails were still Elene's possession, and she was at a
loss how to preserve these holy relics, when the devout Cyriacus, now
ordained Bishop of Jerusalem, went to her and said: "O lady and queen,
take these precious nails for thy son the emperor. Make with them
rings for his horse's bridle. Victory shall ever go with them; they
shall be called Holy to God, and he shall be called blessed whom that
horse bears." The advice pleased the queen, and she had wrought a
glorious bridle, adorned with the Holy Nails, and sent it to her son.
Constantine received it with all reverence, and ordained that April
24, the day of the miracle of revelation, should henceforth be kept in
honour as "Holy Cross Day." Thus were the Emperor's zeal and the royal
mother's devotion rewarded, and Christendom was enriched by some of
its most precious treasures, the True Cross and the Holy Nails.

CHAPTER IV: THE COMPASSION OF CONSTANTINE

Youth of Constantine

Constantine the Great was the eldest son of the Roman Emperor
Constantius and the British Princess Helena, or Elena, and was brought
up as a devout worshipper of the many gods of Rome. The lad grew up
strong and handsome, of a tall and majestic figure, skilled in all
warlike exercises, and, as he fought in the civil wars between the
various Roman emperors, he showed himself a bold and prudent general
in battle, a friendly and popular leader in time of peace. The
popularity of the youthful Constantine was dangerous to him, and he
needed, and showed, great skill in evading the deadly jealousy of the
old Emperor Diocletian, and the hatred of his father's rival,
Galerius. At last, however, his position became so dangerous that
Constantius felt his son's life was no longer safe, and earnestly
begged him to visit his native land of Britain, where Constantius had
just been proclaimed emperor and had defeated the wild Caledonians.
The excuse given was that Constantius was in bad health and needed his
son; but not until the young man was actually in Britain would his
anxious father avow that he feared for his son's life.

Acclaimed Emperor

When the half-British Constantius died, Constantine, who was the

favourite of the Roman soldiery of the west, was at once acclaimed as
emperor by his devoted troops. He professed unwillingness to accept
the honour, and it is said that he even tried in vain to escape on
horseback from the affectionate solicitations of his soldiers. Seeing
the uselessness of further protest, Constantine accepted the imperial
title, and wrote to Galerius claiming the throne and justifying his
acceptance of the unsought dignity thrust upon him. Galerius
acquiesced in the inevitable, and granted Constantine the inferior
title of "C�sar," with rule over Western Europe, and the wise prince
was content to wait until favouring circumstances should destroy his
rivals and give him that sole sway over the Roman Empire for which he
was so well fitted. He had now reached the age of thirty, had fought
valiantly in the wars in Egypt and Persia, and had risen by merit to
the rank of tribune. His marriage with Fausta, the daughter of the
Emperor Maximian, and his elevation to the rank of Augustus brought
him nearer to the attainment of his ambition; and at length the defeat
and death of his rivals placed him at the head of the world-wide
empire of Rome. It is to some period previous to Constantine's
elevation to the supreme authority that we must refer the following
story, told by Gower in his "Confessio Amantis" as an example of that
true charity which is the mother of pity, and makes a man's heart so
tender that,

"Though he might himself relieve,

Yet he would not another grieve,"
but in order to give pleasure to others would bear his own trouble
alone.

Becomes a Leper

The noble Constantine, Emperor of Rome, was in the full flower of his
age, goodly to look upon, strong and happy, when a great and sudden
affliction came upon him: leprosy attacked him. The horrible disease
showed itself first in his face, so that no concealment was possible,
and if he had not been the emperor he would have been driven out to
live in the forests and wilds. The leprosy spread from his face till
it entirely covered his body, and became so bad that he could no
longer ride out or show himself to his people. When all cures had been
tried and had failed, Constantine withdrew himself from his lords,
gave up all use of arms, abandoned his imperial duties, and shut
himself in his palace, where he lived such a secluded life in his own
apartments that Rome had, as it were, no lord, and all men throughout
the empire talked of his illness and prayed their gods to heal him.
When everything seemed to be in vain, Constantine yielded to the
prayer of his council, that he would summon all the doctors, learned
men, and physicians from every realm to Rome, that they might consider
his illness and try if any cure could be found for his malady.

Rewards Offered for his Cure

A proclamation went forth throughout the world and great rewards were
offered to any man who should heal the emperor. Tempted by the rewards
and the great fame to be won, there came leeches and physicians from
Persia and Arabia, and from every land that owned the sway of Rome,
philosophers from Greece and Egypt, and magicians and sorcerers from
the unexplored desert of the east. But, though Constantine tried all
the remedies suggested or recommended by the wise men, his leprosy
grew no better, but rather worse, and even magic could give him no
help.

Again the learned men assembled and consulted what they should advise,
for all were loath to abandon the emperor in his great distress, but
they were all at a loss. They sat in silence, till at last one very
old and very wise man, a great physician from Arabia, arose and said:

A Desperate Remedy

"Now that all else has failed, and naught is of any avail, I will tell
of a remedy of which I have heard. It will, I believe, certainly cure
our beloved emperor, but it is very terrible, and therefore I was
loath to name it till every other means had been tried and failed, for
it is a cruel thing for any man to do. Let the Emperor dip himself in
a full bath of the blood of infants and children, seven years old or
under, and he shall be healed, and his leprosy shall fall from him;
for this malady is not natural to his body, and it demands an
unnatural cure."

Constantine Assents Regretfully

The proposal was a terrible one to the assembly, and many would not
agree to it at first, but when they considered that nothing else would
heal the emperor they at length gave way, and sent two from among
themselves to bring the news to Constantine, who was waiting for them
in his darkened room. He was horrified when he heard the counsel they
brought, and at first utterly refused to carry out so evil a plan; but
because his life was very dear to his people, and because he felt that
he had a great work to do in the world, he ultimately agreed, with
many tears, to try the terrible remedy.

A Cruel Proclamation

Thereupon the council drew up letters, under the emperor's hand and
seal, and sent them out to all the world, bidding all mothers with
children of seven years of age or under to bring them with speed to
Rome, that there the blood of the innocents might prove healing to the
emperor's malady. Alas! what weeping and wailing there was among the
mothers when they heard this cruel decree! How they cried, and clasped
their babes to their breasts, and how they called Constantine more
cruel than Herod, who killed the Holy Innocents! The eastern ruler,
they said, slew only the infants of one poor village, but their
emperor, more ruthless, claimed the lives of all the young children of
his whole empire.

Constantine is Conscience-stricken

But though the mothers lamented bitterly, they must needs bow to the
emperor's decree, whether they were lief or loath, and thus a great
multitude gathered in the great courtyard of the imperial palace at
Rome: women nursing sucking-babes at the breast, or holding toddling
infants by the hand, or with little children running by their sides,
and all so heart-broken and woebegone that many swooned for very
grief. The mothers wailed aloud, the children cried, and the tumult
grew until Constantine heard it, where he sat lonely and wretched in
his darkened room. He looked out of his window on the mournful sight
in the courtyard, and was roused as from a trance, saying to himself:
"O Divine Providence, who hast formed all men alike, lo! the poor man
is born, lives, suffers, and dies, just as does the rich; to wise man
and fool alike come sickness and health; and no man may avoid that
fortune which Nature's law hath ordained for him. Likewise to all men
are Nature's gifts of strength and beauty, of soul and reason, freely
and fully given, so that the poor child is born as capable of virtue
as the king's son; and to each man is given free will to choose virtue
or vice. Yet thou givest to men diversity of rank, wealth or poverty,
lordship or servitude, not always according to their deserts; so much
the more virtuous should that man be to whom thou hast put other men
in subjection, men who are nevertheless his fellows and wear his
likeness. Thou, O God, who hast put Nature and the whole universe
under law, wouldst have all men rule themselves by law, and thou hast
said that a man must do to others such things as he would have done to
himself."

His Noble Resolve

Thus Constantine spoke within himself as he stood by the window and

looked upon the weeping mothers and children, the very sentinels of
his palace pitying them, and trying in vain to comfort them; and a
strife grew strong within him between his natural longing for healing
and deliverance from this loathsome disease which had darkened his
life, and the pity he felt for these poor creatures, and his horror at
the thought of so much human blood to be shed for himself alone. The
great moaning of the woeful mothers came to him and the pitiful crying
of the children, and he thought: "What am I that my health is to
outweigh the lives and happiness of so many of my people? Is my life
of more value to the world than those of all the children who must
shed their blood for my healing? Surely each babe is as precious as
Constantine the Emperor!" Thus his heart grew so tender and so full of
compassion that he chose rather to die by this terrible sickness than
to commit so great a slaughter of innocent children, and he renounced
all other physicians, and trusted himself wholly to God's care.

He Announces his Determination

He at once summoned his council, and announced to them his resolution,

giving as his reason, "He that will be truly master must be ever
servant to pity!" and without delay the anxious mothers were told
that their children were free and safe, for the emperor had renounced
the cure, and needed their blood no longer. What raptures of rejoicing
there were, what outpouring of blessing on the emperor, what songs of
praise and thanks from the women wild with joy, cannot be fully told;
and yet greater grew their joy and thankfulness when Constantine,
calling his high officials, bade them take all his gathered treasures
and distribute them among the poor women, that they might feed and
clothe their children, and so return home untouched by any loss, and
recompensed in some degree for their sufferings. Thus did Constantine
obey the behests of pity, and try to atone for the wrong to which he
had consented in his heart, and which he had so nearly done to his
people.

The Victims Sent Home Happy

Home to all parts of the Roman Empire went the women, bearing with
them their happy children, and the rich gifts they had received. Each
one thanked and blessed the emperor, and sang his praises, where
before she had passed with tears and bitter curses on his head; each
woman shared her joy with her neighbours; and the very children learnt
from their mothers and fathers to pray for the healing of their great
lord, who had given up his own will and sacrificed his own cure for
gentle pity's sake. Thus the whole world prayed for Constantine's
healing.

A Vision

Lo! it never yet was known that charity went unrequited and this
Constantine now learnt in his own glad experience; for that same
night, as he lay asleep, God sent to him a vision of two strangers,
men of noble face and form, whom he reverenced greatly, and who said
to him: "O Constantine, because thou hast obeyed the voice of pity,
thou hast deserved pity; therefore shalt thou find such mercy, that
God, in His great pity, will save thee. Double healing shalt thou
receive, first for thy body, and next for thy woeful soul; both alike
shall be made whole. And that thou mayst not despair, God will grant
thee a sign--thy leprosy shall not increase till thou hast sent to
Mount Celion, to Sylvester and all his clergy. There they dwell in
secret for dread of thee, who hast been a foe to the law of Christ,
and hast destroyed those who preach in His Holy Name. Now thou hast
appeased God somewhat by thy good deed, since thou hast had pity on
the innocent blood, and hast spared it; for this thou shalt find
teaching, from Sylvester, to the salvation of both body and soul. Thou
wilt need no other leech." The emperor, who had listened with
eagerness and awe, now spoke: "Great thanks I owe to you, my lords,
and I will indeed do as ye have said; but one thing I would pray
you--what shall I tell Sylvester of the name or estate of those who
send me to him?" The two strangers said: "We are the Apostles Peter
and Paul, who endured death here in thy city of Rome for the Holy Name
of Christ, and we bid Sylvester teach and baptize thee into the true
faith. So shall the Roman Empire become the kingdom of the Lord and of
His Christ." So saying, they blessed him, and passed into the heavens
out of his sight, and Constantine awoke from his slumber and knew that
he had seen a vision. He called aloud eagerly, and his servants
waiting in an outer room ran in to him quickly, for there was urgency
in his voice. To them Constantine told his vision and the command
which was laid upon him.

Sylvester Summoned

Messengers rode in hot haste to Mount Celion, and inquired long and
anxiously for Sylvester. At last they found him, a holy and venerable
man, and summoned him, saying: "The Emperor calls for thee: come,
therefore, at once." Sylvester's clergy were greatly affrighted, not
knowing what this summons might mean, and dreading the death of their
dear bishop and master; but he went forth gladly, not knowing to what
fate he was going. When he was brought to the palace the emperor
greeted him kindly, and told him all his dream, and the command of the
Apostles Peter and Paul, and ended with these words: "Now I have done
as the vision bade, and have fetched thee here: tell me, I pray, the
glad tidings which shall bring healing to my body and soul." When
Sylvester heard this speech he was filled with joy and wonder, and
thanked God for the vision He had sent to the emperor, and then he
began to preach to him the Christian faith: he told of the Fall of
Man, and the redemption of the world by the death and resurrection of
Jesus Christ, of the Ascension of Jesus and His return at the Day of
Judgment, of the justice of God, who will judge all men impartially
according to their works, good or bad, and of the life of joy or
misery to come. As Sylvester taught, the monarch listened and
believed, and, when the tale was ended, announced his conversion to
the true faith, and said he was ready, with his whole heart and soul,
to be baptized.

Constantine Baptized

At the emperor's command, they took the great vessel of silver which
had been made for the children's blood, and Sylvester bade them fill
it with pure water from the well. When that was done with all haste,
he bade Constantine stand therein, so that the water reached his chin.
As the holy rite began a great light like the sun's rays shone from
heaven into the place, and upon Constantine; and as the sacred words
were being read there fell now and again from his body scales like
those of a fish, till there was nothing left of his horrible disease;
and thus in baptism Constantine was purified in body and soul.
[Illustration: They filled the great vessel of silver with pure water]

CHAPTER V: HAVELOK THE DANE

The Origin of the Story

The Danish occupation of England has left a very strong mark on our
country in various ways--on its place-names, its racial
characteristics, its language, its literature, and, in part, on its
ideals. The legend of Havelok the Dane, with its popularity and
widespread influence, is one result of Danish supremacy. It is thought
that the origin of the legend, which contains a twofold version of the
common story of the cruel guardian and the persecuted heir, is to be
found in Wales; but, however that may be, it is certain that in the
continual rise and fall of small tribal kingdoms, Celtic or Teutonic,
English or Danish, the circumstances out of which the story grew must
have been common enough. Kings who died leaving helpless heirs to the
guardianship of ambitious and wicked nobles were not rare in the early
days of Britain, Wales, or Denmark; the murder of the heir and the
usurpation of the kingdom by the cruel regent were no unusual
occurrences. The opportunity of localising the early legend seems to
have come with the growing fame of Anlaf, or Olaf, Sihtricson, who was
known to the Welsh as Abloec or Habloc. His adventurous life included
a threefold expulsion from his inheritance of Northumbria, a marriage
with the daughter of King Constantine III. of Scotland, and a family
kinship with King Athelstan of England. In Anlaf Curan (as he was
called) we have an historical hero on whom various romantic stories
were gradually fathered, because of his adventurous life and his
strong personality. These stories finally crystallized in a form which
shows the English and Danish love of physical prowess (Havelok is the
strongest man in the kingdom), as well as a certain cruelty of
revenge which is more peculiarly Danish. There is resentment of the
Norman predominance to be found in the popularity of a story which
shows the kitchen-boy excelling all the nobles in manly exercises, and
the heiress to the kingdom wedded in scorn, as so many Saxon heiresses
were after the Conquest, to a mere scullion. There can be no doubt,
however, that Havelok stood to medi�val England as a hero of the
strong arm, a champion of the populace against the ruling race, and
that his royal birth and dignity were a concession to historic facts
and probabilities, not much regarded by the common people. The story,
again, showed another truly humble hero, Grim the fisher, whose
loyalty was supposed to account for the special trading privileges of
his town, Grimsby. In Grim the story found a character who was in
reality a hero of the poor and lowly, with the characteristic devotion
of the tribesman to his chief, of the vassal to his lord, a devotion
which was handed on from father to son, so that a second generation
continued the services, and received the rewards, of the father who
risked life and all for the sake of his king's heir.

The reader will not fail to notice the characteristic anachronisms

which give to life in Saxon England in the tenth century the colour of
the Norman chivalry of the thirteenth.
Havelok and Godard

In Denmark, long ago, lived a good king named Birkabeyn, rich and
powerful, a great warrior and a man of mighty prowess, whose rule was
undisputed over the whole realm. He had three children--two daughters,
named Swanborow and Elfleda the Fair, and one young and goodly son,
Havelok, the heir to all his dominions. All too soon came the day
that no man can avoid, when Death would call King Birkabeyn away, and
he grieved sore over his young children to be left fatherless and
unprotected; but, after much reflection, and prayers to God for wisdom
to help his choice, he called to him Jarl Godard, a trusted counsellor
and friend, and committed into his hands the care of the realm and of
the three royal children, until Havelok should be of age to be
knighted and rule the land himself. King Birkabeyn felt that such a
charge was too great a temptation for any man unbound by oaths of
fealty and honour, and although he did not distrust his friend, he
required Godard to swear,

"By altar and by holy service book,

By bells that call the faithful to the church,
By blessed sacrament, and sacred rites,
By Holy Rood, and Him who died thereon,
That thou wilt truly rule and keep my realm,
Wilt guard my babes in love and loyalty,
Until my son be grown, and dubb�d knight:
That thou wilt then resign to him his land,
His power and rule, and all that owns his sway."

Jarl Godard took this most solemn oath at once with many protestations
of affection and whole-hearted devotion to the dying king and his
heir, and King Birkabeyn died happy in the thought that his children
would be well cared for during their helpless youth.

When the funeral rites were celebrated Jarl Godard assumed the rule of
the country, and, under pretext of securing the safety of the royal
children, removed them to a strong castle, where no man was allowed
access to them, and where they were kept so closely that the royal
residence became a prison in all but name. Godard, finding Denmark
submit to his government without resistance, began to adopt measures
to rid himself of the real heirs to the throne, and gave orders that
food and clothes should be supplied to the three children in such
scanty quantities that they might die of hardship; but since they were
slow to succumb to this cruel, torturing form of murder, he resolved
to slay them suddenly, knowing that no one durst call him to account.
Having steeled his heart against all pitiful thoughts, he went to the
castle, and was taken to the inner dungeon where the poor babes lay
shivering and weeping for cold and hunger. As he entered, Havelok, who
was even then a bold lad, greeted him courteously, and knelt before
him, with clasped hands, begging a boon.

"Why do you weep and wail so sore?" asked Godard.

"Because we are so hungry," answered Havelok. "We have so little food,

and we have no servants to wait on us; they do not give us half as
much as we could eat; we are shivering with cold, and our clothes are
all in rags. Woe to us that we were ever born! Is there in the land no
more corn with which men can make bread for us? We are nearly dead
from hunger."
These pathetic words had no effect on Godard, who had resolved to
yield to no pity and show no mercy. He seized the two little girls as
they lay cowering together, clasping one another for warmth, and cut
their throats, letting the bodies of the hapless babies fall to the
floor in a pool of blood; and then, turning to Havelok, aimed his
knife at the boy's heart. The poor child, terrified by the awful fate
of the two girls, knelt again before him and begged for mercy:

"Fair lord, have mercy on me now, I pray!

Look on my helpless youth, and pity me!
Oh, let me live, and I will yield you all--
My realm of Denmark will I leave to you,
And swear that I will ne'er assail your sway.
Oh, pity me, lord! be compassionate!
And I will flee far from this land of mine,
And vow that Birkabeyn was ne'er my sire!"

Jarl Godard was touched by Havelok's piteous speech, and felt some
faint compassion, so that he could not slay the lad himself; yet he
knew that his only safety was in Havelok's death.

"If I let him go," thought he, "Havelok will at last work me woe! I
shall have no peace in my life, and my children after me will not hold
the lordship of Denmark in safety, if Havelok escapes! Yet I cannot
slay him with my own hands. I will have him cast into the sea with an
anchor about his neck: thus at least his body will not float."

Godard left Havelok kneeling in terror, and, striding from the tower,
leaving the door locked behind him, he sent for an ignorant fisherman,
Grim, who, he thought, could be frightened into doing his will. When
Grim came he was led into an ante-room, where Godard, with terrible
look and voice, addressed him thus:

"Grim, thou knowest thou art my thrall." "Yea, fair lord," quoth Grim,
trembling at Godard's stern voice. "And I can slay thee if thou dost
disobey me." "Yea, lord; but how have I offended you?" "Thou hast not
yet; but I have a task for thee, and if thou dost it not, dire
punishment shall fall upon thee." "Lord, what is the work that I must
do?" asked the poor fisherman. "Tarry: I will show thee." Then Godard
went into the inner room of the tower, whence he returned leading a
fair boy, who wept bitterly. "Take this boy secretly to thy house, and
keep him there till dead of night; then launch thy boat, row out to
sea, and fling him therein with an anchor round his neck, so that I
shall see him never again."

Grim looked curiously at the weeping boy, and said: "What reward
shall I have if I work this sin for you?"

Godard replied: "The sin will be on my head as I am thy lord and bid
thee do it; but I will make thee a freeman, noble and rich, and my
friend, if thou wilt do this secretly and discreetly."

Thus reassured and bribed, Grim suddenly took the boy, flung him to
the ground, and bound him hand and foot with cord which he took from
his pockets. So anxious was he to secure the boy that he drew the
cords very tight, and Havelok suffered terrible pain; he could not cry
out, for a handful of rags was thrust into his mouth and over his
nostrils, so that he could hardly breathe. Then Grim flung the poor
boy into a horrible black sack, and carried him thus from the castle,
as if he were bringing home broken food for his family. When Grim
reached his poor cottage, where his wife Leve was waiting for him, he
slung the sack from his shoulder and gave it to her, saying, "Take
good care of this boy as of thy life. I am to drown him at midnight,
and if I do so my lord has promised to make me a free man and give me
great wealth."

When Dame Leve heard this she sprang up and flung the lad down in a
corner, and nearly broke his head with the crash against the earthen
floor. There Havelok lay, bruised and aching, while the couple went to
sleep, leaving the room all dark but for the red glow from the fire.
At midnight Grim awoke to do his lord's behest, and Dame Leve, going
to the living-room to kindle a light, was terrified by a mysterious
gleam as bright as day which shone around the boy on the floor and
streamed from his mouth. Leve hastily called Grim to see this wonder,
and together they released Havelok from the gag and bonds and
examined his body, when they found on the right shoulder the token of
true royalty, a cross of red gold.

"God knows," quoth Grim, "that this is the heir of our land. He will
come to rule in good time, will bear sway over England and Denmark,
and will punish the cruel Godard." Then, weeping sore, the loyal
fisherman fell down at Havelok's feet, crying, "Lord, have mercy on me
and my wife! We are thy thralls, and never will we do aught against
thee. We will nourish thee until thou canst rule, and will hide thee
from Godard; and thou wilt perchance give me my freedom in return for
thy life."

At this unexpected address Havelok sat up surprised, and rubbed his

bruised head and said: "I am nearly dead, what with hunger, and thy
cruel bonds, and the gag. Now bring me food in plenty!" "Yea, lord,"
said Dame Leve, and bustled about, bringing the best they had in the
hut; and Havelok ate as if he had fasted for three days; and then he
was put to bed, and slept in peace while Grim watched over him.

[Illustration: "Havelok sat up surprised"]

However, Grim went the next morning to Jarl Godard and said: "Lord, I
have done your behest, and drowned the boy with an anchor about his
neck. He is safe, and now, I pray you, give me my reward, the gold and
other treasures, and make me a freeman as you have promised." But
Godard only looked fiercely at him and said: "What, wouldst thou be an
earl? Go home, thou foul churl, and be ever a thrall! It is enough
reward that I do not hang thee now for insolence, and for thy wicked
deeds. Go speedily, else thou mayst stand and palter with me too
long." And Grim shrank quietly away, lest Godard should slay him for
the murder of Havelok.

Now Grim saw in what a terrible plight he stood, at the mercy of this
cruel and treacherous man, and he took counsel with himself and
consulted his wife, and the two decided to flee from Denmark to save
their lives. Gradually Grim sold all his stock, his cattle, his nets,
everything that he owned, and turned it into good pieces of gold; then
he bought and secretly fitted out and provisioned a ship, and at last,
when all was ready, carried on board Havelok (who had lain hidden all
this time), his own three sons and two daughters; then when he and his
wife had gone on board he set sail, and, driven by a favourable wind,
reached the shores of England.
Goldborough and Earl Godrich

Meanwhile in England a somewhat similar fate had befallen a fair

princess named Goldborough. When her father, King Athelwold, lay dying
all his people mourned, for he was the flower of all fair England for
knighthood, justice, and mercy; and he himself grieved sorely for the
sake of his little daughter, soon to be left an orphan. "What will she
do?" moaned he. "She can neither speak nor walk! If she were only able
to ride, to rule England, and to guard herself from shame, I should
have no grief, even if I died and left her alone, while I lived in the
joy of paradise!"

Then Athelwold summoned a council to be held at Winchester, and asked

the advice of the nobles as to the care of the infant Goldborough.
They with one accord recommended Earl Godrich of Cornwall to be made
regent for the little princess; and the earl, on being appointed,
swore with all solemn rites that he would marry her at twelve years
old to the highest, the best, fairest, and strongest man alive, and in
the meantime would train her in all royal virtues and customs. So
King Athelwold died, and was buried with great lamentations, and
Godrich ruled the land as regent. He was a strict but just governor,
and England had great peace, without and within, under his severe
rule, for all lived in awe of him, though no man loved him.
Goldborough grew and throve in all ways, and became famous through the
land for her gracious beauty and gentle and virtuous demeanour. This
roused the jealousy of Earl Godrich, who had played the part of king
so long that he almost believed himself King of England, and he began
to consider how he could secure the kingdom for himself and his son.
Thereupon he had Goldborough taken from Winchester, where she kept
royal state, to Dover, where she was imprisoned in the castle, and
strictly secluded from all her friends; there she remained, with poor
clothes and scanty food, awaiting a champion to uphold her right.

Havelok Becomes Cook's Boy

When Grim sailed from Denmark to England he landed in the Humber, at

the place now called Grimsby, and there established himself as a
fisherman. So successful was he that for twelve years he supported his
family well, and carried his catches of fish far afield, even to
Lincoln, where rare fish always brought a good price. In all this time
Grim never once called on Havelok for help in the task of feeding the
family; he reverenced his king, and the whole household served Havelok
with the utmost deference, and often went with scanty rations to
satisfy the boy's great appetite. At length Havelok began to think how
selfishly he was living, and how much food he consumed, and was filled
with shame when he realized how his foster-father toiled unweariedly
while he did nothing to help. In his remorseful meditations it became
clear to him that, though a king's son, he ought to do some useful
work. "Of what use," thought he, "is my great strength and stature if
I do not employ it for some good purpose? There is no shame in honest
toil. I will work for my food, and try to make some return to Father
Grim, who has done so much for me. I will gladly bear his baskets of
fish to market, and I will begin to-morrow."

On the next day, in spite of Grim's protests Havelok carried a load of

fish equal to four men's burden to Grimsby market, and sold it
successfully, returning home with the money he received; and this he
did day by day, till a famine arose and fish and food both became
scarce. Then Grim, more concerned for Havelok than for his own
children, called the youth to him and bade him try his fortunes in
Lincoln, for his own sake and for theirs; he would be better fed, and
the little food Grim could get would go further among the others if
Havelok were not there. The one obstacle in the way was Havelok's lack
of clothes, and Grim overcame that by sacrificing his boat's sail to
make Havelok a coarse tunic. That done, they bade each other farewell,
and Havelok started for Lincoln, barefooted and bareheaded, for his
only garment was the sailcloth tunic. In Lincoln Havelok found no
friends and no food for two days, and he was desperate and faint with
hunger, when he heard a call: "Porters, porters! hither to me!" Roused
to new vigour by the chance of work, Havelok rushed with the rest, and
bore down and hurled aside the other porters so vigorously that he was
chosen to carry provisions for Bertram, the earl's cook; and in return
he received the first meal he had eaten for nearly three days.

On the next day Havelok again overthrew the porters, and, knocking
down at least sixteen, secured the work. This time he had to carry
fish, and his basket was so laden that he bore nearly a cartload,
with which he ran to the castle. There the cook, amazed at his
strength, first gave him a hearty meal, and then offered him good
service under himself, with food and lodging for his wages. This offer
Havelok accepted, and was installed as cook's boy, and employed in all
the lowest offices--carrying wood, water, turf, hewing logs, lifting,
fetching, carrying--and in all he showed himself a wonderfully strong
worker, with unfailing good temper and gentleness, so that the little
children all loved the big, gentle, fair-haired youth who worked so
quietly and played with them so merrily. When Havelok's old tunic
became worn out, his master, the cook, took pity on him and gave him a
new suit, and then it could be seen how handsome and tall and strong a
youth this cook's boy really was, and his fame spread far and wide
round Lincoln Town.

[Illustration: "Havelok again overthrew the porters"]

Havelok and Goldborough

At the great fair of Lincoln, sports of all kinds were indulged in,
and in these Havelok took his part, for the cook, proud of his mighty
scullion, urged him to compete in all the games and races. As Earl
Godrich had summoned his Parliament to meet that year at Lincoln,
there was a great concourse of spectators, and even the powerful Earl
Regent himself sometimes watched the sports and cheered the champions.
The first contest was "putting the stone," and the stone chosen was so
weighty that none but the most stalwart could lift it above the
knee--none could raise it to his breast. This sport was new to
Havelok, who had never seen it before, but when the cook bade him try
his strength he lifted the stone easily and threw it more than twelve
feet. This mighty deed caused his fame to be spread, not only among
the poor servants with whom Havelok was classed, but also among the
barons, their masters, and Havelok's Stone became a landmark in
Lincoln. Thus Godrich heard of a youth who stood head and shoulders
taller than other men and was stronger, more handsome--and yet a mere
common scullion. The news brought him a flash of inspiration: "Here is
the highest, strongest, best man in all England, and him shall
Goldborough wed. I shall keep my vow to the letter, and England must
fall to me, for Goldborough's royal blood will be lost by her marriage
with a thrall, the people will refuse her obedience, and England will
cast her out."

Godrich therefore brought Goldborough to Lincoln, received her with

bell-ringing and seemly rejoicing, and bade her prepare for her
wedding. This the princess refused to do until she knew who was her
destined husband, for she said she would wed no man who was not of
royal birth. Her firmness drove Earl Godrich to fierce wrath, and he
burst out: "Wilt thou be queen and mistress over me? Thy pride shall
be brought down: thou shalt have no royal spouse: a vagabond and
scullion shalt thou wed, and that no later than to-morrow! Curses on
him who speaks thee fair!" In vain the princess wept and bemoaned
herself: the wedding was fixed for the morrow morn.

The next day at dawn Earl Godrich sent for Havelok, the mighty cook's
boy, and asked him: "Wilt thou take a wife?"

"Nay," quoth Havelok, "that will I not. I cannot feed her, much less
clothe and lodge her. My very garments are not my own, but belong to
the cook, my master." Godrich fell upon Havelok and beat him
furiously, saying, "Unless thou wilt take the wench I give thee for
wife I will hang or blind thee"; and so, in great fear, Havelok agreed
to the wedding. At once Goldborough was brought, and forced into an
immediate marriage, under penalty of banishment or burning as a witch
if she refused. And thus the unwilling couple were united by the
Archbishop of York, who had come to attend the Parliament.

Never was there so sad a wedding! The people murmured greatly at this
unequal union, and pitied the poor princess, thus driven to wed a man
of low birth; and Goldborough herself wept pitifully, but resigned
herself to God's will. All men now acknowledged with grief that she
and her husband could have no claim to the English throne, and thus
Godrich seemed to have gained his object. Havelok and his unwilling
bride recognised that they would not be safe near Godrich, and as
Havelok had no home in Lincoln to which he could take the princess, he
determined to go back to his faithful foster-father, Grim, and put the
fair young bride under his loyal protection. Sorrowfully, with grief
and shame in their hearts, Havelok and Goldborough made their way on
foot to Grimsby, only to find the loyal Grim dead; but his five
children were alive and in prosperity. When they saw Havelok and his
wife they fell on their knees and saluted them with all respect and
reverence. In their joy to see their king again, these worthy
fisherfolk forgot their newly won wealth, and said: "Welcome, dear
lord, and thy fair lady! What joy is ours to see thee again, for thy
subjects are we, and thou canst do with us as thou wilt. All that we
have is thine, and if thou wilt dwell with us we will serve thee and
thy wife truly in all ways!" This greeting surprised Goldborough, who
began to suspect some mystery, and she was greatly comforted when
brothers and sisters busied themselves in lighting fires, cooking
meals, and waiting on her hand and foot, as if she had been indeed a
king's wife. Havelok, however, said nothing to explain the mystery,
and Goldborough that night lay awake bewailing her fate as a thrall's
bride, even though he was the fairest man in England.

The Revelation and Return to Denmark

As Goldborough lay sleepless and unhappy she became aware of a

brilliant light shining around Havelok and streaming from his mouth;
and while she feared and wondered an angelic voice cried to her:

"Fair Princess, cease this grief and heavy moan!

For Havelok, thy newly wedded spouse,
Is son and heir to famous kings: the sign
Thou findest in the cross of ruddy gold
That shineth on his shoulder. He shall be
Monarch and ruler of two mighty realms;
Denmark and England shall obey his rule,
And he shall sway them with a sure command.
This shalt thou see with thine own eyes, and be
Lady and Queen, with Havelok, o'er these lands."

This angelic message so gladdened Goldborough that she kissed, for the
first time, her unconscious husband, who started up from his sleep,
saying, "Dear love, sleepest thou? I have had a wondrous dream. I
thought I sat on a lofty hill, and saw all Denmark before me. As I
stretched out my arms I embraced it all, and the people clung to my
arms, and the castles fell at my feet; then I flew over the salt sea
with the Danish people clinging to me, and I closed all fair England
in my hand, and gave it to thee, dear love! Now what can this mean?"

Goldborough answered joyfully: "It means, dear heart, that thou shalt
be King of Denmark and of England too: all these realms shall fall
into thy power, and thou shalt be ruler in Denmark within one year.
Now do thou follow my advice, and let us go to Denmark, taking with us
Grim's three sons, who will accompany thee for love and loyalty; and
have no fear, for I know thou wilt succeed."

The next morning Havelok went to church early, and prayed humbly and
heartily for success in his enterprise and retribution on the false
traitor Godard; then, laying his offering on the altar before the
Cross, he went away glad in heart. Grim's three sons, Robert the Red,
William Wendut, and Hugh the Raven, joyfully consented to go with
Havelok to Denmark, to attack with all their power the false Jarl
Godard and to win the kingdom for the rightful heir. Their wives and
families stayed in England, but Goldborough would not leave her
husband, and after a short voyage the party landed safely on the
shores of Denmark, in the lands of Jarl Ubbe, an old friend of King
Birkabeyn, who lived far from the court now that a usurper held sway
in Denmark.

Havelok and Ubbe

Havelok dared not reveal himself and his errand until he knew more of
the state of parties in the country, and he therefore only begged
permission to live and trade there, giving Ubbe, as a token of
goodwill and a tribute to his power, a valuable ring, which the jarl
prized greatly. Ubbe, gazing at the so-called merchant's great stature
and beauty, lamented that he was not of noble birth, and planned to
persuade him to take up the profession of arms. At first, however, he
simply granted Havelok permission to trade, and invited him and
Goldborough to a feast, promising them safety and honour under his
protection. Havelok dreaded lest his wife's beauty might place them in
jeopardy, but he dared not refuse the invitation, which was pointedly
given to both; accordingly, when they went to Ubbe's hall, Goldborough
was escorted by Robert the Red and William Wendut.
Ubbe received them with all honour, and all men marvelled at
Goldborough's beauty, and Ubbe's wife loved Goldborough at first sight
as her husband did Havelok, so that the feast passed off with all joy
and mirth, and none dared raise a hand or lift his voice against the
wandering merchant whom Ubbe so strangely favoured. But Ubbe knew that
when once Havelok and his wife were away from his protection there
would be little safety for them, since the rough Danish nobles would
think nothing of stealing a trader's fair wife, and many a man had
cast longing eyes on Goldborough's loveliness. Therefore when the
feast was over, and Havelok took his leave, Ubbe sent with him a body
of ten knights and sixty men-at-arms, and recommended them to the
magistrate of the town, Bernard Brown, a true and upright man, bidding
him, as he prized his life, keep the strangers in safety and honour.
Well it was that Ubbe and Bernard Brown took these precautions, for
late at night a riotous crowd came to Bernard's house clamouring for
admittance. Bernard withstood the angry mob, armed with a great axe,
but they burst the door in by hurling a huge stone; and then Havelok
joined in the defence. He drew out the great beam which barred the
door, and crying, "Come quickly to me, and you shall stay here! Curses
on him who flees!" began to lay about him with the big beam, so that
three fell dead at once. A terrible fight followed, in which Havelok,
armed only with the beam, slew twenty men in armour, and was then sore
beset by the rest of the troop, aiming darts and arrows at his
unarmoured breast. It was going hardly with him, when Hugh the Raven,
hearing and understanding the cries of the assailants, called his
brothers to their lord's aid, and they all joined the fight so
furiously that, long ere day, of the sixty men who had attacked the
inn not one remained alive.

In the morning news was brought to Jarl Ubbe that his stranger
guest had slain sixty of the best of his soldiery.

"What can this mean?" said Ubbe. "I had better go and see to it
myself, for any messenger would surely treat Havelok discourteously,
and I should be full loath to do that." He rode away to the house of
Bernard Brown, and asked the meaning of its damaged and battered
appearance.

"My lord," answered Bernard Brown, "last night at moonrise there came
a band of sixty thieves who would have plundered my house and bound me
hand and foot. When Havelok and his companions saw it they came to my
aid, with sticks and stones, and drove out the robbers like dogs from
a mill. Havelok himself slew three at one blow. Never have I seen a
warrior so good! He is worth a thousand in a fray. But alas! he is
grievously wounded, with three deadly gashes in side and arm and
thigh, and at least twenty smaller wounds. I am scarcely harmed at
all, but I fear he will die full soon."

Ubbe could scarcely believe so strange a tale, but all the bystanders
swore that Bernard told nothing but the bare truth, and that the whole
gang of thieves, with their leader, Griffin the Welshman, had been
slain by the hero and his small party. Then Ubbe bade them bring
Havelok, that he might call a leech to heal his wounds, for if the
stranger merchant should live Jarl Ubbe would without fail dub him
knight; and when the leech had seen the wounds he said the patient
would make a good and quick recovery. Then Ubbe offered Havelok and
his wife a dwelling in his own castle, under his own protection, till
Havelok's grievous wounds were healed. There, too, fair Goldborough
would be under the care of Ubbe's wife, who would cherish her as her
own daughter. This kind offer was accepted gladly, and they all went
to the castle, where a room was given them next to Ubbe's own.

At midnight Ubbe woke, aroused by a bright light in Havelok's room,

which was only separated from his own by a slight wooden partition. He
was vexed suspecting his guest of midnight wassailing, and went to
inquire what villainy might be hatching. To his surprise, both husband
and wife were sound asleep, but the light shone from Havelok's mouth,
and made a glory round his head. Utterly amazed at the marvel, Ubbe
went away silently, and returned with all the garrison of his castle
to the room where his guests still lay sleeping. As they gazed on the
light Havelok turned in his sleep, and they saw on his shoulder the
golden cross, shining like the sun, which all men knew to be the token
of royal birth. Then Ubbe exclaimed: "Now I know who this is, and why
I loved him so dearly at first sight: this is the son of our dead King
Birkabeyn. Never was man so like another as this man is to the dead
king: he is his very image and his true heir." With great joy they
fell on their knees and kissed him eagerly, and Havelok awoke and
began to scowl furiously, for he thought it was some treacherous
attack; but Ubbe soon undeceived him.

[Illustration: "With great joy they fell on their knees"]

"'Dear lord,' quoth he, 'be thou in naught dismayed,

For in thine eyes methinks I see thy thought--
Dear son, great joy is mine to live this day!
My homage, lord, I freely offer thee:
Thy loyal men and vassals are we all,
For thou art son of mighty Birkabeyn,
And soon shalt conquer all thy father's land,
Though thou art young and almost friendless here.
To-morrow will we swear our fealty due,
And dub thee knight, for prowess unexcelled.'"

Now Havelok knew that his worst danger was over, and he thanked God
for the friend He had sent him, and left to the good Jarl Ubbe the
management of his cause. Ubbe gathered an assembly of as many mighty
men of the realm, and barons, and good citizens, as he could summon;
and when they were all assembled, pondering what was the cause of this
imperative summons, Ubbe arose and said:

"Gentles, bear with me if I tell you first things well known to you.
Ye know that King Birkabeyn ruled this land until his death-day, and
that he left three children--one son, Havelok, and two daughters--to
the guardianship of Jarl Godard: ye all heard him swear to keep them
loyally and treat them well. But ye do not know how he kept his oath!
The false traitor slew both the maidens, and would have slain the boy,
but for pity he would not kill the child with his own hands. He bade a
fisherman drown him in the sea; but when the good man knew that it was
the rightful heir, he saved the boy's life and fled with him to
England, where Havelok has been brought up for many years. And now,
behold! here he stands. In all the world he has no peer, and ye may
well rejoice in the beauty and manliness of your king. Come now and
pay homage to Havelok, and I myself will be your leader!"

Jarl Ubbe turned to Havelok, where he stood with Goldborough beside

him, and knelt before him to do homage, an example which was followed
by all present. At a second and still larger assembly held a fortnight
later a similar oath of fealty was sworn by all, Havelok was dubbed
knight by the noble Ubbe, and a great festival was celebrated, with
sports and amusements for the populace. A council of war and vengeance
was held with the great nobles.

The Death of Godard

Havelok, now acknowledged King of Denmark, was unsatisfied until he had

punished the treacherous Godard, and he took a solemn oath from his
soldiers that they would never cease the search for the traitor till
they had captured him and brought him bound to judgment. After all,
Godard was captured as he was hunting. Grim's three sons, now knighted
by King Havelok, met him in the forest, and bade him come to the king,
who called on him to remember and account for his treatment of
Birkabeyn's children. Godard struck out furiously with his fists, but
Sir Robert the Red wounded him in the right arm. When Godard's men
joined in the combat, Robert and his brothers soon slew ten of their
adversaries, and the rest fled; returning, ashamed at the bitter
reproaches of their lord, they were all slain by Havelok's men. Godard
was taken, bound hand and foot, placed on a miserable jade with his
face to the tail, and so led to Havelok. The king refused to be the
judge of his own cause, and entrusted to Ubbe the task of presiding at
the traitor's trial. No mercy was shown to the cruel Jarl Godard, and
he was condemned to a traitor's death, with torments of terrible
barbarity. The sentence was carried out to the letter, and Denmark
rejoiced in the punishment of a cruel villain.

Death of Godrich

Meanwhile Earl Godrich of Cornwall had heard with great uneasiness

that Havelok had become King of Denmark, and intended to invade
England with a mighty army to assert his wife's right to the throne.
He recognised that his own device to shame Goldborough had turned
against him, and that he must now fight for his life and the usurped
dominion he held over England. Godrich summoned his army to Lincoln
for the defence of the realm against the Danes, and called out every
man fit to bear weapons, on pain of becoming thrall if they failed
him. Then he thus addressed them:

"Friends, listen to my words, and you will know

'Tis not for sport, nor idle show, that I
Have bidden you to meet at Lincoln here.
Lo! here at Grimsby foreigners are come
Who have already won the Priory.
These Danes are cruel heathen, who destroy
Our churches and our abbeys: priests and nuns
They torture to the death, or lead away
To serve as slaves the haughty Danish jarls.
Now, Englishmen, what counsel will ye take?
If we submit, they will rule all our land,
Will kill us all, and sell our babes for thralls,
Will take our wives and daughters for their own.
Help me, if ever ye loved English land,
To fight these heathen and to cleanse our soil
From hateful presence of these alien hordes.
I make my vow to God and all the saints
I will not rest, nor houseled be, nor shriven,
Until our realm be free from Danish foe!
 Accursed be he who strikes no blow for home!"

The army was inspired with valour by these courageous words, and the
march to Grimsby began at once, with Earl Godrich in command.
Havelok's men marched out gallantly to meet them, and when the battle
joined many mighty deeds of valour were done, especially by the king
himself, his foster-brothers, and Jarl Ubbe. The battle lasted long
and was very fierce and bloody, but the Danes gradually overcame the
resistance of the English, and at last, after a great hand-to-hand
conflict, King Havelok captured Godrich. The traitor earl, who had
lost a hand in the fray, was sent bound and fettered to Queen
Goldborough, who kept him, carefully guarded, until he could be tried
by his peers, since (for all his treason) he was still a knight.

When the English recognised their rightful lady and queen they did
homage with great joy, begging mercy for having resisted their lawful
ruler at the command of a wicked traitor; and the king and queen
pardoned all but Godrich, who was speedily brought to trial at
Lincoln. He was sentenced to be burnt at the stake, and the sentence
was carried out amid general rejoicings.

Now that vengeance was satisfied, Havelok and his wife thought of
recompensing the loyal helpers who had believed in them and supported
them through the long years of adversity. Havelok married one of
Grim's daughters to the Earl of Chester, and the other to Bertram, the
good cook, who became Earl of Cornwall in the place of the felon
Godrich and his disinherited children; the heroic Ubbe was made Regent
of Denmark for Havelok, who decided to stay and rule England, and all
the noble Danish warriors were rewarded with gifts of gold, and lands
and castles. After a great coronation feast, which lasted for forty
days, King Havelok dismissed the Danish regent and his followers, and
after sad farewells they returned to their own country. Havelok and
Goldborough ruled England in peace and security for sixty years, and
lived together in all bliss, and had fifteen children, who all became
mighty kings and queens.

CHAPTER VI: HOWARD THE HALT

Introduction

In every society and in all periods the obligations of family

affection and duty to kinsmen have been recognised as paramount. In
the early European communities a man's first duty was to stand by his
kinsman in strife and to avenge him in death, however unrighteous the
kinsman's quarrel might be.

How pitiful is the aged Priam's lament that he must needs kiss the
hands that slew his dear son Hector, and, kneeling, clasp the knees of
his son's murderer! How sad is Cuchulain's plaint that his son Connla
must go down to the grave unavenged, since his own father slew him,
all unwitting! One remembers, too, Beowulf's words: "Better it is for
every man that he avenge his friend than that he mourn him much!"
Since, then, family affection, the laws of honour and duty, and every
recognised standard of life demanded that a kinsman should obtain a
full wergild (or money payment) for his relative's death, unless he
chose to take up the blood-feud against the murderer's family, we can
hardly wonder that some of the heroes of early European literature are
heroes of vengeance. Orestes and Electra are Greek embodiments of the
idea of the sacredness of vengeance for murdered kinsfolk, and similar
feelings are revealed in Gudrun's revenge for the murder of Siegfried
in the "Nibelungenlied." To the Teutonic or Celtic warrior there would
be heroism of a noble type in a just vengeance fully accomplished, and
this heroism would be more easily recognised when the wrongdoer was
rich and powerful, the avenger old, poor, and friendless. While
admitting that the hero of vengeance belongs to and represents only
one side of the civilisation of a somewhat barbaric community, we
must allow that the elements of dogged perseverance, dauntless
courage, and resolute loyalty in some degree redeemed the ferocity and
cruelty of the blood-feud he waged against the ill-doer.

It is certain that in the popular Icelandic saga of "Howard the Halt"

tradition has recorded with minute detail of approbation the story of
a man and woman, old, weak, friendless, who, in spite of terrible
odds, succeeded in obtaining a late but sufficing vengeance for the
cruel slaughter of their only son, the murderer being the most
powerful man of the region. The part here assigned to the woman
indicates the firm hold which the blood-feud had gained on the
imagination of the Norsemen.

Icelandic Ghosts

The story possesses a further interest as revealing the unique

character of the Icelandic ghost or phantom. In other literatures the
spirit returned from the dead is a thin, immaterial, disembodied
essence, a faint shadow of its former self; in Icelandic legend the
spirit returns in full possession of its body, but more evil-disposed
to mankind than before death. It fights and wrestles, pummels its
adversary black and blue, it is huge and bloated and hideous, it tries
to strangle men, and leaves finger-marks on their throats. If the
ghosts are those of drowned men, they come home every night dripping
with sea-water, and crowd the family from the fire and from the hall.
Apparently they are evil spirits animating the dead body, and nothing
but the utter destruction of the body avails to drive away the
malignant spirit.

The Story. Howard and Thorbiorn

Thus runs the saga of "Howard the Halt":

About the year 1000, when the Christian faith had hardly yet been
heard of in Iceland, there dwelt at Bathstead, on the shores of
Icefirth, in that far-distant land a mighty chieftain, of royal
descent and great wealth, named Thorbiorn. Though not among the first
settlers of Iceland, he had appropriated much unclaimed land, and was
one of the leading men of the country-side, but was generally disliked
for his arrogance and injustice. Thorkel, the lawman and arbitrator of
Icefirth, was weak and easily cowed, so Thorbiorn's wrongdoing
remained unchecked; many a maiden had he betrothed to himself, and
afterwards rejected, and many a man had he ousted from his lands, yet
no redress could be obtained, and no man was bold enough to attack so
great a chieftain or resist his will. Thorbiorn's house at Bathstead
was one of the best in the district, and his lands stretched down to
the shores of the firth, where he had made a haven with a jetty for
ships. His boathouse stood a little back above a ridge of shingle, and
beside a deep pool or lagoon. The household of Thorbiorn included
Sigrid, a fair maiden, young and wealthy, who was his housekeeper;
Vakr, an ill-conditioned and malicious fellow, Thorbiorn's nephew; and
a strong and trusted serving-man named Brand. Besides these there were
house-carles in plenty, and labourers, all good fighting-men.

Not far from Bathstead, at Bluemire, dwelt an old Viking called

Howard. He was of honourable descent, and had won fame in earlier
Viking expeditions, but since he had returned lamed and nearly
helpless from his last voyage he had aged greatly, and men called him
Howard the Halt. His wife, Biargey, however, was an active and
stirring woman, and their only son, Olaf, bade fair to become a
redoubtable warrior. Though only fifteen, Olaf had reached full
stature, was tall, fair, handsome, and stronger than most men. He wore
his fair hair long, and always went bareheaded, for his great bodily
strength defied even the bitter winter cold of Iceland, and he faced
the winds clad in summer raiment only. With all his strength and
beauty, Olaf was a loving and obedient son to Howard and Biargey, and
the couple loved him as the apple of their eye.

Olaf Meets Sigrid

The men of Icefirth were wont to drive their sheep into the mountains
during the summer, leave them there till autumn, and then, collecting
the scattered flocks, to restore to each man his own branded sheep.
One autumn the flocks were wild and shy, and it was found that many
sheep had strayed in the hills. When those that had been gathered were
divided Thorbiorn had lost at least sixty wethers, and was greatly
vexed. Some weeks later Olaf Howardson went alone into the hills, and
returned with all the lost sheep, having sought them with great toil
and danger. Olaf drove the rest of the sheep home to their grateful
owners, and then took Thorbiorn's to Bathstead. Reaching the house at
noonday, he knocked on the door, and as all men sat at their noontide
meal, the housekeeper, the fair Sigrid, went forth herself and saw
Olaf.

She greeted him courteously and asked his business, and he replied, "I
have brought home Thorbiorn's wethers which strayed this autumn," and
then the two talked together for a short time. Now Thorbiorn was
curious to know what the business might be, and sent his nephew Vakr
to see who was there; he went secretly and listened to the
conversation between Sigrid and Olaf, but heard little, for Olaf was
just saying, "Then I need not go in to Thorbiorn; thou, Sigrid, canst
as well tell him where his sheep are now"; then he simply bade her
farewell and turned away.

[Illustration: Olaf and Sigrid]

Vakr ran back into the hall, shouting and laughing, till Thorbiorn
asked: "How now, nephew! Why makest thou such outcry? Who is there?"

"It was Olaf Howardson, the great booby of Bluemire, bringing back the
sheep thou didst lose in the autumn."

"That was a neighbourly deed," said Thorbiorn.

"Ah! but there was another reason for his coming, I think," said Vakr.
"He and Sigrid had a long talk together, and I saw her put her arms
round his neck; she seemed well pleased to greet him."

"Olaf may be a brave man, but it is rash of him to anger me thus, by

trying to steal away my housekeeper," said Thorbiorn, scowling
heavily. Olaf had no thanks for his kindness, and was ill received
whenever he came; yet he came often to see Sigrid, for he loved her,
and tried to persuade her to wed him. Thorbiorn hated him the more for
his open wooing, which he could not forbid.

Thorbiorn Insults Olaf

The next year, when harvest was over, and the sheep were brought home,
again most of the missing sheep belonged to Thorbiorn, and again Olaf
went to the mountains alone and brought back the stray ones. All
thanked him, except the master of Bathstead, to whom Olaf drove back
sixty wethers. Thorbiorn had grown daily more enraged at Olaf's
popularity, his strength and beauty, and his evident love for Sigrid,
and now chose this opportunity of insulting the bold youth who
rivalled him in fame and in public esteem.

Olaf reached Bathstead at noon, and seeing that all men were in the
hall, he entered, and made his way to the da�s where Thorbiorn sat;
there he leaned on his axe, gazed steadily at the master, who gave him
no single word of greeting. Then every one kept silence watching them
both.

At last Olaf broke the stillness by asking: "Why are you all dumb?
There is no honour to those who say naught. I have stood here long
enough and had no word of courteous greeting. Master Thorbiorn, I have
brought home thy missing sheep."

Vakr answered spitefully: "Yes, we all know that thou hast become the
Icefirth sheep-drover; and we all know that thou hast come to claim
some share of the sheep, as any other beggar might. Kinsman Thorbiorn,
thou hadst better give him some little alms to satisfy him!"

Olaf flushed angrily as he answered: "Nay, it is not for that I came;

but, Thorbiorn, I will not seek thy lost sheep a third time." And as
he turned and strode indignantly from the hall Vakr mocked and jeered
at him. Yet Olaf passed forth in silence.

The third year Olaf found and brought home all men's sheep but
Thorbiorn's; and then Vakr spread the rumour that Olaf had stolen
them, since he could not otherwise obtain a share of them. This rumour
came at last to Howard's ears, and he upbraided Olaf, saying, when his
son praised their mutton, "Yes, it is good, and it is really ours, not
Thorbiorn's. It is terrible that we have to bear such injustice."

Olaf said nothing, but, seizing the leg of mutton, flung it across the
room; and Howard smiled at the wrath which his son could no longer
suppress; perhaps, too, Howard longed to see Olaf in conflict with
Thorbiorn.

Olaf and the Wizard's Ghost

While Howard was still upbraiding Olaf a widow entered, who had come
to ask for help in a difficult matter. Her dead husband (a reputed
wizard) returned to his house night after night as a dreadful ghost,
and no man would live in the house. Would Howard come and break the
spell and drive away the dreadful nightly visitant?

"Alas!" replied Howard, "I am no longer young and strong. Why do you
not ask Thorbiorn? He accounts himself to be chief here, and a
chieftain should protect those in his country-side."

"Nay," said the widow. "I am only too glad if Thorbiorn lets me alone.
I will not meddle with him."

Then said Olaf: "Father, I will go and try my strength with this
ghost, for I am young and stronger than most, and I deem such a matter
good sport."

Accordingly Olaf went back with the widow, and slept in the hall that
night, with a skin rug over him. At nightfall the dead wizard came in,
ghastly, evil-looking, and terrible, and tore the skin from over Olaf;
but the youth sprang up and wrestled with the evil creature, who
seemed to have more than mortal strength. They fought grimly till the
lights died out, and the struggle raged in the darkness up and down
the hall, and finally out of doors. In the yard round the house the
dead wizard fell, and Olaf knelt upon him and broke his back, and
thought him safe from doing any mischief again. When Olaf returned to
the hall men had rekindled the lights, and all made much of him, and
tended his bruises and wounds, and counted him a hero indeed. His fame
spread through the whole district, and he was greatly beloved by all
men; but Thorbiorn hated him more than ever.

Soon another quarrel arose, when a stranded whale, which came ashore
on Howard's land, was adjudged to Thorbiorn. The lawman, Thorkel, was
summoned to decide to whom the whale belonged, and came to view it.
"It is manifestly theirs," said he falteringly, for he dreaded
Thorbiorn's wrath. "Whose saidst thou?" cried Thorbiorn, coming to him
menacingly, with drawn sword. "Thine," said Thorkel, with downcast
eyes; and Thorbiorn triumphantly claimed and took the whale though the
injustice of the decree was evident. Yet Olaf felt no ill-will to
Thorbiorn, for Sigrid's sake, but contrived to render him another
service.

Olaf's Second Fight with the Ghost

Brand the Strong, Thorbiorn's shepherd, could not drive his sheep one
day. Olaf met him trying to get his frightened wethers home: it seemed
an impossible task, because an uncanny human form, with waving arms,
stood in a narrow bend of the path and drove them back and scattered
them. Brand told Olaf all the tale, and when the two went to look,
Olaf saw that the enemy was the ghost of the dead wizard whom he had
fought before. "Which wilt thou do," said Olaf, "fight the wizard or
gather thy sheep?"

"I have no wish to fight the ghost; I will find my scattered sheep,"
said Brand; "that is the easier task."

Then Olaf ran at the ghost, who awaited him at the top of a high bank,
and he and the wizard wrestled again with each other till they fell
from the bank into a snowdrift, and so down to the sea-shore. There
Olaf, whose strength had been tried to the utmost, had the upper hand,
and again broke the back of the dead wizard; but, seeing that that had
been of no avail before, he took the body, swam out to sea with it,
and sank it deep in the firth. Ever after men believed that this part
of the coast was dangerous to ships.

Brand thanked the youth much for his help, and when he reached
Bathstead related what Olaf had done for him. Thorbiorn said nothing,
but Vakr sneered, and called Brand a coward for asking help of Olaf.
The strife grew keen between them, almost to blows, and was only
settled by Thorbiorn, who forbade Brand to praise Olaf or to accept
help from him. His ill-will grew so evident to all men that Howard the
Halt decided, in spite of Olaf's reluctance, to remove to a homestead
on the other side of the firth, away from Thorbiorn's neighbourhood.

Olaf Meets Thorbiorn

That summer Thorbiorn decided to marry. He wooed a maiden who was

sister of the wise Guest, who dwelt at the Mead, and Guest agreed to
the match, on condition that Thorbiorn should renounce his injustice
and evil ways; to this Thorbiorn assented, and the wedding was held
shortly after. Thorbiorn had said nothing to his household of his
proposed marriage, and Sigrid first heard of it when the wedding was
over, and the bridal party would soon be riding home to Bathstead.
Sigrid was very wroth that she must give up her control of the
household to another, and refused to stay to serve under Thorbiorn's
wife; accordingly she withdrew from Bathstead to a kinsman's house,
taking all her goods with her. Thorbiorn raged furiously on his
return, when he found that she was gone, for her wealth made a great
difference to his comfort, and threatened dire punishment to all who
had helped her. Olaf continued his wooing of Sigrid, and went to see
her often in her kinsman's abode, and they loved each other greatly.

One day when Olaf had been seeking some lost sheep he made his way to
Sigrid's house, to talk with her as usual. As they stood near the
house together and talked Sigrid looked suddenly anxious and said:

"I see Thorbiorn and Vakr coming in a boat over the firth with weapons
beside them, and I see the gleam of Thorbiorn's great sword Warflame.
I fear they have done, or will do, some evil deed, and therefore I
pray thee, Olaf, not to stay and meet them. He has hated thee for a
long time, and the help thou didst give me to leave Bathstead did not
mend matters. Go thy way now, and do not fall in with them."

"I am not afraid," said Olaf. "I have done Thorbiorn no wrong, and I
will not flee before him. He is only one man, as I am."

"Alas!" Sigrid replied, "how canst thou, a stripling of eighteen, hope

to stand before a grown man, a mighty champion, armed with a magic
sword? Thy words and thoughts are brave, as thou thyself art, but the
odds are too great for thee: they are two to one, since Vakr, ever
spiteful and malicious, will not stand idle while thou art in combat
with Thorbiorn."

"Well," said Olaf, "I will not avoid them, but I will not seek a
contest. If it must be so, I will fight bravely; thou shalt hear of my
deeds."
"No, that will never be; I will not live after thee to ask of them,"
said Sigrid.

"Farewell now; live long and happily!" said Olaf; and so they bade
each other farewell, and Olaf left her there, and went down to the
shore where his sheep lay. Thorbiorn and Vakr had just landed, and
they greeted each other, and Olaf asked them their errand. "We go to
my mother," said Vakr.

"Let us go together," replied Olaf, "for my way is the same in part.

But I am sorry that I must needs drive my sheep home, for Icefirth
sheep-drovers will become proud if a great man like thee should join
the trade, Thorbiorn."

"Nay, I do not mind that," said Thorbiorn; so they all went on

together; and as he went Olaf caught up a crooked cudgel with which to
herd his sheep; he noticed, too, that Thorbiorn and Vakr kept trying
to lag behind him, and he took care that they all walked abreast.

The Combat

When the three came near the house of Thordis, Vakr's mother, where
the ways divided, Thorbiorn said: "Now, nephew Vakr, we need no longer
delay what we would do." And then Olaf knew that he had fallen into
their snare. He ran up a bank beside the road, and the two set on him
from below, and he defended himself at first manfully with the crooked
cudgel; but Thorbiorn's sword Warflame sliced this like a stalk of
flax, and Olaf had to betake himself to his axe, and the fight went on
for long.

A New Enemy Comes

The noise of the fray reached the ears of Thordis, Vakr's mother, in
her house, so that she sent a boy to learn the cause, and when he told
her that Olaf Howardson was fighting against Thorbiorn and Vakr she
bade her second son go to the help of his kinsfolk.

"I will not go," said he. "I would rather fight for Olaf than for
them. It is a shame for two to set on one man, and they such great
champions too. I will not be the third; I will not go."

"Now I know that thou art a coward," sneered his mother. "Daughter,
not son, thou art, too timid to help thy kinsfolk. I will show thee
that I am a braver daughter than thou a son!"

Olaf's Death

By these words Thordis so enraged her son that he seized his axe and
rushed from the house down the hill towards Olaf, who could not see
the new-comer, because he stood with his back to the house. Coming
close to Olaf, the new assailant drove the axe in deep between his
shoulders, and when Olaf felt the blow he turned and with a mighty
stroke slew his last enemy. Thereupon Thorbiorn thrust Olaf through
with the sword Warflame, and he died. Then Thorbiorn took Olaf's
teeth, which he smote from his jaw, wrapped them in a cloth, and
carried them home.

The news of the slaughter was at once told by Thorbiorn (for so long
as homicide was not concealed it was not considered murder), and told
fairly, so that all men praised Olaf for his brave defence, and
lamented his death. But when men sought for the fair Sigrid she could
not be found, and was seen no more from that day. She had loved Olaf
greatly, had seen him fall, and could not live when he was dead; but
no man knew where she died or was buried.

The terrible news of Olaf's death came to Howard, and he sighed

heavily and took to his bed for grief, and remained bedridden for
twelve months, leaving his wife Biargey to manage the daily fishing
and the farm. Men thought that Olaf would be for ever unavenged,
because Howard was too feeble, and his adversary too mighty and too
unjust.

Howard Claims Wergild for Olaf

When a year had passed away Biargey came to Howard where he lay in his
bed, and bade him arise and go to Bathstead. Said she:

"I would have thee claim wergild for our son, since a man that can no
longer fight may well prove his valour by word of mouth, and if
Thorbiorn should show any sign of justice thou shalt not claim too
much."

Howard replied: "I know it is a bootless errand to ask justice from

Thorbiorn, but I will do thy will in this matter."

So Howard went heavily, walking as an old man, to Bathstead, and,

after the usual greetings, said:

"I have come to thee, Thorbiorn, on a great matter--to claim wergild

for my dead son Olaf, whom thou didst slay guiltless."

Thorbiorn answered: "I have never yet paid a wergild, though I have
slain many men--some say innocent men. But I am sorry for thee, since
thou hast lost a brave son, and I will at least give thee something.
There is an old horse named Dodderer out in the pastures, grey with
age, sore-backed, too old to work; but thou canst take him home, and
perhaps he will be some good, when thou hast fed him up."

Now Howard was angered beyond speech. He reddened and turned straight
to the door; and as he went down the hall Vakr shouted and jeered; but
Howard said no word, good or bad. He returned home, and took to his
bed for another year.

[Illustration: Howard leaves the house of Thorbiorn]

Howard at the Thing

In the second year Biargey again urged Howard to try for a wergild.
She suggested that he should follow Thorbiorn to the Thing and try to
obtain justice, for men loathed Thorbiorn's evil ways, and Howard
would be sure to have many sympathizers. Howard was loath to go.
"Thorbiorn, my son's slayer, has mocked me once; shall he mock me
again where all the chieftains are assembled? I will not go to endure
such shame!"

To his surprise, Biargey urged her will, saying: "Thou wilt have
friends, I know, since Guest will be there, and he is a just man, and
will strive to bring about peace between thee and Thorbiorn. And
hearken to me, and heed my words, husband! If Thorbiorn is condemned
to pay thee money, and there is a large ring of assessors, it may be
that when thou and he are in the ring together he will do something
to grieve thee sorely. Then look thou well to it! If thy heart be
light, make thou no peace; I am somewhat foresighted, and I know that
then Olaf shall be avenged. But if thou be heavy-hearted, then do thou
be reconciled to Thorbiorn, for I know that Olaf shall lie unatoned
for."

Howard replied: "Wife, I understand thee not, nor thy words, but this
I know: I would do and bear all things if I might but obtain due
vengeance for Olaf's death."

At last Howard, impressed by his wife's half-prophetic words, roused

himself, and rode away to the Thing; here he found shelter with a
great chieftain, Steinthor of Ere, who was kind to the old man, and
gave Howard a place in his booth. Steinthor praised Olaf's courage and
manful defence, and bade his followers cherish the old man, and not
arouse his grief for his dead son.

Howard and Thorbiorn

As the days wore on Howard did nothing towards obtaining compensation

for his great loss, until Steinthor asked him why he took no action in
the matter. Howard replied that he felt helpless against Thorbiorn's
evil words and deeds; but Steinthor bade him try to win Guest to his
side--then he would succeed. Howard took heart, and set off for the
booth which Thorbiorn shared with Guest; but unhappily Guest was not
there when Howard came. Thorbiorn greeted him and asked what matter
had brought him, and Howard replied:

"My grief for Olaf is yet deep in my heart; still I remember his
death; and now again I come to claim a wergild for him."

Thorbiorn answered: "Come to me at home in my own country, and I may

do somewhat for thee, but I will not have thee whining against me
here."

Howard said: "If thou wilt do nothing here, I have proved that thou
wilt do still less in thine own country; but I had hoped for help from
other chieftains."

Thorbiorn burst out wrathfully: "See! He will stir up other men

against me! Get thee gone, old man, or thou shalt not escape a
beating."

Now Howard was greatly angered, and said: "Yes, old I am--too old and
feeble to win respect; but the days have been when I would not have
endured such wrong; yea, and if Olaf were still alive thou wouldst not
have flouted me thus." As he left Thorbiorn's sight his grief and
anger were so great that he did not notice Guest returning, but went
heavily to Steinthor's booth, where he told all Thorbiorn's injustice,
and won much sympathy.

Guest and Howard

When Guest had entered the booth he sat down beside Thorbiorn and
said:

"Who was the man whom I met leaving the booth just now?"

"A wise question for a wise man to ask! How can I tell? So many come
and go," said Thorbiorn.

"But this was an old man, large of stature, lame in one knee; yet he
looked a brave warrior, and he was so wrathful that he did not know
where he went. He seemed a man likely to be lucky, too, and not one to
be lightly wronged."

"That must have been old Howard the Halt," said Thorbiorn. "He is a
man from my district, who has come after me to the Thing."

"Ah! Was it his brave son Olaf whom thou didst slay guiltless?"

"Yes, certainly," returned Thorbiorn.

"How hast thou kept the promise of better ways which thou didst make
when thou didst marry my sister?" he asked; and Thorbiorn sat silent.
"This wrong must be amended," said Guest, and sent an honourable man
to bring Howard to him. Howard at first refused to face Thorbiorn
again, but at last reluctantly consented to meet Guest, and when the
latter had greeted him in friendly and honourable fashion he told the
whole story, from the time of Thorbiorn's first jealousy of Olaf.

Guest was horrified. "Heard ever man such injustice!" he cried. "Now,
Thorbiorn, choose one of two things: either my sister shall no longer
be thy wife, or thou shalt allow me to give judgment between Howard
and thee."

Guest's Judgment and the Payment of the Wergild

Thorbiorn agreed to leave the matter in Guest's hands, and many men
were called to make a ring as assessors, that all might be legally
done, and Thorbiorn and Howard stood together in the ring. Then Guest
gave judgment: "Thorbiorn, I cannot condemn thee to pay Howard all
thou owest--with all thy wealth, thou hast not money enough for that;
but for slaying Olaf thou shalt pay a threefold wergild. For the other
wrongs thou hast done him, I, thy brother-in-law, will try to atone by
gifts, and friendship, and all honour in my power, as long as we both
live; and if he will come home to stay with me he shall be right
welcome."

Thorbiorn agreed to the award, saying carelessly: "I will pay him at
home in my own country, if he will come to me when I have more
leisure."

"No," said Guest, who distrusted Thorbiorn, "thou shalt pay here, and
now, fully; and I myself will pay one wergild, to help thee in
atonement." When this was agreed Howard sat down in the ring, and
Guest gave him the one wergild (a hundred of silver), which Howard
received in the skirt of his cloak; and then Thorbiorn paid one
wergild slowly, coin by coin, and said he had no more money; but Guest
bade him pay it all.

Then Thorbiorn drew out a cloth and untied it, saying, "He will surely
count himself paid in full if I give him this!" and he flung into the
old man's face, as he sat on the ground, the teeth of the dead Olaf,
saying, "Here are thy son's teeth!"

Howard sprang up, bleeding, mad with rage and grief. The silver rolled
in all directions from his cloak as he came to his feet, but he heeded
it not at all. Blinded with blood, and furious, he broke through the
ring of assessors, dashed one of them to earth, and rushed away like a
young man; but when he came to Steinthor's booth he lay as if dead,
and spoke to no man.

[Illustration: "The silver rolled in all directions from his cloak"]

Guest would have no more to do with Thorbiorn. "Thou hast no equal for
cruelty and evil; thou shalt surely repent it," he said; and he rode
to Bathstead, took his sister away, with all her wealth, and broke off
his alliance with Thorbiorn, caring nothing for the shame he put upon
so unjust a man.

Howard went home, told Biargey all that had happened, and took to his
bed again, a poor, old, helpless, miserable man; but his wife, who saw
her presage beginning to come true, kept up her courage, rowed out
fishing every day, and guided the household for yet another year.

Biargey and her Brethren

That summer, one day, as Biargey was rowed out to the fishing as
usual, she saw Thorbiorn's boat coming up the firth, and bade her man
take up the lines and go to meet him, and row round the cutter, while
she talked with Thorbiorn. As Biargey's little boat approached the
cutter Thorbiorn stopped his vessel for he saw that she would speak
with him, and her boat circled round the cutter while she asked his
business, and learnt that he was going with Vakr to meet a brother and
nephew of his, to bring them to Bathstead, and that he expected to be
away from home for a week. The little skiff had now passed completely
round the motionless cutter, and Olaf's mother, having learnt all she
wanted, bade her rower quit Thorbiorn; the little boat shot swiftly
and suddenly away, leaving Thorbiorn with an uneasy sense of
witchcraft. So disquieted did he feel that he would have pursued her
and drowned "the old hag," as he called her, had he not been prevented
by Brand the Strong, who had been helped in his need by Olaf.

As the little craft shot away Biargey smiled mysteriously, and said to
her rower: "Now I feel sure that Olaf my son will be avenged. I have
work to do: let us not go home yet."

"Where, then, shall we go?" asked the man.

"To my brother Valbrand."

Valbrand
Now Valbrand was an old man who had been a mighty warrior in his
youth, but had now settled down to a life of quiet and peace; he had,
however, two promising sons, well-grown and manly youths. When
Valbrand saw his sister he came to meet her, saying:

"Welcome, sister! Seldom it is that we see thee. Wilt thou abide with
us this night, or is thine errand one that craves haste?"

"I must be home to-night," she replied, and added mysteriously: "But
there is help I would fain ask of thee. Wilt thou lend me thy
seal-nets? We have not enough to catch such fish as we need."

Valbrand answered: "Willingly, and thou shalt choose for thyself. Here
are three, one old and worn out, two new and untried; which wilt thou
take?"

"I will have the new ones, but I do not need them yet; keep them ready
for the day when I shall send and ask for them," Biargey replied, and
bade Valbrand farewell, and rowed away to her next brother.

Thorbrand and Asbrand

When Howard's wife came to her brother Thorbrand she was well received
by him and his two sons, and here she asked for the loan of a
trout-net, since she had not enough to catch the fish. Thorbrand
offered her her choice--one old and worn out, or two new and untried
nets; and again Biargey chose the new ones, and bade them be ready
when the messenger came.

From her third brother, Asbrand, who had only one son, Biargey asked a
turf-cutter, as hers was not keen enough to cut all she wanted; again
she was offered her choice, and chose the new, untried cutter, instead
of the old, rusty, notched one. Then Biargey bade farewell to Asbrand,
refusing his offer of hospitality, and went home to Howard, and told
him of her quests and the promises she had received. The old couple
knew what the promises meant, but they said nothing to each other
about it.

The Arousing of Howard

When seven days had passed Biargey came to Howard, saying: "Arise now,
and play the man, if thou wilt ever win vengeance for Olaf. Thou must
do it now or never, since now the opportunity has come. Knowest thou
not that to-day Thorbiorn returns to Bathstead, and thou must meet him
to-day? And have I not found helpers for thee in my nephews? Thou wilt
not need to face the strife alone."

Hereupon Howard sprang up joyfully from his bed, and was no longer
lame or halt, nor looked like an old man, but moved briskly, clad
himself in good armour, and seemed a mighty warrior. His joy broke
forth in words, and he chanted songs of gladness in vengeance, and joy
in strife, and evil omen to the death-doomed foe. Thus gladly, with
spear in hand, he went forth to find his enemy and avenge his son; but
he turned and kissed his brave wife farewell, for he said: "It may
well be that we shall not meet again." Biargey said: "Nay, we shall
meet again, for I know that thou bearest a bold heart and a strong
arm, and wilt do valiantly."

Howard Gathers his Friends

Howard and one fighting-man took their boat and rowed to Valbrand's
house, and saw him and his sons making hay. Valbrand greeted Howard
well, for he had not seen him for long, and begged him to stay there,
but Howard would not. "I am in haste, and have come to fetch the two
new seal-nets thou didst lend to my wife," he said; and Valbrand
understood him well. He called to his sons, "Come hither, lads; here
is your kinsman Howard, with mighty work on hand," and the two youths
ran up hastily, leaving their hay-making. Valbrand went to the house,
and returned bearing good weapons, which he gave to his sons, bidding
them follow their kinsman Howard and help in his vengeance.

They three went down to the boat, took their seats beside Howard's
man, and rowed to Asbrand's house. There Howard asked for the promised
new turf-cutter, and Asbrand's son, a tall and manly youth, joined the
party. At their next visit, to Thorbrand's house, Howard asked for the
two trout-nets, and Thorbrand's two sons, with one stout fighting-man,
came gladly with their kinsman.

Howard's Plan

As they rowed away together one of the youths asked: "Why is it that
thou hast no sword or axe, Uncle Howard?" Howard replied: "It may be
that we shall meet Thorbiorn, and when the meeting is over I shall not
be a swordless man, but it is likely that I shall have Warflame, that
mighty weapon, the best of swords; and here I have a good spear."

These words seemed to them all a good omen, and as they rowed towards
Bathstead they saw a flock of ravens, which encouraged them yet more,
since the raven was the bird of Odin, the haunter of fields of strife
and bloodshed.

When they reached Bathstead they sprang on the jetty, carried their
boat over the ridge of shingle to the quiet pool by the boathouse, and
hid themselves where they could see, but remain themselves unseen.
Howard took command, and appointed their places, bidding them be wary,
and not stir till he gave the word.

Thorbiorn's Return

Late that evening, just before dusk, Thorbiorn and Vakr came home,
bringing their kinsmen with them, a party of ten in all. They had no
suspicion of any ambush, and Thorbiorn said to Vakr: "It is a fine
night, and dry, Vakr; we will leave the boat here--she will take no
hurt through the night--and thou shalt carry our swords and spears up
to the boathouse."

Vakr obeyed, and bore all the weapons to the boathouse. Howard's men
would have slain him then but Howard forbade, and let him return to
the jetty for more armour. When Vakr had gone back Howard sent to the
boathouse for the magic sword, Warflame; drawing it, he gripped it
hard and brandished it, for he would fain avenge Olaf with the weapon
which had slain him. When Vakr came towards the ambush a second time
he was laden with shields and helmets. Howard's men sprang up to take
him, and he turned to flee as he saw and heard them. But his foot
slipped, and he fell into the pool, and lay there weighed down by all
the armour, till he died miserably--a fitting end for one so ignoble
and cruel.

Thorbiorn's Death

Howard's men shouted and waved their weapons, and ran down to the
beach to attack their enemies; but Thorbiorn, seeing them, flung
himself into the sea, swimming towards a small rocky islet. When
Howard saw this he took Warflame between his teeth, and, old as he
was, plunged into the waves and pursued Thorbiorn. The latter had,
however, a considerable start, and was both younger and stronger than
his adversary, so that he was already on the rock and prepared to dash
a huge stone at Howard, when the old man reached the islet. Now there
seemed no hope for Howard, but still he clung fiercely to the rock and
strove to draw himself up on the land. Thorbiorn lifted the huge stone
to cast at his foe, but his foot slipped on the wet rocks, and he fell
backward; before he could recover his footing Howard rushed forward
and slew him with his own sword Warflame, striking out his teeth, as
Thorbiorn had done to Olaf.

[Illustration: "Thorbiorn lifted the huge stone"]

When Howard swam back to Bathstead, and they told him that in all
six of Thorbiorn's men were dead, while he had only lost one
serving-man, he rejoiced greatly; but his vengeance was not satisfied
until he had slain yet another brother of Thorbiorn's.

Steinthor Shelters Howard

Then, with the news of this great revenge to be told, Howard and his
kinsmen took refuge with that Steinthor who had given him help and
shelter during the Thing.

"Who are ye, and what tidings do ye bring?" asked Steinthor as the
little party of seven entered his hall.

"I am Howard, and these are my kinsmen," said Howard. "We tell the
slaying of Thorbiorn and his brothers, his nephews and his
house-carles, eight in all."

Steinthor exclaimed in surprise: "Art thou that Howard, old and

bedridden, who didst seem like to die last year at the Thing, and hast
thou done these mighty deeds with only these youths to aid thee? This
is a great marvel, nearly as wondrous as thy restoration to youth and
health. Great enmity will ye have aroused against you!"

Said Howard: "Bethink thee that thou didst promise me thy help if I
should ever need it. Therefore have I come to thee now, because I have
some little need of aid."

Steinthor laughed. "A little help! When dost thou think thou wilt need
much, if this be not the time? But bide ye all here in honour, and I
will set the matter right, since thou and these thy helpers have done
so valiantly."
The Thing and Guest's Award

Howard and his kinsmen abode long with their host, until the Thing met
again; then Steinthor rode away, leaving the uncle and nephews under
good safeguard. It was a great meeting, with many cases to judge.
When the matter of the death of Thorbiorn's family was brought up
Steinthor spoke on Howard's behalf, and offered to let Guest again
give judgment, since he had done so before. This offer was accepted by
Thorbiorn's surviving kinsfolk, and Guest, as before, gave a fair
award.

Since a threefold wergild was still due to Howard for the slaying of
Olaf, three of the eight dead need not be paid for. Thorbiorn, Vakr,
and that brother of his slain by Olaf should continue unatoned for,
because they were evildoers, and fell in an unrighteous quarrel of
their own seeking; moreover, the slaying of Howard's serving-man
cancelled one wergild; there remained, therefore, but one wergild for
Howard to pay--one hundred of silver--which was paid out of hand. In
addition to this, Howard must change his dwelling, and his nephews
must travel abroad for some years. This sentence pleased all men
greatly, and they broke up the Thing in great content, and Howard rode
home at the head of a goodly company to his stout-hearted wife
Biargey, who had kept his house and lands in good order all this time.
They made a great feast, and gave rich gifts to all their friends and
kinsmen; then when the farewells were over the exiles went abroad and
did valiantly in Norway; but Howard sold his lands and moved to
another part of the island. There he prospered greatly; and when he
died his memory was handed down as that of a mighty warrior and a
valiant and prudent man.

CHAPTER VII: ROLAND, THE HERO OF EARLY FRANCE

The Roland Legends

Charles the Great, King of the Franks, world-famous as Charlemagne,

won his undying renown by innumerable victories for France and for the
Church. Charles as the head of the Holy Roman Empire and the Pope as
the head of the Holy Catholic Church equally dominated the imagination
of the medi�val world. Yet in romance Charlemagne's fame has been
eclipsed by that of his illustrious nephew and vassal, Roland, whose
crowning glory has sprung from his last conflict and heroic death in
the valley of Roncesvalles.

"Oh for a blast of that dread horn,

On Fontarabian echoes borne,
That to King Charles did come,
When Roland brave, and Olivier,
And every paladin and peer
On Roncesvalles died."

_Scott._

Briefly, the historical facts are these: In A.D. 778 Charles was
returning from an expedition into Spain, where the dissensions of the
Moorish rulers had offered him the chance of extending his borders
while he fought for the Christian faith against the infidel. He had
taken Pampeluna, but had been checked before Saragossa, and had not
ventured beyond the Ebro; he was now making his way home through the
Pyrenees. When the main army had safely traversed the passes, the rear
was suddenly attacked by an overwhelming body of mountaineers, Gascons
and Basques, who, resenting the violation of their mountain
sanctuaries, and longing for plunder, drove the Frankish rearguard
into a little valley (now marked by the chapel of Ibagneta and still
called Roncesvalles), and there slew every man.

[Illustration: Charlemagne

Stella Langdale]

The Historic Basis

The whole romantic legend of Roland has sprung from the simple words
in a contemporary chronicle, "In which battle was slain Roland,
prefect of the marches of Brittany."[12]

This same fight of Roncesvalles was the theme of an archaic poem, the
"Song of Altobiscar," written about 1835. In it we hear the exultation
of the Basques as they see the knights of France fall beneath their
onslaughts. The Basques are on the heights--they hear the trampling of
a mighty host which throngs the narrow valley below: its numbers are
as countless as the sands of the sea, its movement as resistless as
the waves which roll those sands on the shore. Awe fills the bosoms of
the mountain tribesmen, but their leader is undaunted. "Let us unite
our strong arms!" he cries aloud. "Let us tear our rocks from their
beds and hurl them upon the enemy! Let us crush and slay them all!" So
said, so done: the rocks roll plunging into the valley, slaying whole
troops in their descent. "And what mangled flesh, what broken bones,
what seas of blood! Soon of that gallant band not one is left alive;
night covers all, the eagles devour the flesh, and the bones whiten in
this valley to all eternity!"

A Spanish Version

So runs the "Song of Altobiscar." But Spain too claims part of the
honour of the day of Roncesvalles. True, Roland was in reality
slain by Basques, not by Spaniards; but Spain, eager to share the
honour, has glorified a national hero, Bernardo del Carpio, who, in
the Spanish legend, defeats Roland in single combat and wins the day.

The Italian Orlando

Italy has laid claim to Roland, and in the guise of Orlando, Orlando
Furioso, Orlando Innamorato, has made him into a fantastic, chivalrous
knight, a hero of many magical adventures.

Roland in French Literature

Noblest of all, however, is the development of the "Roland Saga" in

French literature; for, even setting aside much legendary lore and
accumulated tradition, the Roland of the old epic is a perfect hero of
the early days of feudalism, when chivalry was in its very beginnings,
before the cult of the Blessed Virgin Mary added the grace of courtesy
to its heroism. Evidently Roland had grown in importance before the
"Chanson de Roland" took its present form, for we find the rearguard
skirmish magnified into a great battle, which manifestly contains
recollections of later Saracen invasions and Gascon revolts. As befits
the hero of an epic, Roland is now of royal blood, the nephew of the
great emperor, who has himself increased in age and splendour; this
heroic Roland can obviously only be overcome by the treachery of one
of the Franks themselves, so there appears the traitor Ganelon (a
Romance version of a certain Danilo or Nanilo), who is among the
Twelve Peers what Judas was among the Apostles; the mighty Saracens,
not the insignificant Basques, are now the victors; and the vengeance
taken by Charlemagne on the Saracens and on the traitor is boldly
added to history, which leaves the disaster unavenged. Thus the bare
fact was embroidered over gradually by the historical imagination,
aided by patriotism, until a really national hero was evolved out of
an obscure Breton count.

The "Chanson de Roland"

The "Song of Roland," as we now have it, seems to be a late version of

an Anglo-Norman poem, made by a certain Turoldus or Thorold; and it
must bear a close resemblance to that chant which fired the soldiers
of William the Norman at Hastings, when

"Taillefer, the noble singer,

On his war-horse swift and fiery,
Rode before the Norman host;
Tossed his sword in air and caught it,
Chanted loud the death of Roland,
And the peers who perished with him
At the pass of Roncevaux."

_Roman de Rou._

The "Song of Roland" bears an intimate relation to the development of

European thought, and the hero is doubly worth our study as hero and
as type of national character. Thus runs the story:

The Story

The Emperor Charles the Great, Carolus Magnus, or Charlemagne, had

been for seven years in Spain, and had conquered it from sea to sea,
except Saragossa, which, among its lofty mountains, and ruled by its
brave king Marsile, had defied his power. Marsile still held to his
idols, Mahomet, Apollo, and Termagaunt, dreading in his heart the day
when Charles would force him to become a Christian.

The Saracen Council

The Saracen king gathered a council around him, as he reclined on a

seat of blue marble in the shade of an orchard, and asked the advice
of his wise men.
 "'My lords,' quoth he, 'you know our grievous state.
The mighty Charles, great lord of France the fair,
Has spread his hosts in ruin o'er our land.
No armies have I to resist his course,
No people have I to destroy his hosts.
Advise me now, what counsel shall I take
To save my race and realm from death and shame?'"

Blancandrin's Advice

A wily emir, Blancandrin, of Val-Fonde, was the only man who replied.
He was wise in counsel, brave in war, a loyal vassal to his lord.

"'Fear not, my liege,' he answered the sad king.

'Send thou to Charles the proud, the arrogant,
And offer fealty and service true,
With gifts of lions, bears, and swift-foot hounds,
Seven hundred camels, falcons, mules, and gold--
As much as fifty chariots can convey--
Yea, gold enough to pay his vassals all.
Say thou thyself will take the Christian faith,
And follow him to Aix to be baptized.
If he demands thy hostages, then I
And these my fellows give our sons to thee,
To go with Charles to France, as pledge of truth.
Thou wilt not follow him, thou wilt not yield
To be baptized, and so our sons must die;
But better death than life in foul disgrace,
With loss of our bright Spain and happy days.'
So cried the pagans all; but Marsile sat
Thoughtful, and yet at last accepted all."

An Embassy to Charlemagne

Now King Marsile dismissed the council with words of thanks, only
retaining near him ten of his most famous barons, chief of whom was
Blancandrin; to them he said: "My lords, go to Cordova, where Charles
is at this time. Bear olive-branches in your hands, in token of peace,
and reconcile me with him. Great shall be your reward if you succeed.
Beg Charles to have pity on me, and I will follow him to Aix within a
month, will receive the Christian law, and become his vassal in love
and loyalty."

"Sire," said Blancandrin, "you shall have a good treaty!"

The ten messengers departed, bearing olive-branches in their hands,

riding on white mules, with reins of gold and saddles of silver, and
came to Charles as he rested after the siege of Cordova, which he had
just taken and sacked.

Reception by Charlemagne

Charlemagne was in an orchard with his Twelve Peers and fifteen

thousand veteran warriors of France. The messengers from the heathen
king reached this orchard and asked for the emperor; their gaze
wandered over groups of wise nobles playing at chess, and groups of
gay youths fencing, till at last it rested on a throne of solid gold,
set under a pine-tree and overshadowed with eglantine. There sat
Charles, the king who ruled fair France, with white flowing beard and
hoary head, stately of form and majestic of countenance. No need was
there of usher to cry: "Here sits Charles the King."

[Illustration: "Here sits Charles the King"]

The ambassadors greeted Charlemagne with all honour, and Blancandrin

opened the embassy thus:

"Peace be with you from God the Lord of Glory whom you adore! Thus
says the valiant King Marsile: He has been instructed in your faith,
the way of salvation, and is willing to be baptized; but you have been
too long in our bright Spain, and should return to Aix. There will
he follow you and become your vassal, holding the kingdom of Spain at
your hand. Gifts have we brought from him to lay at your feet, for he
will share his treasures with you!"

He is Perplexed

Charlemagne raised his hands in thanks to God, but then bent his head
and remained thinking deeply, for he was a man of prudent mind,
cautious and far-seeing, and never spoke on impulse. At last he said
proudly: "Ye have spoken fairly, but Marsile is my greatest enemy: how
can I trust your words?"

Blancandrin replied: "He will give hostages, twenty of our noblest

youths, and my own son will be among them. King Marsile will follow
you to the wondrous springs of Aix-la-Chapelle, and on the feast of
St. Michael will receive baptism in your court."

Thus the audience ended. The messengers were feasted in a pavilion

raised in the orchard, and the night passed in gaiety and
good-fellowship.

He Consults his Twelve Peers

In the early morning Charlemagne arose and heard Mass; then, sitting
beneath a pine-tree, he called the Twelve Peers to council. There came
the twelve heroes, chief of them Roland and his loyal brother-in-arms
Oliver; there came Archbishop Turpin; and, among a thousand loyal
Franks, there came Ganelon the traitor. When all were seated in due
order Charlemagne began:

"My lords and barons, I have received an embassy of peace from King
Marsile, who sends me great gifts and offers, but on condition that I
leave Spain and return to Aix. Thither will he follow me, to receive
the Faith, become a Christian and my vassal. Is he to be trusted?"

"Let us beware," cried all the Franks.

Roland Speaks

Roland, ever impetuous, now rose without delay, and spoke: "Fair uncle
and sire, it would be madness to trust Marsile. Seven years have we
warred in Spain, and many cities have I won for you, but Marsile has
ever been treacherous. Once before when he sent messengers with
olive-branches you and the French foolishly believed him, and he
beheaded the two counts who were your ambassadors to him. Fight
Marsile to the end, besiege and sack Saragossa, and avenge those who
perished by his treachery."

Ganelon Objects

Charlemagne looked out gloomily from under his heavy brows, he twisted
his moustache and pulled his long white beard, but said nothing, and
all the Franks remained silent, except Ganelon, whose hostility to
Roland showed clearly in his words:

"Sire, blind credulity were wrong
advantage. When Marsile offers to
your hand and to take your faith,
terms cares little for our death!
counsellor, but hear the voice of
and foolish, but follow up your own
become your vassal, to hold Spain at
any man who urges you to reject such
Let pride no longer be your
wisdom."

The aged Duke Naimes, the Nestor of the army, spoke next, supporting
Ganelon: "Sire, the advice of Count Ganelon is wise, if wisely
followed. Marsile lies at your mercy; he has lost all, and only begs
for pity. It would be a sin to press this cruel war, since he offers
full guarantee by his hostages. You need only send one of your barons
to arrange the terms of peace."

This advice pleased the whole assembly, and a murmur was heard: "The
Duke has spoken well."

"Who Shall Go to Saragossa?"

"'My lords and peers, whom shall we send

To Saragossa to Marsile?'
'Sire, let me go,' replied Duke Naimes;
'Give me your glove and warlike staff.'
'No!' cried the king, 'my counsellor,
Thou shalt not leave me unadvised--
Sit down again; I bid thee stay.'

"'My lords and peers, whom shall we send

To Saragossa to Marsile?'
'Sire, I can go,' quoth Roland bold.
'That canst thou not,' said Oliver;
'Thy heart is far too hot and fierce--
I fear for thee. But I will go,
If that will please my lord the King.'
'No!' cried the king, 'ye shall not go.
I swear by this white flowing beard
No peer shall undertake the task.'

"'My lords and peers, whom shall we send?'

Archbishop Turpin rose and spoke:
'Fair sire, let me be messenger.
Your nobles all have played their part;
Give me your glove and warlike staff,
 And I will show this heathen king
In frank speech how a true knight feels.'
But wrathfully the king replied:
'By this white beard, thou shalt not go!
Sit down, and raise thy voice no more.'"

Roland Suggests Ganelon

"Knights of France," quoth Charlemagne, "choose me now one of your

number to do my errand to Marsile, and to defend my honour valiantly,
if need be."

"Ah," said Roland, "then it must be Ganelon, my stepfather; for

whether he goes or stays, you have none better than he!"

This suggestion satisfied all the assembly, and they cried: "Ganelon
will acquit himself right manfully. If it please the King, he is the
right man to go."

Charlemagne thought for a moment, and then, raising his head, beckoned
to Ganelon. "Come hither, Ganelon," he said, "and receive this glove
and staff, which the voice of all the Franks gives to thee."

Ganelon is Angry

"No," replied Ganelon, wrathfully. "This is the work of Roland, and I

will never forgive him, nor his friends, Oliver and the other Peers.
Here, in your presence, I bid them defiance!"

"Your anger is too great," said Charlemagne; "you will go, since it is
my will also."

"Yes, I shall go, but I shall perish as did your two former
ambassadors. Sire, forget not that your sister is my wife, and that
Baldwin, my son, will be a valiant champion if he lives. I leave to
him my lands and fiefs. Sire, guard him well, for I shall see him no
more."

"Your heart is too tender," said Charlemagne. "You must go, since such
is my command."

He Threatens Roland

Ganelon, in rage and anguish, glared round the council, and his face
drew all eyes, so fiercely he looked at Roland.

"Madman," said he, "all men know that I am thy stepfather, and for
this cause thou hast sent me to Marsile, that I may perish! But if I
return I will be revenged on thee."

"Madness and pride," Roland retorted, "have no terrors for me; but
this embassy demands a prudent man not an angry fool: if Charles
consents, I will do his errand for thee."

"Thou shalt not. Thou art not my vassal, to do my work, and Charles,
my lord, has given me his commands. I go to Saragossa; but there will
I find some way to vent my anger."

Now Roland began to laugh, so wild did his stepfather's threats seem,
and the laughter stung Ganelon to madness. "I hate you," he cried to
Roland; "you have brought this unjust choice on me." Then, turning to
the emperor: "Mighty lord, behold me ready to fulfil your commands."

But is Sent

"Fair Lord Ganelon," spoke Charlemagne, "bear this message to Marsile.

He must become my vassal and receive holy baptism. Half of Spain shall
be his fief; the other half is for Count Roland. If Marsile does not
accept these terms I will besiege Saragossa, capture the town, and
lead Marsile prisoner to Aix, where he shall die in shame and torment.
Take this letter, sealed with my seal, and deliver it into the king's
own right hand."

Thereupon Charlemagne held out his right-hand glove to Ganelon, who

would fain have refused it. So reluctant was he to grasp it that the
glove fell to the ground. "Ah, God!" cried the Franks, "what an evil
omen! What woes will come to us from this embassy!" "You shall hear
full tidings," quoth Ganelon. "Now, sire, dismiss me, for I have no
time to lose." Very solemnly Charlemagne raised his hand and made the
sign of the Cross over Ganelon, and gave him his blessing, saying,
"Go, for the honour of Jesus Christ, and for your Emperor." So
Ganelon took his leave, and returned to his lodging, where he prepared
for his journey, and bade farewell to the weeping retainers whom he
left behind, though they begged to accompany him. "God forbid," cried
he, "that so many brave knights should die! Rather will I die alone.
You, sirs, return to our fair France, greet well my wife, guard my son
Baldwin, and defend his fief!"

He Plots with Marsile's Messengers

Then Ganelon rode away, and shortly overtook the ambassadors of the
Moorish king, for Blancandrin had delayed their journey to accompany
him, and the two envoys began a crafty conversation, for both were
wary and skilful, and each was trying to read the other's mind. The
wily Saracen began:

"'Ah! what a wondrous king is Charles!

How far and wide his conquests range!
The salt sea is no bar to him:
From Poland to far England's shores
He stretches his unquestioned sway;
But why seeks he to win bright Spain?'
'Such is his will,' quoth Ganelon;
'None can withstand his mighty power!'

"'How valiant are the Frankish lords

But how their counsel wrongs their king
To urge him to this long-drawn strife--
They ruin both themselves and him!'
'I blame not them,' quoth Ganelon,
'But Roland, swollen with fatal pride.
Near Carcassonne he brought the King
An apple, crimson streaked with gold:
 "Fair sire," quoth he, "here at your feet
I lay the crowns of all the kings."
If he were dead we should have peace!'

"'How haughty must this Roland be

Who fain would conquer all the earth!
Such pride deserves due chastisement!
What warriors has he for the task?'
'The Franks of France,' quoth Ganelon,
'The bravest warriors 'neath the sun!
For love alone they follow him
(Or lavish gifts which he bestows)
To death, or conquest of the world!'"

[Illustration: "Ganelon rode away"]

To Betray Roland

The bitterness in Ganelon's tone at once struck: Blancandrin, who cast

a glance at him and saw the Frankish envoy trembling with rage. He
suddenly addressed Ganelon in whispered tones: "Hast thou aught
against the nephew of Charles? Wouldst thou have revenge on Roland?
Deliver him to us, and King Marsile will share with thee all his
treasures." Ganelon was at first horrified, and refused to hear more,
but so well did Blancandrin argue and so skilfully did he lay his
snare that before they reached Saragossa and came to the presence of
King Marsile it was agreed that Roland should be destroyed by their
means.

Ganelon with the Saracens

Blancandrin and his fellow ambassadors conducted Ganelon into the

presence of the Saracen king, and announced Charlemagne's peaceable
reception of their message and the coming of his envoy. "Let him
speak: we listen," said Marsile.

Ganelon then began artfully: "Peace be to you in the name of the Lord
of Glory whom we adore! This is the message of King Charles: You shall
receive the Holy Christian Faith, and Charles will graciously grant
you one-half of Spain as a fief; the other half he intends for his
nephew Roland (and a haughty partner you will find him!). If you
refuse he will take Saragossa, lead you captive to Aix, and give you
there to a shameful death."

Marsile's Anger

Marsile's anger was so great at this insulting message that he sprang

to his feet, and would have slain Ganelon with his gold-adorned
javelin; but he, seeing this, half drew his sword, saying:

"'Sword, how fair and bright thou art!

Come thou forth and view the light.
Long as I can wield thee here
Charles my Emperor shall not say
That I die alone, unwept.
Ere I fall Spain's noblest blood
 Shall be shed to pay my death.'"

The Saracen Council

However, strife was averted, and Ganelon received praise from all for
his bold bearing and valiant defiance of his king's enemy. When quiet
was restored he repeated his message and delivered the emperor's
letter, which was found to contain a demand that the caliph, Marsile's
uncle, should be sent, a prisoner, to Charles, in atonement for the
two ambassadors foully slain before. The indignation of the Saracen
nobles was intense, and Ganelon was in imminent danger, but, setting
his back against a pine-tree, he prepared to defend himself to the
last. Again the quarrel was stayed, and Marsile, taking his most
trusted leaders, withdrew to a secret council, whither, soon,
Blancandrin led Ganelon. Here Marsile excused his former rage, and, in
reparation, offered Ganelon a superb robe of marten's fur, which was
accepted; and then began the tempting of the traitor. First demanding
a pledge of secrecy, Marsile pitied Charlemagne, so aged and so weary
with rule. Ganelon praised his emperor's prowess and vast power.
Marsile repeated his words of pity, and Ganelon replied that as long
as Roland and the Twelve Peers lived Charlemagne needed no man's pity
and feared no man's power; his Franks, also, were the best living
warriors. Marsile declared proudly that he could bring four hundred
thousand men against Charlemagne's twenty thousand French; but Ganelon
dissuaded him from any such expedition.

Ganelon Plans Treachery

"'Not thus will you overcome him;

Leave this folly, turn to wisdom.
Give the Emperor so much treasure
That the Franks will be astounded.
Send him, too, the promised pledges,
Sons of all your noblest vassals.
To fair France will Charles march homeward,
Leaving (as I will contrive it)
Haughty Roland in the rearguard.
Oliver, the bold and courteous,
Will be with him: slay those heroes,
And King Charles will fall for ever!'
'Fair Sir Ganelon,' quoth Marsile,
'How must I entrap Count Roland?'
'When King Charles is in the mountains
He will leave behind his rearguard
Under Oliver and Roland.
Send against them half your army:
Roland and the Peers will conquer,
But be wearied with the struggle--
Then bring on your untired warriors.
France will lose this second battle,
And when Roland dies, the Emperor
Has no right hand for his conflicts--
Farewell all the Frankish greatness!
Ne'er again can Charles assemble
Such a mighty host for conquest,
And you will have peace henceforward!'"
Welcomed by Marsile

Marsile was overjoyed at the treacherous advice and embraced and

richly rewarded the felon knight. The death of Roland and the Peers
was solemnly sworn between them, by Marsile on the book of the Law of
Mahomet, by Ganelon on the sacred relics in the pommel of his sword.
Then, repeating the compact between them, and warning Ganelon against
treason to his friends, Marsile dismissed the treacherous envoy who
hastened to return and put his scheme into execution.

Ganelon Returns to Charles

In the meantime Charles had retired as far as Valtierra, on his way to

France, and there Ganelon found him, and delivered the tribute, the
keys of Saragossa, and a false message excusing the absence of the
caliph. He had, so Marsile said, put to sea with three hundred
thousand warriors who would not renounce their faith, and all had been
drowned in a tempest, not four leagues from land. Marsile would obey
King Charles's commands in all other respects. "Thank God!" cried
Charlemagne. "Ganelon, you have done well, and shall be well
rewarded!"

The French Camp. Charles Dreams

Now the whole Frankish army marched towards the Pyrenees, and, as
evening fell, found themselves among the mountains, where Roland
planted his banner on the topmost summit, clear against the sky, and
the army encamped for the night; but the whole Saracen host had also
marched and encamped in a wood not far from the Franks. Meanwhile, as
Charlemagne slept he had dreams of evil omen. Ganelon, in his dreams,
seized the imperial spear of tough ash-wood, and broke it, so that
the splinters flew far and wide. In another dream he saw himself at
Aix attacked by a leopard and a bear, which tore off his right arm; a
greyhound came to his aid but he knew not the end of the fray, and
slept unhappily.

A Morning Council

When morning light shone, and the army was ready to march, the
clarions of the host sounded gaily, and Charlemagne called his barons
around him.

"'My lords and Peers, ye see these strait defiles:

Choose ye to whom the rearguard shall be given.'
'My stepson Roland,' straight quoth Ganelon.
''Mid all the Peers there is no braver knight:
In him will lie the safety of your host.'
Charles heard in wrath, and spoke in angry tones:
'What fiendish rage has prompted this advice?
Who then will go before me in the van?'
The traitor tarried not, but answered swift:
'Ogier the Dane will do that duty best.'"

When Roland heard that he was to command the rearguard he knew not
whether to be pleased or not. At first he thanked Ganelon for naming
him. "Thanks, fair stepfather, for sending me to the post of danger.
King Charles shall lose no man nor horse through my neglect." But when
Ganelon replied sneeringly, "You speak the truth, as I know right
well," Roland's gratitude turned to bitter anger, and he reproached
the villain. "Ah, wretch! disloyal traitor! thou thinkest perchance
that I, like thee, shall basely drop the glove, but thou shalt see!
Sir King, give me your bow. I will not let my badge of office fall, as
thou didst, Ganelon, at Cordova. No evil omen shall assail the host
through me."

Roland for the Rearguard

Charlemagne was very loath to grant his request, but on the advice of
Duke Naimes, most prudent of counsellors, he gave to Roland his bow,
and offered to leave with him half the army. To this the champion
would not agree, but would only have twenty thousand Franks from fair
France. Roland clad himself in his shining armour, laced on his lordly
helmet, girt himself with his famous sword Durendala, and hung round
his neck his flower-painted shield; he mounted his good steed
Veillantif, and took in hand his bright lance with the white pennon
and golden fringe; then, looking like the Archangel St. Michael, he
rode forward, and easy it was to see how all the Franks loved him and
would follow where he led. Beside him rode the famous Peers of France,
Oliver the bold and courteous, the saintly Archbishop Turpin, and
Count Gautier, Roland's loyal vassal. They chose carefully the twenty
thousand French for the rearguard, and Roland sent Gautier with one
thousand of their number to search the mountains. Alas! they never
returned, for King Almaris, a Saracen chief, met and slew them all
among the hills; and only Gautier, sorely wounded and bleeding to
death, returned to Roland in the final struggle.

Charlemagne spoke a mournful "Farewell" to his nephew and the

rearguard, and the mighty army began to traverse the gloomy ravine
through the dark masses of rocks, and to emerge on the other side of
the Pyrenees. All wept, most for joy to set eyes on that dear land of
fair France, which for seven years they had not seen; but Charles,
with a sad foreboding of disaster, hid his eyes beneath his cloak and
wept in silence.

Charles is Sad

"What grief weighs on your mind, sire?" asked the wise Duke Naimes,
riding up beside Charlemagne.

"I mourn for my nephew. Last night in a vision I saw Ganelon break my
trusty lance--this Ganelon who has sent Roland to the rear. And now I
have left Roland in a foreign land, and, O God! if I lose him I shall
never find his equal!" And the emperor rode on in silence, seeing
naught but his own sad foreboding visions.

The Saracen Pursuit

Meanwhile King Marsile, with his countless Saracens, had pursued so

quickly that the van of the heathen army soon saw waving the banners
of the Frankish rear. Then as they halted before the strife began, one
by one the nobles of Saragossa, the champions of the Moors, advanced
and claimed the right to measure themselves against the Twelve Peers
of France. Marsile's nephew received the royal glove as chief
champion, and eleven Saracen chiefs took a vow to slay Roland and
spread the faith of Mahomet.

"Death to the rearguard! Roland shall die! Death to the Peers! Woe to
France and Charlemagne! We will bring the Emperor to your feet! You
shall sleep at St. Denis! Down with fair France!" Such were their
confident cries as they armed for the conflict; and on their side no
less eager were the Franks.

"Fair Sir Comrade," said Oliver to Roland, "methinks we shall have a

fray with the heathen."

"God grant it," returned Roland. "Our duty is to hold this pass for
our king. A vassal must endure for his lord grief and pain, heat and
cold, torment and death; and a knight's duty is to strike mighty
blows, that men may sing of him, in time to come, no evil songs.
Never shall such be sung of me."

Oliver Descries the Saracens

Hearing a great tumult, Oliver ascended a hill and looked towards

Spain, where he perceived the great pagan army, like a gleaming sea,
with shining hauberks and helms flashing in the sun. "Alas! we are
betrayed! This treason is plotted by Ganelon, who put us in the rear,"
he cried. "Say no more," said Roland; "blame him not in this: he is my
stepfather."

Now Oliver alone had seen the might of the pagan array, and he was
appalled by the countless multitudes of the heathens. He descended
from the hill and appealed to Roland.

Roland will not Blow his Horn

"'Comrade Roland, sound your war-horn,

Your great Olifant, far-sounding:
Charles will hear it and return here.'
'Cowardice were that,' quoth Roland;
'In fair France my fame were tarnished.
No, these Pagans all shall perish
When I brandish Durendala.'

"'Comrade Roland, sound your war-horn:

Charles will hear it and return here.'
'God forbid it,' Roland answered,
'That it e'er be sung by minstrels
I was asking help in battle
From my King against these Pagans.
I will ne'er do such dishonour
To my kinsmen and my nation.
No, these heathen all shall perish
When I brandish Durendala.'

"'Comrade Roland, sound your war-horn

Charles will hear it and return here.
See how countless are the heathen
 And how small our Frankish troop is!'
'God forbid it,' answered Roland,
'That our fair France be dishonoured
Or by me or by my comrades--
Death we choose, but not dishonour!'"

Roland was a valiant hero, but Oliver had prudence as well as valour,
and his advice was that of a good and careful general. Now he spoke
reproachfully.

It is Too Late

"Ah, Roland, if you had sounded your magic horn the king would soon be
here, and we should not perish! Now look to the heights and to the
mountain passes: see those who surround us. None of us will see the
light of another day!"

"Speak not so foolishly," retorted Roland. "Accursed be all cowards,

say I." Then, softening his tone a little, he continued: "Friend and
comrade, say no more. The emperor has entrusted to us twenty thousand
Frenchmen, and not a coward among them. Lay on with thy lance, Oliver,
and I will strike with Durendala. If I die men shall say: 'This was
the sword of a noble vassal.'"

Turpin Blesses the Knights

Then spoke the brave and saintly Archbishop Turpin. Spurring his
horse, he rode, a gallant figure, to the summit of a hill, whence he
called aloud to the Frankish knights:

"'Fair sirs and barons, Charles has left us here

To serve him, or at need to die for him.
See, yonder come the foes of Christendom,
And we must fight for God and Holy Faith.
Now, say your shrift, and make your peace with Heaven;
I will absolve you and will heal your souls;
And if you die as martyrs, your true home
Is ready midst the flowers of Paradise!'"

The Frankish knights, dismounting, knelt before Turpin, who blessed

and absolved them all, bidding them, as penance, to strike hard
against the heathen.

Then Roland called his brother-in-arms, the brave and courteous

Oliver, and said: "Fair brother, I know now that Ganelon has betrayed
us for reward and Marsile has bought us; but the payment shall be made
with our swords, and Charlemagne will terribly avenge us."

"Montjoie! Montjoie!"

While the two armies yet stood face to face in battle array Oliver
replied: "What good is it to speak? You would not sound your horn, and
Charles cannot help us; he is not to blame. Barons and lords, ride on
and yield not. In God's name fight and slay, and remember the war-cry
of our Emperor." And at the words the war-cry of "Montjoie! Montjoie!"
burst from the whole army as they spurred against the advancing
heathen host.

The Fray

Great was the fray that day, deadly was the combat, as the Moors and
Franks crashed together, shouting their cries, invoking their gods or
saints, wielding with utmost courage sword, lance, javelin, scimitar,
or dagger. Blades flashed, lances were splintered, helms were cloven
in that terrible fight of heroes. Each of the Twelve Peers did mighty
feats of arms. Roland himself slew the nephew of King Marsile, who had
promised to bring Roland's head to his uncle's feet, and bitter were
the words that Roland hurled at the lifeless body of his foe, who had
but just before boasted that Charlemagne should lose his right hand.
Oliver slew the heathen king's brother, and one by one the Twelve
Peers proved their mettle on the twelve champions of King Marsile, and
left them dead or mortally wounded on the field. Wherever the battle
was fiercest and the danger greatest, where help was most needed,
there Roland spurred to the rescue, swinging Durendala, and, falling
on the heathen like a thunderbolt of war, turned the tide of battle
again and yet again.

"Red was Roland, red with bloodshed:

Red his corselet, red his shoulders,
Red his arm, and red his charger."

Like the red god Mars he rode through the battle; and as he went he
met Oliver, with the truncheon or a spear in his grasp.

"'Friend, what hast thou there?' cried Roland.

'In this game 'tis not a distaff,
But a blade of steel thou needest.
Where is now Hauteclaire, thy good sword,
Golden-hilted, crystal-pommeled?'
'Here,' said Oliver; 'so fight I
That I have not time to draw it.'
'Friend,' quoth Roland, 'more I love thee
Ever henceforth than a brother.'"

The Saracens Perish

Thus the battle continued, most valiantly contested by both sides, and
the Saracens died by hundreds and thousands, till all their host lay
dead but one man, who fled wounded, leaving the Frenchmen masters of
the field, but in sorry plight--broken were their swords and lances,
rent their hauberks, torn and blood-stained their gay banners and
pennons, and many, many of their brave comrades lay lifeless. Sadly
they looked round on the heaps of corpses, and their minds were filled
with grief as they thought of their companions, of fair France which
they should see no more, and of their emperor who even now awaited
them while they fought and died for him. Yet they were not
discouraged; loudly their cry re-echoed, "Montjoie! Montjoie!" as
Roland cheered them on, and Turpin called aloud: "Our men are heroes;
no king under heaven has better. It is written in the Chronicles of
France that in that great land it is our king's right to have valiant
soldiers."
A Second Saracen Army

While they sought in tears the bodies of their friends, the main army
of the Saracens, under King Marsile in person, came upon them; for the
one fugitive who had escaped had urged Marsile to attack again at
once, while the Franks were still weary. The advice seemed good to
Marsile, and he advanced at the head of a hundred thousand men, whom
he now hurled against the French in columns of fifty thousand at a
time; and they came on right valiantly, with clarions sounding and
trumpets blowing.

"'Soldiers of the Lord,' cried Turpin,

'Be ye valiant and steadfast,
For this day shall crowns be given you
Midst the flowers of Paradise.
In the name of God our Saviour,
Be ye not dismayed nor frighted,
Lest of you be shameful legends
Chanted by the tongue of minstrels.
Rather let us die victorious,
Since this eve shall see us lifeless!--
Heaven has no room for cowards!
Knights, who nobly fight, and vainly,
Ye shall sit amid the holy
In the blessed fields of Heaven.
On then, Friends of God, to glory!'"

And the battle raged anew, with all the odds against the small handful
of French, who knew they were doomed, and fought as though they were
"fey."[13]

Gloomy Portents

Meanwhile the whole course of nature was disturbed. In France there

were tempests of wind and thunder, rain and hail; thunderbolts fell
everywhere, and the earth shook exceedingly. From Mont St. Michel to
Cologne, from Besan�on to Wissant, not one town could show its walls
uninjured, not one village its houses unshaken. A terrible darkness
spread over all the land, only broken when the heavens split asunder
with the lightning-flash. Men whispered in terror: "Behold the end of
the world! Behold the great Day of Doom!" Alas! they knew not the
truth: it was the great mourning for the death of Roland.

Many French Knights Fall

In this second battle the French champions were weary, and before long
they began to fall before the valour of the newly arrived Saracen
nobles. First died Engelier the Gascon, mortally wounded by the lance
of that Saracen who swore brotherhood to Ganelon; next Samson, and the
noble Duke Anseis. These three were well avenged by Roland and Oliver
and Turpin. Then in quick succession died Gerin and Gerier and other
valiant Peers at the hands of Grandoigne, until his death-dealing
career was cut short by Durendala. Another desperate single combat was
won by Turpin, who slew a heathen emir "as black as molten pitch."

The Second Army Defeated

Finally this second host of the heathens gave way and fled, begging
Marsile to come and succour them; but now of the victorious French
there were but sixty valiant champions left alive, including Roland,
Oliver, and the fiery prelate Turpin.

A Third Appears

Now the third host of the pagans began to roll forward upon the
dauntless little band, and in the short breathing-space before the
Saracens again attacked them Roland cried aloud to Oliver:

"'Fair Knight and Comrade, see these heroes,

Valiant warriors, lying lifeless!
I must mourn for our fair country
France, left widowed of her barons.
Charles my King, why art thou absent?
Brother mine, how shall we send him
Mournful tidings of our struggle?'
'How I know not,' said his comrade.
'Better death than vile dishonour.'"

Roland Willing to Blow his Horn

"'Comrade, I will blow my war-horn:

Charles will hear it in the passes
And return with all his army.'
Oliver quoth: ''Twere disgraceful
To your kinsmen all their life-days.
When I urged it, then you would not;
Now, to sound your horn is shameful,
And I never will approve it.'"

Oliver Objects. They Quarrel

"'See, the battle goes against us:

Comrade, I shall sound my war-horn.'
Oliver replied: 'O coward!
When I urged it, then you would not.
If fair France again shall greet me
You shall never wed my sister;
By this beard of mine I swear it!'

"'Why so bitter and so wrathful?'

Oliver returned: ''Tis thy fault;
Valour is not kin to madness,
Temperance knows naught of fury.
You have killed these noble champions,
You have slain the Emperor's vassals,
You have robbed us of our conquests.
Ah, your valour, Count, is fatal!
Charles must lose his doughty heroes,
And your league with me must finish
With this day in bitter sorrow.'"
Turpin Mediates

Archbishop Turpin heard the dispute, and strove to calm the angry
heroes. "Brave knights, be not so enraged. The horn will not save the
lives of these gallant dead, but it will be better to sound it, that
Charles, our lord and emperor, may return, may avenge our death and
weep over our corpses, may bear them to fair France, and bury them in
the sanctuary, where the wild beasts shall not devour them." "That is
well said," quoth Roland and Oliver.

The Horn is Blown

Then at last Roland put the carved ivory horn, the magic Olifant, to
his lips, and blew so loudly that the sound echoed thirty leagues
away. "Hark! our men are in combat!" cried Charlemagne; but Ganelon
retorted: "Had any but the king said it, that had been a lie."

A second time Roland blew his horn, so violently and with such anguish
that the veins of his temples burst, and the blood flowed from his
brow and from his mouth. Charlemagne, pausing, heard it again, and
said: "That is Roland's horn; he would not sound it were there no
battle." But Ganelon said mockingly: "There is no battle, for Roland
is too proud to sound his horn in danger. Besides, who would dare to
attack Roland, the strong, the valiant, great and wonderful Roland? No
man. He is doubtless hunting, and laughing with the Peers. Your
words, my liege, do but show how old and weak and doting you are. Ride
on, sire; the open country lies far before you."

[Illustration: "Charlemagne heard it again"]

When Roland blew the horn for the third time he had hardly breath to
awaken the echoes; but still Charlemagne heard. "How faintly comes the
sound! There is death in that feeble blast!" said the emperor; and
Duke Naimes interrupted eagerly: "Sire, Roland is in peril; some one
has betrayed him--doubtless he who now tries to beguile you! Sire,
rouse your host, arm for battle, and ride to save your nephew."

Ganelon Arrested

Then Charlemagne called aloud: "Hither, my men. Take this traitor

Ganelon and keep him safe till my return." And the kitchen folk seized
the felon knight, chained him by the neck, and beat him; then, binding
him hand and foot, they flung him on a sorry nag, to be borne with
them till Charles should demand him at their hands again.

Charles Returns

With all speed the whole army retraced their steps, turning their
faces to Spain, and saying: "Ah, if we could find Roland alive what
blows we would strike for him!" Alas! it was too late! Too late!

How lofty are the peaks, how vast and shadowy the mountains! How dim
and gloomy the passes, how deep the valleys! How swift the rushing
torrents! Yet with headlong speed the Frankish army hastens back, with
trumpets sounding in token of approaching help, all praying God to
preserve Roland till they come. Alas! they cannot reach him in time!
Too late. Too late!

Roland Weeps for his Comrades

Now Roland cast his gaze around on hill and valley, and saw his noble
vassals and comrades lie dead. As a noble knight he wept for them,
saying:

"'Fair Knights, may God have mercy on your souls!

May He receive you into Paradise
And grant you rest on banks of heavenly flowers!
Ne'er have I known such mighty men as you.
Fair France, that art the best of all dear lands,
How art thou widowed of thy noble sons!
Through me alone, dear comrades, have you died,
And yet through me no help nor safety comes.
God have you in His keeping! Brother, come,
Let us attack the heathen and win death,
Or grief will slay me! Death is duty now.'"

He Fights Desperately

So saying, he rushed into the battle, slew the only son of King
Marsile, and drove the heathen before him as the hounds drive the
deer. Turpin saw and applauded. "So should a good knight do, wearing
good armour and riding a good steed. He must deal good strong strokes
in battle, or he is not worth a groat. Let a coward be a monk in some
cloister and pray for the sins of us fighters."

Marsile in wrath attacked the slayer of his son, but in vain; Roland
struck off his right hand, and Marsile fled back mortally wounded to
Saragossa, while his main host, seized with panic, left the field to
Roland. However, the caliph, Marsile's uncle, rallied the ranks, and,
with fifty thousand Saracens, once more came against the little troop
of Champions of the Cross, the three poor survivors of the rearguard.

Roland cried aloud: "Now shall we be martyrs for our faith. Fight
boldly, lords, for life or death! Sell yourselves dearly! Let not fair
France be dishonoured in her sons. When the Emperor sees us dead with
our slain foes around us he will bless our valour."

Oliver Falls

The pagans were emboldened by the sight of the three alone, and the
caliph, rushing at Oliver, pierced him from behind with his lance. But
though mortally wounded Oliver retained strength enough to slay the
caliph, and to cry aloud: "Roland! Roland! Aid me!" then he rushed on
the heathen army, doing heroic deeds and shouting "Montjoie!
Montjoie!" while the blood ran from his wound and stained the earth
blood-red. At this woeful sight Roland swooned with grief, and Oliver,
faint from loss of blood, and with eyes dimmed by fast-coming death,
distinguished not the face of his dear friend; he saw only a vague
figure drawing near, and, mistaking it for an enemy, raised his sword
Hauteclaire and gave Roland one last terrible blow, which clove the
helmet, but harmed not the head. The blow roused Roland from his
swoon, and, gazing tenderly at Oliver, he gently asked him:
 "'Comrade and brother, was that blow designed
To slay your Roland, him who loves you so?
There is no vengeance you would wreak on me.'
'Roland, I hear you speak, but see you not.
God guard and keep you, friend; but pardon me
The blow I struck, unwitting, on your head.'
'I have no hurt,' said Roland; 'I forgive
Here and before the judgment-throne of God.'"

And Dies

Now Oliver felt the pains of death come upon him. Both sight and
hearing were gone, his colour fled, and, dismounting, he lay upon the
earth; there, humbly confessing his sins, he begged God to grant him
rest in Paradise, to bless his lord Charlemagne and the fair land of
France, and to keep above all men his comrade Roland, his best-loved
brother-in-arms. This ended, he fell back, his heart failed, his head
drooped low, and Oliver the brave and courteous knight lay dead on the
blood-stained earth, with his face turned to the east. Roland lamented
him in gentle words: "Comrade, alas for thy valour! Many days and
years have we been comrades: no ill didst thou to me, nor I to thee:
now thou art dead, 'tis pity that I live!"

Turpin is Mortally Wounded. The Horn Again

Turpin and Roland now stood together for a time and were joined by the
brave Count Gautier, whose thousand men had been slain, and he himself
grievously wounded; he now came, like a loyal vassal, to die with his
lord Roland, and was slain in the first discharge of arrows which the
Saracens shot. Taught by experience, the pagans kept their distance,
and wounded Turpin with four lances, while they stood some yards away
from the heroes. But when Turpin felt himself mortally wounded he
plunged into the throng of the heathen, killing four hundred before he
fell, and Roland fought on with broken armour, and with ever-bleeding
head, till in a pause of the deadly strife he took his horn and again
sent forth a feeble dying blast.

Charles Answers the Horn

Charlemagne heard it, and was filled with anguish. "Lords, all goes
ill: I know by the sound of Roland's horn he has not long to live!
Ride on faster, and let all our trumpets sound, in token of our
approach." Then sixty thousand trumpets sounded, so that mountains
echoed it and valleys replied, and the heathen heard it and trembled.
"It is Charlemagne! Charles is coming!" they cried. "If Roland lives
till he comes the war will begin again, and our bright Spain is
lost." Thereupon four hundred banded together to slay Roland; but he
rushed upon them, mounted on his good steed Veillantif, and the
valiant pagans fled. But while Roland dismounted to tend the dying
archbishop they returned and cast darts from afar, slaying Veillantif,
the faithful war-horse, and piercing the hero's armour. Still nearer
and nearer sounded the clarions of Charlemagne's army in the defiles,
and the Saracen host fled for ever, leaving Roland alone, on foot,
expiring, amid the dying and the dead.
Turpin Blesses the Dead

Roland made his way to Turpin, unlaced his golden helmet, took off his
hauberk, tore his own tunic to bind up his grievous wounds, and then
gently raising the prelate, carried him to the fresh green grass,
where he most tenderly laid him down.

"'Ah, gentle lord,' said Roland, 'give me leave

To carry here our comrades who are dead,
Whom we so dearly loved; they must not lie
Unblest; but I will bring their corpses here
And thou shalt bless them, and me, ere thou die.'
'Go,' said the dying priest, 'but soon return.
Thank God! the victory is yours and mine!'"

With great pain and many delays Roland traversed the field of
slaughter, looking in the faces of the dead, till he had found and
brought to Turpin's feet the bodies of the eleven Peers, last of all
Oliver, his own dear friend and brother, and Turpin blessed and
absolved them all. Now Roland's grief was so deep and his weakness so
great that he swooned where he stood, and the archbishop saw him fall
and heard his cry of pain. Slowly and painfully Turpin struggled to
his feet, and, bending over Roland, took Olifant, the curved ivory
horn; inch by inch the dying archbishop tottered towards a little
mountain stream, that the few drops he could carry might revive
Roland.

He Dies

However, his weakness overcame him before he reached the water, and he
fell forward dying. Feebly he made his confession, painfully he joined
his hands in prayer, and as he prayed his spirit fled. Turpin, the
faithful champion of the Cross, in teaching and in battle, died in the
service of Charlemagne. May God have mercy on his soul!

When Roland awoke from his swoon he looked for Turpin, and found him
dead, and, seeing Olifant, he guessed what the archbishop's aim had
been, and wept for pity. Crossing the fair white hands over Turpin's
breast, he sadly prayed:

"'Alas! brave priest, fair lord of noble birth,

Thy soul I give to the great King of Heaven!
No mightier champion has He in His hosts,
No prophet greater to maintain the Faith,
No teacher mightier to convert mankind
Since Christ's Apostles walked upon the earth!
May thy fair soul escape the pains of Hell
And Paradise receive thee in its bowers!'"

Roland's Last Fight

Now death was very near to Roland, and he felt it coming upon him
while he yet prayed and commended himself to his guardian angel
Gabriel. Taking in one hand Olifant, and in the other his good sword
Durendala, Roland climbed a little hill, one bowshot within the realm
of Spain. There under two pine-trees he found four marble steps, and
as he was about to climb them, fell swooning on the grass very near
his end. A lurking Saracen, who had feigned death, stole from his
covert, and, calling aloud, "Charles's nephew is vanquished! I will
bear his sword back to Arabia," seized Durendala as it lay in Roland's
dying clasp. The attempt roused Roland, and he opened his eyes,
saying, "Thou art not of us," then struck such a blow with Olifant on
the helm of the heathen thief that he fell dead before his intended
victim.

He Tries to Break his Sword

Pale, bleeding, dying, Roland struggled to his feet, bent on saving

his good blade from the defilement of heathen hands. He grasped
Durendala, and the brown marble before him split beneath his mighty
blows; but the good sword stood firm, the steel grated but did not
break, and Roland lamented aloud that his famous sword must now become
the weapon of a lesser man. Again Roland smote with Durendala, and
clove the block of sardonyx, but the good steel only grated and did
not break, and the hero bewailed himself aloud, saying, "Alas! my good
Durendala, how bright and pure thou art! How thou flamest in the
sunbeams, as when the angel brought thee! How many lands hast thou
conquered for Charles my King, how many champions slain, how many
heathen converted! Must I now leave thee to the pagans? May God spare
fair France this shame!" A third time Roland raised the sword and
struck a rock of blue marble, which split asunder, but the steel only
grated--it would not break; and the hero knew that he could do no
more.

His Last Prayer

Then he flung himself on the ground under a pine-tree with his face to
the earth, his sword and Olifant beneath him, his face to the foe,
that Charlemagne and the Franks might see when they came that he died
victorious. He made his confession, prayed for mercy, and offered to
Heaven his glove, in token of submission for all his sins. "_Mea
culpa!_ O God! I pray for pardon for all my sins, both great and
small, that I have sinned from my birth until this day." So he held up
towards Heaven his right-hand glove, and the angels of God descended
around him. Again Roland prayed:

"'O very Father, who didst never lie,

Didst bring St. Lazarus from the dead again,
Didst save St. Daniel from the lion's mouth,
Save Thou my soul and keep it from all ills
That I have merited by all my sins!'"

He Dies

Again he held up to Heaven his glove, and St. Gabriel received it;
then, with head bowed and hands clasped, the hero died, and the
waiting cherubim, St. Raphael, St. Michael, and St. Gabriel, bore his
soul to Paradise.

So died Roland and the Peers of France.

Charles Arrives

Soon after Roland's heroic spirit had passed away the emperor came
galloping out of the mountains into the valley of Roncesvalles, where
not a foot of ground was without its burden of death.

Loudly he called: "Fair nephew, where art thou? Where is the

archbishop? And Count Oliver? Where are the Peers?"

Alas! of what avail was it to call? No man replied, for all were dead;
and Charlemagne wrung his hands, and tore his beard and wept, and his
army bewailed their slain comrades, and all men thought of vengeance.
Truly a fearful vengeance did Charles take, in that terrible battle
which he fought the next day against the Emir of Babylon, come from
oversea to help his vassal Marsile, when the sun stood still in heaven
that the Christians might be avenged on their enemies; in the capture
of Saragossa and the death of Marsile, who, already mortally wounded,
turned his face to the wall and died when he heard of the defeat of
the emir; but when vengeance was taken on the open enemy Charlemagne
thought of mourning, and returned to Roncesvalles to seek the body of
his beloved nephew.

The emperor knew well that Roland would be found before his men, with
his face to the foe. Thus he advanced a bowshot from his companions
and climbed a little hill, there found the little flowery meadow
stained red with the blood of his barons, and there at the summit,
under the trees, lay the body of Roland on the green grass. The broken
blocks of marble bore traces of the hero's dying efforts, and
Charlemagne raised Roland, and, clasping the hero in his arms,
lamented over him.

His Lament

"'The Lord have mercy, Roland, on thy soul!

Never again shall our fair France behold
A knight so worthy, till France be no more!

"'The Lord have mercy, Roland, on thy soul!

That thou mayest rest in flowers of Paradise
With all His glorious Saints for evermore!
My honour now will lessen and decay,
My days be spent in grief for lack of thee,
My joy and power will vanish. There is none,
Comrade or kinsman, to maintain my cause.

"'The Lord have mercy, Roland, on thy soul!

And grant thee place in Paradise the blest,
Thou valiant youth, thou mighty conqueror!
How widowed lies our fair France and how lone
How will the realms that I have swayed rebel
Now thou art taken from my weary age!
So deep my woe that fain would I die too
And join my valiant Peers in Paradise
While men inter my weary limbs with thine!'"[14]

The Dead Buried

The French army buried the dead with all honour, where they had
fallen, except the bodies of Roland, Oliver, and Turpin, which were
carried to Blaye, and interred in the great cathedral there; and then
Charlemagne returned to Aix.

Aude the Fair

As Charles the Great entered his palace a beauteous maiden met him,
Aude the Fair, the sister of Oliver and betrothed bride of Roland. She
asked eagerly:

"Where is Roland the mighty captain, who swore to take me for his
bride?"

[Illustration: Aude the Fair

Evelyn Paul]

"Alas! dear sister and friend," said Charlemagne, weeping and tearing
his long white beard, "thou askest tidings of the dead. But I will
replace him: thou shalt have Louis, my son, Count of the Marches."

"These words are strange," exclaimed Aude the Fair. "God and all His
saints and angels forbid that I should live when Roland my love is
dead." Thereupon she lost her colour and fell at the emperor's feet;
he thought her fainting, but she was dead. God have mercy on her soul!

The Traitor Put to Death

Too long it would be to tell of the trial of Ganelon the traitor.

Suffice it that he was torn asunder by wild horses, and his name
remains in France a byword for all disloyalty and treachery.

FOOTNOTES:

[12] _See_ "Myths and Legends of the Middle Ages," by H. Guerber.

[13] Marked out for death.

[14] The poetical quotations are from the "Chanson de Roland."

CHAPTER VIII: THE COUNTESS CATHLEEN

Celtic Mysticism

In all Celtic literature there is recognisable a certain spirit which

seems to be innate in the very character of the people, a spirit of
mysticism and acknowledgment of the supernatural. It carries with it a
love of Nature, a delight in beauty, colour and harmony, which is
common to all the Celtic races. But with these characteristics we find
in Ireland a spiritual beauty, a passion of self-sacrifice, unknown in
Wales or Brittany. Hence the early Irish heroes are frequently found
renouncing advantages, worldly honour, and life itself, at the bidding
of some imperative moral impulse. They are the knights-errant of early
European chivalry which was a much deeper and more real inspiration
than the carefully cultivated artificial chivalry of centuries later.
Cuchulain, Diarmuit, Naesi all pay with their lives for their
obedience to the dictates of honour and conscience. And in women, for
whom in those early days sacrifice of self was the only way of
heroism, the surrender even of eternal bliss was only the sublimation
of honour and chivalry; and this was the heroism of the Countess
Cathleen.

The Cathleen Legend

The legend is old, so old that its root has been lost and we know not
who first imagined it; but the idea, the central incident, doubtless
goes back to Druid times, when a woman might well have offered herself
up to the cruel gods to avert their wrath and stay the plagues which
fell upon her people. Under a like impulse Curtius sprang into the
gulf in the Forum, and Decius devoted himself to death to win the
safety of the Roman army. In each case the powers, evil or
beneficent, were supposed to be appeased by the offering of a human
life. When Christianity found this legend of sacrifice popular among
the heathen nations, it was comparatively easy to adopt it and give it
a yet wider scope, by making the sacrifice spiritual rather than
physical, and by finally rewarding the hero with heavenly joys. It is
to be noted, too, that even at this early period there is a certain
glorification of chicanery: the fiend fulfils his side of the
contract, but God Himself breaks the other side. This becomes a
regular feature in all tales that relate dealings with the Evil One:
all Devil's Bridges, Devil's Dykes, and the Faust legends show that
Satan may be trusted to keep his word, while the saints invariably
kept the letter and broke the spirit. To so primitive a tale as that
of "The Countess Cathleen" the pettifogging quibbles of later saints
are utterly unknown: God saves her soul because it is His will to
reward such abnegation of self, and even the Evil One dare not
question the Divine Will.

The Story. Happy Ireland

Once, long ago, as the Chronicles tell us, Ireland was known
throughout Europe as "The Isle of Saints," for St. Patrick had not
long before preached the Gospel, the message of good tidings, to the
warring inhabitants, to tribes of uncivilised Celts, and to marauding
Danes and Vikings. He had driven out the serpent-worshippers, and
consecrated the Black Stone of Tara to the worship of the True God; he
had convinced the High King of the truth and reasonableness of the
doctrine of the Trinity by the illustration of the shamrock leaf, and
had overthrown the great idols and purified the land. Therefore the
fair shores and fertile vales of Erin, the clustered islets, dropped
like jewels in the azure seas, the mist-covered, heather-clad
hill-sides, even the barren mountain-tops and the patches of firm
ground scattered in the solitudes of fathomless bogs, were homes of
pious Culdee or lonely hermit. There was still strife in Ireland, for
king fought with king, and heathen marauders still vexed the land; but
many warlike Irish clans or "septs" turned their ardour for fight to
religious conflicts, and often every man of a tribe became a monk, so
that great abbeys and tribal monasteries and schools were built on the
hills where, in former days, stood the chieftain's stronghold (_rath_
or _dun_, as Irish legends name it), with its earth mounds and wooden
palisades. Holy psalms and chants replaced the boastful songs of the
old bards, whilst warriors accustomed to regard fighting and hunting
as the only occupations worthy of a free-born man, now peacefully
illuminated manuscripts or wrought at useful handicrafts. Yet still in
secret they dreaded and tried to appease the wrath of the Dagda,
Brigit of the Holy Fire, �ngus the Ever-Young, and the awful Washers
of the Ford, the Choosers of the Slain; and to this dread was now
joined the new fear of the cruel demons who obeyed Satan, the Prince
of Evil.

The Young Countess

At this time there dwelt in Ireland the Countess Cathleen, young,

good, and beautiful. Her eyes were as deep, as changeful, and as pure
as the ocean that washed Erin's shores; her yellow hair, braided in
two long tresses, was as bright as the golden circlet on her brow or
the yellow corn in her garners; and her step was as light and proud
and free as that of the deer in her wide domains. She lived in a
stately castle in the midst of great forests, with the cottages of her
tribesmen around her gates, and day by day and year by year she
watched the changing glories of the mighty woods, as the seasons
brought new beauties, till her soul was as lovely as the green woods
and purple hills around. The Countess Cathleen loved the dim,
mysterious forest, she loved the tales of the ancient gods, and of

"Old, unhappy, far-off things,

And battles long ago;"

_Wordsworth._

but more than all she loved her clansmen and vassals: she prayed for
them at all the holy hours, and taught and tended them with loving
care, so that in no place in Ireland could be found a happier tribe
than that which obeyed her gentle rule.

Dearth and Famine

One year there fell upon Ireland, erewhile so happy, a great

desolation--"For Scripture saith, an ending to all good things must
be"[15]--and the happiness of the Countess Cathleen's tribe came to an
end in this wise: A terrible famine fell on the land; the seed-corn
rotted in the ground, for rain and never-lifting mists filled the
heavy air and lay on the sodden earth; then when spring came barren
fields lay brown where the shooting corn should be; the cattle died in
the stall or fell from weakness at the plough, and the sheep died of
hunger in the fold; as the year passed through summer towards autumn
the berries failed in the sun-parched woods, and the withered leaves,
fallen long before the time, lay rotting on the dank earth; the timid
wild things of the forest, hares, rabbits, squirrels, died in their
holes or fell easy victims to the birds and beasts of prey; and these,
in their turn, died of hunger in the famine-stricken forests.

"I searched all day: the mice and rats and hedgehogs
Seemed to be dead, and I could hardly hear
A wing moving in all the famished woods."[16]
Distress of the Peasants

A cry of bitter agony and lamentation rose from the starving Isle of
Saints to the gates of Heaven, and fell back unheard; the sky was hard
as brass above and the earth was barren beneath, and men and women
died in despair, their shrivelled lips still stained green by the
dried grass and twigs they had striven to eat.

"I passed by Margaret Nolan's: for nine days

Her mouth was green with dock and dandelion;
And now they wake her."

The Misery Increases

In vain the High King of Ireland proclaimed a universal peace, and

wars between quarrelling tribes stopped and foreign pirates ceased to
molest the land, and chief met chief in the common bond of misery; in
vain the rich gave freely of their wealth--soon there was no
distinction between rich and poor, high and low, chief and vassal, for
all alike felt the grip of famine, all died by the same terrible
hunger. Soon many of the great monasteries lay desolate, their stores
exhausted, their portals open, while the brethren, dead within, had
none to bury them; the lonely hermits died in their little
beehive-shaped cells, or fled from the dreadful solitude to gather in
some wealthy abbey which could still feed its monks; and isle and vale
which had echoed their holy chants knew the sounds no more. Over all,
unlifting, unchanging, brooded the deadly vapour, bearing the plague
in its heavy folds, and filling the air with a sultry lurid haze.

"There is no sign of change--day copies day,

Green things are dead--the cattle too are dead
Or dying--and on all the vapour hangs
And fattens with disease, and glows with heat."

Cathleen Heartbroken for her People

Round the castle of the Countess Cathleen there was great stir and
bustle, for her tender heart was wrung with the misery of her people,
and her prayers for them ascended to God unceasingly. So thin she grew
and so worn that the physicians bade her servants bring harp and song
to charm away the sadness that weighed upon her spirit; but all in
vain! Neither the well-loved legends of the ancient gods, nor her
harp, nor the voice of her bards could bring her relief--nothing but
the attempt to save her people. From the earliest days of the famine
her house and her stores were ever ready to supply the wants of the
homeless, the poor, the suffering; her wealth was freely spent for
food for the starving while supplies could yet be bought either near
or in distant baronies; and when known supplies failed her lavish
offers tempted the churlish farmers, who still hoarded grain that they
might enrich themselves in the great dearth, to sell some of their
garnered stores. When she could no longer induce them to part with
their grain, her own winter provisions, wine and corn, were
distributed generously to all who asked for relief, and none ever left
her castle without succour.
Her Wide Charity

Thus passed the early months of bitter starvation, and the Countess
Cathleen's name was borne far and wide through Ireland, accompanied
with the blessings of all the rescued; and round her castle, from
every district, gathered a mighty throng of poor--not only her own
clansmen--who all looked to her for a daily dole of food and drink to
keep some life in them until the pestilential mists should pass away.
The wholesome cold of winter would purify the air and bring new hope
and promise of new life in the coming year. Alas! the winter drew on
apace and still the poisonous yellow vapours hung heavily over the
land, and still the deadly famine clutched each feeble heart and
weakened the very springs of life, and the winter frosts slew more
than the summer heats, so feeble were the people and so weakened.

Lawlessness Breaks Out

At last, even in the Isle of Saints, the bonds of right and wrong were
loosened, all respect for property vanished in the universal
desolation, and men began to rob and plunder, to trust only to the
right of might, thinking that their poor miserable lives were of more
value than aught else, than conscience and pity and honesty. Thus
Cathleen lost by barefaced robbery much of what she still possessed of
flocks and herds, of scanty fruit and corn. Her servants would gladly
have pursued the robbers and regained the spoils, but Cathleen forbade
it, for she pitied the miserable thieves, and thought no evil of them
in this bitter dearth. By this time she had distributed all her winter
stores, and had only enough to feed her poor pensioners and her
household with most scanty rations; and she herself shared equally
with them, for the most earnest entreaties of her faithful servants
could not induce her to fare better than they in anything. Soon there
would be nothing left for daily distribution, and her heart almost
broke as she saw the misery of her helpless dependents; they looked to
her as an angel of pity and deliverance, while she knew herself to be
as helpless as they. Day by day Cathleen went among them, with her
pitifully scanty doles of food, cheering them by her words and
smiles, and by her very presence; and each day she went to her chapel,
where she could cast aside the mask of cheerfulness she wore before
her people, and prayed to the Blessed Virgin Mary and all the saints
to show her how to save her own tribe and all the land.

[Illustration: "Day by day Cathleen went among them"]

Cathleen Has an Inspiration

As the Countess knelt long before the altar one noontide she passed
from her prayers into a deep sleep, and sank down on the altar steps.
In the troubled depths of her mind a thought arose, which came to her
as an inspiration from Heaven itself. She awoke and sprang up
joyfully, exclaiming aloud: "Thanks be to Our Lady and to all the
saints! To them alone the blessed thought is due. Thus can I save my
poor until the dearth is over."

Then Cathleen left her oratory with such a light heart as she had not
felt since the terrible visitation began, and the gladness in her face
was so new and wonderful that all her servants noticed the change, and
her old foster-mother, who loved the Countess with the utmost
devotion, shuddered at the thought that perhaps her darling had come
under the power of the ancient gods and would be bewitched away to
Tir-nan-og, the land of never-dying youth. Fearfully old Oona watched
Cathleen's face as she passed through the hall, and Cathleen saw the
anxious gaze, and came and laid her hand on the old woman's shoulder,
saying, "Nay, fear not, nurse; the saints have heard my prayer and put
it into my heart to save all these helpless ones." Then she crossed
the hall to her own room, and called a servant, saying, "Send hither
quickly Fergus my steward."

She Summons her Steward

Shortly afterwards the steward came, Fergus the White, an old

grey-haired man, who had been foster-brother to Cathleen's
grandfather. He had seen three generations pass away, he had watched
the change from heathenism to Christianity, and of all the chief's
family, to which his loyal devotion had ever clung, there remained but
this one young girl, and he loved her as his own child. Fergus did
obeisance to his liege lady, and kissed her hand kneeling as he asked:

"What would the Countess Cathleen with her steward? Shall I render my
account of lands and wealth?"

Demands to Know what Wealth she Owns

"How much have I in lands?" the Countess asked. And Fergus answered in
surprise: "Your lands are worth one hundred thousand pounds."

"Of what value is the timber in my forests?" "As much again."

"What is the worth of my castles and my fair residences?" continued

the Countess Cathleen. And Fergus still replied: "As much more,"
though in his heart he questioned why his lady wished to know now,
while the famine made all riches seem valueless.

"How much gold still unspent lies in thy charge in my

treasure-chests?"

"Lady, your stored gold is three hundred thousand pounds, as much as

all your lands and forests and houses are worth."

The Countess Cathleen thought for an instant, and then, as one who
makes a momentous decision, spoke firmly, though her lips quivered as
she gave utterance to her thought:

"Go Far and Buy Food"

"Then, Fergus, take my bags of coin and go. Leave here my jewels and
some gold, for I may hear of some stores of grain hoarded by niggard
farmers, and may induce them to sell, if not for the love of God, then
for the love of gold. Take, too, authority from me, written and sealed
with my seal, to sell all my lands and timber, and castles, except
this one alone where I must dwell. Send a man, trustworthy and speedy,
to the North, to Ulster, where I hear the famine is less terrible, and
let him buy what cattle he can find, and drive them back as soon as
may be."

"Keeping this house alone, sell all I have;

Go to some distant country, and come again
With many herds of cows and ships of grain."

The Steward Reluctantly Obeys

The ancient steward, Fergus the White, stood at first speechless with
horror and grief, but after a moment of silence his sorrow found vent
in words, and he besought his dear lady not to sell everything, her
ancient home, her father's lands, her treasured heirlooms, and leave
herself no wealth for happier times. All his persuasions were useless,
for Cathleen would not be moved; she bade him "Farewell" and hastened
his journey, saying, "A cry is in mine ears; I cannot rest." So there
was no help for it. A trusty man was despatched to Ulster to buy up
all the cattle (weak and famine-stricken as they would be) in the
North Country; while Fergus himself journeyed swiftly to England,
which was still prosperous and fertile, untouched by the deadly
famine, and knowing nothing of the desolation of the sister isle, to
which the English owed so much of their knowledge of the True Faith.

Buys Stores in England

In England Fergus spent all the gold he brought with him, and then
sold all the Countess Cathleen bade him sell--lands, castles, forests,
pastures, timber--all but one lonely castle in the desolate woods,
where she dwelt among her own people, with the dying folk thronging
round her gates and in her halls. Good bargains Fergus made also, for
he was a shrewd and loyal steward, and the saints must have touched
the hearts of the English merchants, so that they gave good prices for
all, or perhaps they did not realize the dire distress that prevailed
in Ireland. However that may have been, Fergus prospered in his
trading, and bought grain, and wine, and fat oxen and sheep, so that
he loaded many ships with full freights of provisions, enough to carry
the starving peasantry through the famine year till the next harvest.
At last all his money was spent, all his ships were laden, everything
was ready, and the little fleet lay in harbour, only awaiting a fair
wind, which, unhappily, did not come.

His Return Delayed

First of all Fergus waited through a deadly calm, when the sails hung
motionless, drooping, with no breath of air to stir them, when the fog
that brooded over the shores of England never lifted and all sailing
was impossible; then the winds dispersed the fog, and Fergus,
forgetting caution in his great anxiety to return, hastily set sail
for his own land, and there came fierce tempests and contrary winds,
so that his little fleet was driven back, and one or two ships went
down with all their stores of food. Fergus wept to see his lady's
wealth lost in the wintry sea, but he dared not venture again, and
though he chafed and fretted at the delay, it was nearly two months
after he reached England before he could sail back to his young
mistress and her starving countrymen. The trusty messenger who had
been sent to buy cattle had succeeded beyond his own expectation; he
also had made successful bargains, and had found more cattle than he
believed were still alive in Ireland. He had bought all, and was
driving them slowly towards the Countess Cathleen's forest dwelling.
Their progress was so slow, because of their weakness and the scanty
fodder by the way, that no news of them came to Cathleen, and she knew
not that while corn and cattle were coming with Fergus across the sea,
food was also coming to her slowly through the barren ways of her own
native land. None of this she knew, and despair would have filled her
heart, but for her faith in God and her belief in the great
inspiration that had been given to her.

Deepening Misery in Ireland

Meanwhile terrible things had been happening in Ireland. As in England

in later days, "men said openly that Christ and His saints slept";
they thought with longing of the mighty old gods, for the new seemed
powerless, and they yearned for the friendly "good people" who had
fled from the sound of the church bell. Thus many minds were ready to
revolt from the Christian faith if they had not feared the life after
death and the endless torments of the Christian Hell. Some few,
desperate, even offered secret worship to the old heathen gods, and
true love to the One True God had grown cold.

Two Mysterious Strangers

Now on the very day on which Fergus sailed for England, and his
comrade departed to Ulster, two mysterious and stately strangers
suddenly appeared in Erin. Whence they came no man knew, but they were
first seen near the wild sea-shore of the west, and the few poor
inhabitants thought they had been put ashore by some vessel or wrecked
on that dangerous coast. Aliens they certainly were, for they talked
with each other in a tongue that none understood, and they appeared as
if they did not comprehend the questions asked of them. Thus they
passed away from the western coasts, and made their way inland; but
when they next appeared, in a village not far from Dublin, they had
greatly changed: they wore magnificent robes and furs, with splendid
jewelled gloves on their hands, and golden circlets, set with gleaming
rubies, bound their brows; their black steeds showed no trace of
weakness and famine as they rode through the woods and carefully noted
the misery everywhere.

Their Strange Story

At last they alighted at the little lodge, where a forester's widow

gladly received them; and their royal dress, lofty bearing and strange
language accorded ill with the mean surroundings and the scanty
accommodation of that little hut. The dead forester had been one of
the Countess Cathleen's most faithful vassals, and his holding was but
a short distance from the castle, so that the strangers could,
unobserved, watch the life of the little village. As time passed they
told their hostess they were merchants, simple traders from a distant
country, trafficking in very precious gems; but they had no wares for
exchange, and no gems to show; they made no inquiries or researches,
bargained with no man, seemed to do no business; they were the most
unusual merchants ever seen in Ireland, and the strangeness of their
behaviour troubled men's minds.
Mysterious Behaviour

Day by day they ate, unquestioning, the coarse food their poor hostess
set before them, and the black bread which was the best food
obtainable in those terrible days, but they added to it wine, rich and
red, from their own private store, and they paid her lavishly in good
red gold, so that she wondered that any men should stay in the
famine-stricken country when they could so easily leave it at their
will. Gradually, too, speaking now in the Irish tongue, they began to
ask her cautious questions of the people, of the land, of the famine,
how men lived and how they died, and so they heard of the exceeding
goodness of the Countess Cathleen, whose bounty had saved so many
lives, and was still saving others, though the deadly pinch of famine
grew sorer with the passing days. To their hostess they admired
Cathleen's goodness, and were loud in her praises, but they looked
askance at one another and their brows were black with discontent.

Professed Errand of Mercy

Then one day the kingly merchants told the poor widow who harboured
them that they too were the friends of the poor and starving; they
were servants of a mighty prince, who in his compassion and mercy had
sent them on a mission to Ireland to help the afflicted peasants to
fight against famine and death. They said that they themselves had no
food to give, only wine and gold in plenty, so that men might exert
themselves and search for food to buy. Their hostess, hearing this,
and knowing that there were still some niggards who refused to part
with their mouldering heaps of corn, setting the price so high that no
man could buy, called down the blessing of God and Mary and all the
saints upon their heads, for if they would distribute their gold to
all, or even buy the corn themselves and distribute it, men need no
longer die of hunger.

A New Traffic

When she prayed for a blessing on the two strangers they smiled
scornfully and impatiently; and the elder said, cunningly:

"Alas! we know the evils of mere charity,

And would devise a more considered way.
Let each man bring one piece of merchandise."

"Ah, sirs!" replied the hostess, "then your compassion, your gold and
your goodwill are of no avail. Think you, after all these weary
months, that any man has merchandise left to sell? They have sold long
ago all but the very clothes they wear, to keep themselves alive till
better days come. Such offers are mockery of our distress."

"We mock you not," said the elder merchant. "All men have the one
precious thing we wish to buy, and have come hither to find; none has
already lost or sold it."

"What precious treasure can you mean? Men in Ireland now have only
their lives, and can barely cherish those," said the poor woman,
wondering greatly and much afraid.
Buyers of Souls

The elder merchant continued gazing at her with a crafty smile and an
eye ever on the alert for tokens of understanding. "Poor as they are,
Irishmen have still one thing that we will purchase, if they will
sell: their souls, which we have come to obtain for our mighty Prince,
and with the great price that we shall pay in pure gold men can well
save their lives till the starving time is over. Why should men die a
cruel, lingering death or drag through weary months of miserable
half-satisfied life when they may live well and merrily at the cost of
a soul, which is no good but to cause fear and pain? We take men's
souls and liberate them from all pain and care and remorse, and we
give in exchange money, much money, to procure comforts and ease; we
enrol men as vassals of our great lord, and he is no hard taskmaster
to those who own his sway."

Slow Trade at First

When the poor widow heard these dreadful words she knew that the
strangers were demons come to tempt men's souls and to lure them to
Hell. She crossed herself, and fled from them in fear, praying to be
kept from temptation; and she would not return to her little cottage
in the forest, but stayed in the village warning men against the evil
demons who were tempting the starving people, till she too died of the
famine, and her house was left wholly to the strangers. Yet the
merchants fared ever well, better than before her departure, and those
who ventured to the forest dwelling found good food and rich wine,
which the strangers sometimes gave to their visitors, with crafty
hints of abundance to be easily obtained. Then when timid individuals
asked the way to win these comforts the strangers began their
tempting, and represented the case to be gained by the sale of men's
souls. One man, bolder than the rest, made a bargain with the demons
and gave them his soul for three hundred crowns of gold, and from that
time he in his turn became a tempter. He boasted of his wealth, of the
rich food the merchants gave him at times, of the potent wine he drank
from their generously opened bottles, and, best of all, he vaunted
his freedom from pity, conscience, or remorse.

Trade Increases

Gradually many people came to the forest dwelling and trafficked with
the demon merchants. The purchase of souls went on busily, and the
demons paid prices varying according to the worth of the soul and the
record of its former sins; but to all who sold they gave food and
wine, and in gloating over their gold and satisfying hunger and
thirst, men forgot to ask whence came this food and wine and the
endless stores of coin. Now many people ventured into the forest to
deal with the demons, and the narrow track grew into a broad beaten
way with the numbers of those who came, and all returned fed and
warmed, and bearing bags heavy with coin, and the promise of abundant
food and easy service. Those who had sold their souls rioted with the
money, for the demons gave them food, and they bought wine from the
inexhaustible stores of the evil merchants. The poor, lost people knew
that there was no hope for them after death, and they tried by all
means to keep themselves alive and to enjoy what was yet left to them;
but their mirth was fearful and they durst not stop to think.
Cathleen Hears of the Demon Traders

At first the Countess Cathleen knew nothing of the terrible doings of

the demons, for she never passed beyond her castle gates, but spent
her time in prayer for her people's safety and for the speedy return
of her messengers; but when the starving throng of pensioners at her
gates grew daily less, and there were fewer claimants for the pitiful
allowance which was all she had to give, she wondered if some other
mightier helper had come to Ireland. But she could hear of none,
and soon the shameless rioting and drunkenness in the village came to
her knowledge, and she wondered yet more whence her clansmen obtained
the means for their excesses, for she felt instinctively that the
origin of all this rioting must be evil. Cathleen therefore called to
her an old peasant, whose wife had died of hunger in the early days of
the famine, so that he himself had longed to die and join her; but
when he came to her she was horror-struck by the change in him. Now he
came flushed with wine, with defiant look and insolent bearing, and
his face was full of evil mirth as he tried to answer soberly the
Countess's questions.

"Why do the villagers and strangers no longer come to me for food? I

have but little now to give, but all are welcome to share it with me
and my household."

The Peasant's Story

"They do not come, O Countess, because they are no longer starving.

They have better food and wine, and abundance of money to buy more."

[Illustration: The peasant's story]

"Whence then have they obtained the money, the food, and the wine for
the drinking-bouts, the tumult of which reaches me even in my
oratory?"

"Lady, they have received all from the generous merchants who are in
the forest dwelling where old Mairi formerly lived; she is dead now,
and these noble strangers keep open house in her cottage night and
day; they are so wealthy that they need not stint their bounty, and so
powerful that they can find good food, enough for all who go to them.
Since Brigit died (your old servant, lady) her husband and son work no
more, but serve the strange merchants, and urge men to join them; and
I, and many others, have done so, and we are now wealthy" (here he
showed the Countess a handful of gold) "and well fed, and have wine as
much as heart can desire."

"But do you give them nothing in return for all their generosity? Are
they so noble that they ask nothing in requital of their bounty?"

"Good Gold for Souls"

"Oh, yes, we give them something, but nothing of importance, nothing

we cannot spare. They are merchants of souls, and buy them for their
king, and they pay good red gold for the useless, painful things. I
have sold my soul to them, and now I weep no more for my wife; I am
gay, and have wine enough and gold enough to help me through this
dearth!"

"Alas!" sighed the Countess, "and what when you too die?" The old
peasant laughed at her grief as he said: "Then, as now, I shall have
no soul to trouble me with remorse or conscience"; and the Countess
covered her eyes with her hand and beckoned silently that he should
go. In her oratory, whither she betook herself immediately, she prayed
with all her spirit that the Virgin and all the saints would inspire
her to defeat the demons and to save her people's souls.

Cathleen Tries to Check the Traffic

Next day Cathleen called together all the people in the village, her
own tribesmen and strangers. She offered them again a share of all she
had, and the daily rations she could distribute, but told them that
all must share alike and that she had nothing but the barest
necessaries to give--scanty portions of corn and meal, with milk from
one or two famine-stricken cows her servants had managed to keep
alive. To this she added that she had sent two trusty messengers for
help, one to Ulster for cattle, and Fergus to England for corn and
wine; they must return soon, she felt sure, with abundant supplies, if
men would patiently await their return.

In Vain

But all was useless. Her messengers had sent no word of their return,
and the abundant supplies at the forest cottage were more easily
obtained, and were less carefully regulated, than those of the
Countess Cathleen. The merchants, too, were ever at hand with their
cunning wiles, and their active, persuasive dupes, who would gladly
bring all others into their own soulless condition. The wine given by
the demons warmed the hearts of all who drank, and the deceived
peasants dreamed of happiness when the famine was over, and so the
passionate appeal of the Countess failed, and the sale of souls
continued merrily. The noise of revelry grew daily louder and more
riotous, and the drinkers cared nothing for the death or departure of
their dearest friends; while those who died, died drunken and utterly
reckless, or full of horror and despair, reviling the crafty merchants
who had deceived them with promises of life and happiness. The evil
influence clung all about the country-side, and seemed in league with
the pitiless powers of Nature against the souls of men, till at last
the stricken Countess, putting her trust in God, sought out the forest
lodge where the demon merchants dwelt, trafficking for souls. The way
was easy to find now, for a broad beaten track led to the dwelling,
and as the evil spirits saw Cathleen coming slowly along the path
their wicked eyes gleamed and their clawlike hands worked convulsively
in their jewelled gloves, for they hoped she had come to sell her pure
soul.

She Visits the Demons

"What does the Countess Cathleen wish to obtain from two poor stranger
merchants?" said the elder with an evil smile; and the younger, bowing
deeply said: "Lady, you may command us in all things, save what
touches our allegiance to our king." Cathleen replied: "I have no
merchandise to barter, nothing for trade with you, for you buy such
things as I will never sell: you buy men's souls for Hell. I come only
to beg that you will release the poor souls whom you have bought for
Satan's kingdom, and will have mercy on my ignorant people and deceive
them no more. I have yet some gold unspent and jewels unsold: take all
there is but let my people go free." Then the merchants laughed aloud
scornfully, and rejected her offer. "Would you have us undo our work?
Have we toiled, then, for naught to extend our master's sway? Have we
won for him so many souls to dwell for ever in his kingdom and do his
work, and shall we give them back for your entreaties? We have gold
enough, and food and wine enough, fair lady. The souls we have bought
we keep, for our master gives us honour and rank proportioned to the
number of souls we win for him, and you may see by the golden circlets
round our brows that we are princes of his kingdom, and have brought
him countless souls. Nevertheless, there is one most rare and precious
thing which could redeem these bartered souls of Ireland's peasants,
things of little worth."

They Make a Proposal

"Oh, what is that?" said the Countess. "If I have it, or can in any
way procure it, tell me, that I may redeem these deluded people's
souls."

"You have it now, fair saint. It is one pure soul, precious as

multitudes of more sin-stained souls. Our master would far rather have
a perfect and flawless pearl for his diadem than myriads of these
cracked and flawed crystals. Your soul, most saintly Countess, would
redeem the souls of all your tribe, if you would sell it to our king;
it would be the fairest jewel in his crown. But think not to save your
people otherwise, and beguile them no longer with false promises of
help: your messenger to Ulster lies sick of ague in the Bog of Allen,
and no food comes from England."

False Tidings

"We saw a man

Heavy with sickness in the Bog of Allen
Whom you had bid buy cattle. Near Fair Head
We saw your grain ships lying all becalmed
In the dark night, and not less still than they
Burned all their mirrored lanterns in the sea."

When Cathleen heard of the failure of her messengers to bring food it

seemed as if all hope were indeed over, and the demons smiled craftily
upon her as she turned silently to go, and laughed joyously to each
other when she had left their presence. Now they had good hope to win
her for their master; but they knew that their time was short, since
help was not far away.

"Last night, closed in the image of an owl,

I hurried to the cliffs of Donegal,
And saw, creeping on the uneasy surge,
Those ships that bring the woman grain and meal;
They are five days from us.
I hurried east,
A grey owl flitting, flitting in the dew,
 And saw nine hundred oxen toil through Meath,
Driven on by goads of iron; they too, brother,
Are full five days from us. Five days for traffic."

Cathleen's Despair

The Countess then went back in bitter grief to her desolate castle,
where only faithful old servants now waited in the halls, and
whispered together in the dark corners, and, kneeling in her oratory,
she prayed far into the night for light in her darkness. As she prayed
before the altar she slept for very weariness, and was aroused by a
sudden furious knocking, and an outcry of "Thieves! Thieves!" Cathleen
rose quickly from the altar steps, and met her foster-mother, Oona, at
the door of the oratory; and Oona cried aloud: "Thieves have broken
into the treasure-chamber, and nothing is left!" Cathleen asked if
this were true, and discovered that not a single coin, not a single
gem was left: the demons had stolen all. And while the servants still
mourned over the lost treasures of the house there came another cry of
"Thieves! Thieves!" and an old peasant rushed in, exclaiming that all
the food was gone. That, alas! was true: the few sacks of meal which
supplied the scanty daily fare were emptied and the bags flung on the
floor. Now indeed the last poor resource was gone.

[Illustration: "Thieves have broken into the treasure-chamber"]

A Desperate Decision

When the Countess heard of this last terrible misfortune a great light
broke upon her mind with a blinding flash, and showed her a way to
save others, even at the cost of her own salvation. It seemed God's
answer to her prayer for guidance, and she resolved to follow the
inspiration thus sent into her mind. She decided now what she would
do; her mind was made up, and the light which shines from extreme
sacrifice of self was so bright upon her face that her old nurse and
her servants, wailing around her, were awe-stricken and durst not
question or check her. She returned to her oratory door, and, standing
on the steps, looking down on her weeping domestics, she cried:

"I am desolate,
For a most sad resolve wakes in my heart;
But always I have faith. Old men and women,
Be silent; God does not forsake the world.
Mary Queen of Angels
And all you clouds and clouds of saints, farewell!"

With one last long gaze at the little altar of her oratory she
resolutely closed the door and turned away.

She Revisits the Demons

The next day the merchants in their forest lodge were still buying
souls, and giving food and wine to the starving peasants who sold.
They were buying men and women, sinful, terrified, afraid to die,
eager to live; buying them more cheaply than before because of the
increase of sin and terror. Bargains were being struck and bartering
was in full progress, when suddenly all the peasants stopped,
shamefaced, as one said, "Here comes the Countess Cathleen," and down
the track she was seen approaching slowly. One by one the peasants
slunk away, and the demon merchants were quite alone when Cathleen
entered the little cottage where they sat, with bags of coin on the
table before them and on the ground beside them. Again they greeted
her with mocking respect, and asked to know her will.

"Merchants, do you still buy souls for Hell?"

"Lady, our traffic prospers, for the famine lies long on the land, and
men would fain live till better days come again. Besides, we can give
them food and wine and wealth for future years; and all in exchange
for a mere soul, a little breath of wind."

"Perhaps the Countess Cathleen has come to deal with us," said the
younger.

"Merchant, you are right; I have come to bring you merchandise. I have
a soul to sell, so costly that perhaps the price is beyond your
means."

The elder merchant replied joyfully: "No price is beyond our means, if
only the soul be worth the price; if it be a pure and stainless soul,
fit to join the angels and saints in Paradise, our master will gladly
pay all you ask. Whose is the soul, and what is the price?"

Her Terms

"The people starve, therefore the people go

Thronging to you. I hear a cry come from them,
And it is in my ears by night and day:
And I would have five hundred thousand crowns,
To find food for them till the dearth go by;
And have the wretched spirits you have bought
For your gold crowns, released, and sent to God.
The soul that I would barter is my soul."

The Bond Signed

When the demons heard this, and knew that Cathleen was willing to give
her own soul as ransom for the souls of others, they were overjoyed,
their eyes flashed, the rubies of their golden crowns shot out fiery
gleams, and their fingers clutched the air as if they already held her
stainless soul. This would be a great triumph to their master, and
they would win great honour in Hell when they brought him a soul worth
far, far more than large abundance of ordinary sinful souls. Very
carefully they watched while the trembling Countess signed the bond
which gave her soul to Hell, very gladly they paid down the money for
which she had stipulated, and very joyously they saw the signs of
speedy death in her face, knowing, as they did, how soon the coming
relief would show her sacrifice to have been unnecessary, though
now it was irrevocable.

[Illustration: "Cathleen signed the bond"]

General Lamentation
Sadly but resolutely she turned away, followed by her servants bearing
the bags of gold, and as she passed through the village a rumour ran
before her of what she had done. All men were sobered by the terrible
tidings, and the redeemed people waited for her coming, and followed
her weeping and lamenting, for now their souls were free again, and
they recognised the great sacrifice she had made for them; but it was
too late to save her, though now all would have died for her. Cathleen
passed on into her castle, and there in the courtyard she distributed
the money to all her people, and bade them dwell quietly in obedience
till her steward returned. She herself, she said, could not stay; she
must go on a long and dark journey, for her people's need had broken
her heart and conquered her; she was no longer her own, but belonged
to the dark lord of Hell; she could not bid them pray for her, nor
could she pray for herself.

Cathleen Fades Away

Her people, who knew the great price at which she had redeemed them,
besought the Blessed Virgin and all the saints to have mercy on her;
and all the souls she had released, on earth and in Heaven, prayed for
her night and day, and the blessed saints interceded for her. Yet from
day to day the Countess Cathleen faded, and the demons, ceasing all
other traffic, lurked in waiting to catch her soul as she died. Night
and day her heart-broken foster-mother Oona tended her; but she grew
feebler, till it seemed that she would die before Fergus returned.

The Steward Returns

On the fifth day, however, glad tidings came. Fergus had landed, and
sent word that he was bringing corn and meal as quickly as possible;
also a wandering peasant brought a message that nine hundred oxen were
within one day's journey of her castle; and when the gentle Cathleen
heard this, and knew that her people were safe, she died with a smile
on her lips and thanks to God for her people on her tongue. That same
night a great tempest broke over the land, which drove away the
pestilential mists, and left the country free from evil influences,
for with the morning men found the forest lodge crushed beneath the
fallen trees, and the two demon merchants vanished. All gathered round
the castle and mourned for the Countess Cathleen, for none knew how it
would go with her spirit; they feared that the evil demons had borne
her soul to Hell. All had prayed for her, but there had been no sign,
no token of forgiveness. Nevertheless their prayers were heard and
answered.

The Demons Cheated

In the next night, when the great storm had passed away and the
vapours no longer filled the air, when Fergus had distributed food and
wine, and the oxen had been apportioned to every family, so that
plenty reigned in every house, when only Cathleen's castle lay
desolate, shrouded in gloom, the faithful old nurse Oona, watching by
the body of her darling, had a glorious vision. She saw the splendid
armies of the angels who guard mankind from evil, she saw the saints
who had suffered and overcome, and amid them was the Countess
Cathleen, happy with saints and angels in the bliss of Paradise; for
her love had redeemed her own soul as well as the souls of others,
and God had pardoned her sin because of her self-sacrifice.

"The light beats down: the gates of pearl are wide,

And she is passing to the floor of peace,
And Mary of the seven times wounded heart
Has kissed her lips, and the long blessed hair
Has fallen on her face; the Light of Lights
Looks always on the motive, not the deed,
The Shadow of Shadows on the deed alone."

FOOTNOTES:

[15] C. Kingsley.

[16] The poetical quotations throughout this story are taken, by

permission, from Mr. W. B. Yeats's play "The Countess Cathleen."

CHAPTER IX: CUCHULAIN, THE CHAMPION OF IRELAND

Introduction

Among all the early literatures of Europe, there are two which, at
exactly opposite corners of the continent, display most strikingly
similar characteristics, characteristics which apparently point to
some racial affinity in the peoples who produced them. These
literatures are the Greek and the Irish. It has been maintained with
much ingenuity that the Greeks of Homer, the early Britons, and the
Irish Celts were all of one stock, as shown by the many points they
had in common. It is certain that in customs, manner of life, ethics,
ideas of religion, and methods of warfare a striking similarity may be
seen between the Greeks as described by Homer and the Britons as
Julius C�sar knew them, or the Irish as their own legends reveal them.
We must expect to find in their myths and legends a certain
resemblance of Celtic ideas to Greek ideas; and if the great Achilles
sulks in his tent because he is unjustly deprived of his captive, the
fair Briseis, we shall not be surprised to find the Champion of Erin
quarrelling over his claim to precedence. The contest between the
heroes for the armour of dead Achilles is paralleled by this contest
between the three greatest warriors of Ireland for the special dish of
honour called the "Champion's Portion," a distinction which also
recalls Greek life.

Cuchulain, the Irish Achilles

The resemblance of the Cuchulain legend to the story of Achilles is so

strong that Cuchulain is often called "the Irish Achilles," but there
are elements of humour and pathos in his story which the tale of
Achilles cannot show, and in reckless courage, power of inspiring
dread, sense of personal merit, and frankness of speech the Irish hero
is not inferior to the mighty Greek. The way in which Cuchulain
established his claim to be regarded as Chief Champion of Erin is
related in the following story, which shows some primitive Celtic
features found again in Welsh legends and other national folk-tales.

The Youth of Cuchulain

Cuchulain was the nephew of King Conor of Ulster, son of his sister
Dechtire, and men say his father was no mortal man, but the great god
Lugh of the Long Hand. When Cuchulain was born he was brought up by
King Conor himself and the wisest men of Ireland; when five years old,
he beat all the other boys in games and warlike exercises, and on the
day on which he was seven he assumed the arms of a warrior, so much
greater was he than the sons of mortal men. Cuchulain had overheard
his tutor, Cathbad the Druid, say to the older youths, "If any young
man take arms to-day, his name will be greater than any other name in
Ireland, but his span of life will be short," and as he loved fame
above long life, he persuaded his uncle, King Conor, to invest him
with the weapons of manhood. His fame soon spread all over Ireland,
for his warlike deeds were those of a proved warrior, not of a child
of nursery age, and by the time Cuchulain was seventeen he was in
reality without peer among the champions of Ulster, or of all Ireland.

Cuchulain's Marriage

When the men of Ulster remembered Cuchulain's divine origin, they

would fain have him married, so that he might not die childless; and
for a year they searched all Erin for a fit bride for so great a
champion. Cuchulain, however, went wooing for himself, to the dun of
Forgall the Wily, a Druid of great power. Forgall had two daughters,
of whom the younger, Emer, was the most lovely and virtuous maiden to
be found in the country, and she became Cuchulain's chosen bride.
Gallant was his wooing, and merry and jesting were her answers to his
suit, for though Emer loved Cuchulain at first sight she would not
accept him at once, and long they talked together. Finally Emer
consented to wed Cuchulain when he had undergone certain trials and
adventures for a year, and had accomplished certain feats, a test
which she imposed on her lover, partly as a trial of his worthiness
and constancy and partly to satisfy her father Forgall, who would not
agree to the marriage. When Cuchulain returned triumphant at the end
of the year, he rescued Emer from the confinement in which her father
had placed her, and won her at the sword's point; they were wedded,
and dwelt at Armagh, the capital of Ulster, under the protection of
King Conor.

Bricriu's Feast

It happened that at Conor's court was one chief who delighted in

making mischief, as Thersites among the Grecian leaders. This man,
Bricriu of the Bitter Tongue, came to King Conor and invited him and
all the heroes of the Red Branch, the royal bodyguard of Ulster, to a
feast at his new dwelling, for he felt sure he could find some
occasion to stir up strife at a feast. King Conor, however, and the
Red Branch heroes, distrusted Bricriu so much that they refused to
accept the invitation, unless Bricriu would give sureties that, having
received his guests, he would leave the hall before the feasting
began. Bricriu, who had expected some such condition, readily agreed,
and before going home to prepare his feast took measures for stirring
up strife among the heroes of Ulster.
Bricriu's Falsehood

Before Bricriu left Armagh he went to the mighty Laegaire and with
many words of praise said: "All good be with you, O Laegaire, winner
of battles! Why should you not be Champion of Ireland for ever?"

"I can be, if I will," said Laegaire.

"Follow my advice, and you shall be head of all the champions of

Ireland," said cunning Bricriu.

"What is your counsel?" asked Laegaire.

"King Conor is coming to a feast in my house," said Bricriu, "and the

Champion's Bit will be a splendid portion for any hero. That warrior
who obtains it at this feast will be acclaimed Chief Champion of Erin.
When the banquet begins do you bid your chariot-driver rise and claim
the hero's portion for you, for you are indeed worthy of it, and I
hope that you may get what you so well deserve!"

"Some men shall die if my right is taken from me," quoth Laegaire; but
Bricriu only laughed and turned away.

Bricriu Meets Conall Cearnach

Bricriu next met Conall Cearnach, Cuchulain's cousin, one of the

chiefs of the Red Branch.

"May all good be with you, Conall the Victorious," quoth he. "You are
our defence and shield, and no foe dare face you in battle. Why should
you not be Chief Champion of Ulster?"

"It only depends on my will," said Conall; and then Bricriu continued
his flattery and insidious suggestions until he had stirred up Conall
to command his charioteer to claim the Champion's Portion at
Bricriu's feast. Very joyous was Bricriu, and very evilly he smiled as
he turned away when he had roused the ambition of Conall Cearnach, for
he revelled in the prospect of coming strife.

Bricriu Meets Cuchulain

"May all good be with you, Cuchulain," said Bricriu, as he met the
youthful hero. "You are the chief defence of Erin, our bulwark against
the foe, our joy and darling, the hero of Ulster, the favourite of all
the maidens of Ireland, the greatest warrior of our land! We all live
in safety under the protection of your mighty hand, so why should you
not be the Chief Champion of Ulster? Why will you leave the Hero's
Portion to some less worthy warrior?"

"By the god of my people, I will have it, or slay any bold man who
dares to deprive me of it," said Cuchulain.

Thereupon Bricriu left Cuchulain and travelled to his home, where he

made his preparations for receiving the king, as if nothing were
further from his thoughts than mischief-making and guile.
The Feast and the Quarrel

When King Conor and his court had entered Bricriu's house at Dundrum,
and were sitting at the feast, Bricriu was forced by his sureties to
leave the hall, for men feared his malicious tongue, and as he went to
his watch-tower he turned and cried:

"The Champion's Portion at my feast is worth having; let it be given

to the best hero in Ulster."

The carving and distribution of the viands began, and when the
Champion's Portion was brought forward it was claimed by three
chariot-drivers, Laegaire's, Conall's, and Cuchulain's, each on
behalf of his master; and when no decision was made by King Conor the
three heroes claimed it, each for himself. But Laegaire and Conall
united in defying Cuchulain and ridiculing his claim, and a great
fight began in the hall, till all men shook for fear; and at last King
Conor intervened, before any man had been wounded.

"Put up your swords," he said. "The Champion's Portion at this feast

shall be divided among the three, and we will ask King Ailill and
Queen Meave of Connaught to say who is the greatest champion." This
plan pleased every one but Bricriu, who saw his hopes of fomenting
strife disappear.

The Women's Quarrel

Just at that moment the women rose and quitted the hall to breathe the
fresh air, and Bricriu spied his opportunity. Going down from his
watch-tower, he met Fedelm, the wife of Laegaire, with her fifty
maidens, and said to her:

"All good be with you to-night, Fedelm of the Fresh Heart! Truly in
beauty, in birth, in dignity, no woman in Ulster is your equal. If you
enter my hall first to-night, you will be queen of the Ulster women."

Fedelm walked on merrily enough, but determined that she would soon
re-enter the hall, and certainly before any other woman. Bricriu next
met Lendabair the Favourite, Conall's wife, and gave her similar
flattery and a similar prophecy, and Lendabair also determined to be
first back at the house and first to enter the hall.

Then Bricriu waited till he saw Emer, Cuchulain's fair wife. "Health
be with you, Emer, wife of the best man in Ireland! As the sun
outshines the stars, so do you outshine all other women! You should
of right enter the house first, for whoever does so will be queen of
the women of Ulster, and none has a better claim to be their queen
than Cuchulain's wife, Forgall's fair daughter."

The Husbands Intervene

The three fair women, each with her train of fifty maidens, watched
one another carefully, and when one turned back towards the house the
others accompanied her, step for step; and the noise of their
returning footsteps as they raced along alarmed their husbands.
Sencha, the king's wise counsellor, reassured them, saying, "It is
only a woman's quarrel; Bricriu has stirred up enmity among the wives
of the heroes"; and as he spoke Emer reached the hall, having suddenly
outrun the others; but the doors were shut. Then followed bitter
complaints from Fedelm and Lendabair, both united against Emer, as
their husbands had been against Cuchulain. Again King Conor was forced
to call for silence, since each hero was supporting his own wife's
claims to be queen of the Ulster women. The strife was only calmed by
the promise that the claim to the highest place should be settled by
Ailill and Meave of Connaught, who would be impartial judges.

The Heroes Journey to Connaught

Bricriu's feast lasted for three days longer, and then King Conor and
the Red Branch heroes returned to Armagh. There the dispute about the
Championship began again, and Conor sent the heroes to Cruachan, in
Connaught, to obtain a judgment from King Ailill. "If he does not
decide, go to Curoi of Munster, who is a just and wise man, and will
find out the best hero by wizardry and enchantments." When Conor had
decided thus, Laegaire and Conall, after some disputation as to who
should start first, had their chariots got ready and drove towards
Cruachan, but Cuchulain stayed amusing himself and the women in
Armagh. When his chariot-driver reproached him with losing the
Champion's Portion through laziness Cuchulain replied: "I never
thought about it, but there is still time to win it. Yoke my steeds to
the chariot." By this time, however, the other two heroes were far,
very far, in advance, with the chief men of Ulster following them.

Cuchulain's Steeds

Cuchulain had quite lately won two mighty magic steeds, which arose
from two lonely lakes--the Grey of Macha, his best-beloved horse, and
the Black Sainglain. The struggle between the hero and these magic
steeds had been terrible before he had been able to tame them and
reduce them to submission; now he had them yoked to his chariot, and
when he had once started he soon came up with the other two heroes,
and all three drove furiously towards Cruachan, with all the warriors
of Ulster behind them.

[Illustration: "All three drove furiously towards Cruachan"]

Queen Meave Watches the Heroes

The noise of the advancing war-chariots reached Queen Meave at

Cruachan, and she wondered greatly to hear thunder from a clear sky;
but her fair daughter, looking from her window, said: "Mother, I see
chariots coming."

"Who comes in the first?" asked Queen Meave.

"I see a big stout man, with reddish gold hair and long forked beard,
dressed in purple with gold adornments; and his shield is bronze edged
with gold; he bears a javelin in his hand."

"That man I know well," answered her mother. "He is mighty Laegaire,
the Storm of War, the Knife of Victory; he will slay us all, unless he
comes in peace."

"I see another chariot," quoth the princess, "bearing a fair man with
long wavy hair, a man of clear red and white complexion, wearing a
white vest and a cloak of blue and crimson. His shield is brown, with
yellow bosses and a bronze edge."

"That is valiant Conall the Victorious," quoth Meave. "Small chance

shall we have if he comes in anger."

"Yet a third chariot comes, wherein stands a dark, sad youth, most
handsome of all the men of Erin; he wears a crimson tunic, brooched
with gold, a long white linen cloak, and a white, gold-embroidered
hood. His hair is black, his look draws love, his glance shoots fire,
and the hero-light gleams around him. His shield is crimson, with a
silver rim, and images of beasts shine on it in gold."

Terror in Connaught

"Alas! that is the hero Cuchulain," said Meave. "He is more to be

feared than all others. His voice in anger tells the doom of men; his
wrath is fatal. Truly we are but dead if we have aroused Cuchulain's
wrath." After a pause: "Tell me, daughter, are there yet other
chariots?"

"The men of Ulster follow in chariots so numerous that the earth

quakes beneath them, and their sound is as thunder, or the dashing
waves of the sea."

Now Queen Meave was terrified in good earnest, but hoped by a hearty
welcome to turn aside the wrath of the heroes of Ulster; thus when
they arrived at the dun of Cruachan they found the best of receptions,
and all the Red Branch warriors were feasted for three days and
nights.

Conor Explains the Matter

After three days Ailill of Connaught asked their business, and King
Conor related to him everything as it had occurred--the feast, the
dispute for the Champion's Portion, the women's quarrel, and the
decision to be judged by King Ailill. This angered Ailill, who was a
peaceable man.

"It was no friend of mine who referred you to me, for I shall surely
incur the hatred of two heroes," quoth he.

"You are the best judge of all," replied King Conor.

"Then I must have time--three days and nights--to decide," said

Ailill.

"We can spare our heroes so long," quoth Conor, and therewith the
Ulster men returned to Armagh, leaving the three claimants to the
Championship at Cruachan.

The First Test

That night Ailill put them to an unexpected test. Their feast was
served to them in a separate room, and the king went to his
protectors, the Fairy People of the Hills, in the Good People's Hill
at Cruachan, and begged some help in his judgment. They willingly
aided him, and three magic beasts, in the shape of monstrous cats,
were let into the room where the heroes feasted. When they saw them
Laegaire and Conall rose up from their meal, clambered up among the
rafters, and stayed there all night. Cuchulain waited till one
attacked him, and then drawing his sword, struck the monster. It
showed no further sign of fight, and Cuchulain kept watch all night,
till the magic beasts disappeared at daybreak. When Ailill came into
the room and saw the heroes as they had spent the night he laughed as
he said:

"Are you not content to yield the Championship to Cuchulain?"

[Illustration: "Three monstrous cats were let into the room"]

"Indeed no," said Conall and Laegaire. "We are used to fighting men,
not monstrous beasts."

The Second Test

The next day King Ailill sent the heroes to his own foster-father,
Ercol, to spend a night with him, that he also might test them. When
they arrived, and had feasted, Laegaire was sent out that night to
fight the witches of the valley. Fierce and terrible were these
witches, and they beat Laegaire, and took his arms and armour.

When Conall went to fight them the witches beat him and took his
spear, but he kept his sword and brought it back with honour.
Cuchulain, who was the youngest, went last, and he too was being
beaten, when the taunts of his chariot-driver, who was watching,
aroused him, and he beat the witches, and bore off in triumph their
cloaks of battle. Yet even after this the other two heroes would not
acknowledge Cuchulain's superiority.

Ercol's Defeat

The next day Ercol fought with each champion separately, and conquered
both Laegaire and Conall, terrifying the former so much that he fled
to Cruachan and told Meave and Ailill that Ercol had killed the other
two. When Cuchulain arrived victorious, with Ercol tied captive at his
chariot-wheels, he found all men mourning for him and Conall as for
the dead.

Meave's Plan to Avoid Strife in Cruachan

Now indeed Ailill was in great perplexity, for he durst not delay his
decision, and he dreaded the wrath of the two disappointed heroes. He
and Queen Meave consulted long together, and at length Meave promised
to relieve him of the responsibility of judgment. Summoning Laegaire
to the king's room, she said:

"Welcome, O Laegaire! You are greatest of the warriors of Ulster. To

you we give the headship of the heroes of Ireland and the Champion's
Portion, and to your wife the right to walk first of all the women of
Ulster. In token thereof we give you this cup of bronze with a silver
bird embossed, to be seen by no man till you be come to King Conor in
the Red Branch House at Armagh. Then show your cup and claim your
right, and none will dispute it with you."

So Laegaire went away well pleased, and they sent for Conall. To him
they gave a silver cup, with a bird embossed in gold, and to him they
pretended to adjudge the Championship, and Conall left them well
content.

Cuchulain, who was playing chess, refused to attend the King of

Connaught when he was summoned, and Queen Meave had to entreat him to
come to their private room. There they gave him a golden cup, with a
bird designed in precious gems, with many words of flattery for
Cuchulain and his fair and noble wife, Emer.

The Return of the Champions

Now the heroes, each well content, bade farewell to the court at
Cruachan, and drove back to Armagh, but none durst ask how they had
sped. That evening, at the banquet, when the Champion's Portion was
set aside, Laegaire arose and claimed it, showing as proof that his
claim was just the bronze cup he brought from Queen Meave.

But alas! Conall the Victorious had a silver cup, and while he was
exulting in this proof of his rightful claim to the championship
Cuchulain produced his golden cup, and the dispute began all over
again. King Conor would have allowed Cuchulain's claim, but Laegaire
vowed that his rival had bribed Ailill and Meave with great treasures
to give him the golden cup, and neither Laegaire nor Conall would
yield him the victory or accept the judgment as final. "Then you must
go to Curoi," said the king, and to that they all agreed.

The Champions Visit Curoi

The next day the three champions drove to Kerry where Curoi dwelt in a
magic dun. He was away from home planning enchantments to test them,
for he knew they were coming, but his wife welcomed them, and bade
them watch the dun for one night each, beginning with Laegaire, as the
eldest. Laegaire took up his sentinel's post outside the dun, and
Curoi's wife worked the charm which prevented entrance after
nightfall. The night was long and silent, and Laegaire thought he
would have a quiet watch, when he saw a great shadow arise from the
sea.

The Giant Fights Laegaire and Conall

This shadow took the shape of a huge giant, whose spears were mighty
branch-stripped oaks, which he hurled at Laegaire. They did not touch
him, however, and Laegaire made some show of fight; but the giant took
him up, squeezed him so tightly as nearly to slay him, and then threw
him over the magic wall of the dun, where the others found him lying
half dead. All men thought that he had sprung with a mighty leap over
the wall, since no other entrance was to be found, and Laegaire kept
silence and did not explain to them.

Conall, who took the watch the second night, fared exactly as Laegaire
had done, and likewise did not confess how he had been thrown over
the wall of the dun, nor what became of the giant in the dawn.

Cuchulain's Trials

The third night was Cuchulain's watch, and he took his post outside
the dun, and the gates and wall were secured by magic spells, so that
none could enter. Vainly he watched till midnight, and then he thought
he saw nine grey shadowy forms creeping towards him.

"Who goes there?" he cried. "If you be friends, stop; if foes, come
on!" Then the nine shadowy foes raised a shout, and fell upon the
hero; but he fought hard and slew them, and beheaded them. A second
and a third time similar groups of vague, shadowy foemen rushed at
him, and he slew them all in like manner, and then, wearied out, sat
down to rest.

The Dragon

Later on in the night, as he was still watching, he heard a heavy

sound, like waves surging in the lake, and when he roused himself to
see what it was he beheld a monstrous dragon. It was rising from the
water and flying towards the dun, and seemed ready to devour
everything in its way. When the dragon perceived him it soared swiftly
into the air, and then gradually sank towards him, opening its
terrible jaws. Cuchulain sprang up, giving his wonderful hero-leap,
and thrust his arm into the dragon's mouth and down its throat; he
found its heart, tore it out, and saw the monster fall dead on the
ground. He then cut off its scaly head, which he added to those of his
former enemies.

[Illustration: "The dragon sank towards him, opening its terrible

jaws"]

The Giant Worsted by Cuchulain

Towards daybreak, when feeling quite worn out and very sleepy, he
became slowly aware of a great shadow coming to him westward from the
sea. The shadow, as before, became a giant, who greeted him in a surly
tone with, "This is a bad night." "It will be worse yet for you," said
Cuchulain. The giant, as he had done with the other heroes, threw
oaks, but just missed him; and when he tried to grapple with him the
hero leaped up with drawn sword. In his anger the hero-light shone
round him, and he sprang as high as the giant's head, and gave him a
stroke that brought him to his knees. "Life for life, Cuchulain," said
the giant, and vanished at once, leaving no trace.

Cuchulain Re-enters the Dun

Now Cuchulain would gladly have returned to the fort to rest, but
there seemed no way of entrance, and the hero was vexed at his own
helplessness, for he thought his comrades had jumped over the magic
walls. Twice he boldly essayed to leap the lofty wall, and twice he
failed; then in his wrath his great strength came upon him, the
hero-light shone round him, and he took a little run and, leaning on
his spear, leaped so high and so far that he alighted in the middle of
the court, just before the door of the hall.

As he sighed heavily and wearily, Curoi's wife said: "That is the sigh
of a weary conqueror, not of a beaten man"; and Cuchulain went in and
sat down to rest.

The Decision

The next morning Curoi's wife asked the champions: "Are you content
that the Championship should go to Cuchulain? I know by my magic skill
what he has endured in the past night, and you must see that you are
not equal to him."

"Nay, that we will not allow," quoth they. "It was one of Cuchulain's
friends among the People of the Hills who came to conquer us and to
give him the Championship. We are not content, and we will not give up
our claim, for the fight was not fair."

"Go home now to Armagh, is Curoi's word, and wait there until he
himself brings his decision," said Curoi's wife. So they bade her
farewell, and went back to the Red Branch House in Armagh, with the
dispute still unsettled; but they agreed to await peaceably Curoi's
decision, and abide by it when he should bring it.

Uath, the Stranger

Some time after this, when Curoi had made no sign of giving judgment,
it happened that all the Ulster heroes were in their places in the Red
Branch House, except Cuchulain and his cousin Conall. As they sat in
order of rank in the hall they saw a terrible stranger coming into the
room. He was gigantic in stature, hideous of aspect, with ravening
yellow eyes. He wore a skin roughly sewn together, and a grey cloak
over it, and he sheltered himself from the light with a spreading tree
torn up by the roots. In his hand he bore an enormous axe, with keen
and shining edge. This hideous apparition strode up the hall and leant
against a carved pillar beside the fire.

"Who are you?" asked one chieftain in sport. "Are you come to be our
candlestick, or would you burn the house down? Is this the place for
such as you? Go farther down the hall!"

"My name is Uath, the Stranger, and for neither of those things am I
come. I seek that which I cannot find in the whole world, and that is
a man to keep the agreement he makes with me."

The Agreement

"What is the agreement?" asked King Conor.

"Behold my axe!" quoth the stranger. "The man who will grasp it
to-day may cut my head off with it, provided that I may, in like
manner, cut off his head to-morrow. Now you men of Ulster, heroes of
the Red Branch, have won the palm through the wide world for courage,
honour, strength, truth, and generosity; do you, therefore, find me a
man to keep this agreement. King Conor is excepted, because of his
royal dignity, but no other. And if you have no champion who dare face
me, I will say that Ulster has lost her courage and is dishonoured."

"It is not right for a whole province to be disgraced for lack of a

man to keep his word," said King Conor, "but I fear we have no such
champions here."

Laegaire Accepts the Challenge

"By my word," said Laegaire, who had listened attentively to the whole
conversation, "there will be a champion this very moment. Stoop down,
fellow, and let me cut off your head, that you may take mine
to-morrow."

Then Uath chanted magic spells over the axe as he stroked the edge,
and laid his neck on a block, and Laegaire hewed so hard that the axe
severed the head from the body and struck deep into the block. Then
the body of Uath arose, took up the head and the axe, and strode away
down the hall, all people shrinking out of its way, and so it passed
out into the night.

[Illustration: "The body of Uath arose"]

"If this terrible stranger returns to-morrow he will slay us all,"

they whispered, as they looked pityingly at Laegaire, who was trying
in vain to show no signs of apprehension.

Laegaire and Conall Disgraced

When the next evening came, and men sat in the Red Branch House,
talking little and waiting for what would happen, in came Uath, the
Stranger, as well and sound as before the terrible blow, bearing his
axe, and eager to return the stroke. Alas! Laegaire's heart had failed
him and he did not come, and the stranger jeered at the men of Ulster
because their great champion durst not keep his agreement, nor face
the blow he should receive in return for one he gave.

The men of Ulster were utterly ashamed, but Conall Cearnach, the
Victorious, was present that night, and he made a new agreement with
Uath. Conall gave a blow which beheaded Uath, but again, when the
stranger returned whole and sound on the following evening, the
champion was not to be found: Conall would not face the blow.

Cuchulain Accepts the Challenge

When Uath found that a second hero of Ulster had failed him he again
taunted them all with cowardice and promise-breaking.

"What! is there not one man of courage among you Ulstermen? You would
fain have a great name, but have no courage to earn it! Great heroes
are you all! Not one among you has bravery enough to face me! Where is
that childish youth Cuchulain! A poor miserable fellow he is, but I
would like to see if his word is better to be relied on than the word
of these two great heroes."

"A youth I may be," said Cuchulain, "but I will keep my word without
any agreement."

Uath laughed aloud. "Yes! that is likely, is it not? And you with so
great a fear of death!"

Thereupon the youth leapt up, caught the deadly axe, and severed the
giant's head as he stood with one stroke.

Cuchulain Stands the Test

The next day the Red Branch heroes watched Cuchulain to see what he
would do. They would not have been surprised if he had failed like the
others, who now were present. The champion, however, showed no signs
of failing or retreat. He sat sorrowfully in his place waiting for the
certain death that must come, and regretting his rashness, but with no
thought of breaking his word.

With a sigh he said to King Conor as they waited: "Do not leave this
place till all is over. Death is coming to me very surely, but I must
fulfil my agreement, for I would rather die than break my word."

Towards the close of day Uath strode into the hall exultant.

"Where is Cuchulain?" he cried.

"Here I am," was the reply.

"Ah, poor boy! your speech is sad to-night, and the fear of death lies
heavy on you; but at least you have redeemed your word and have not
failed me."

The youth rose from his seat and went towards Uath, as he stood with
the great axe ready, and knelt to receive the blow.

Curoi's Decision and Cuchulain's Victory

The hero of Ulster laid his head on the block; but Uath was not
satisfied. "Stretch out your neck better," said he.

"You are playing with me, to torment me," said Cuchulain. "Slay me now
speedily, for I did not keep you waiting last night."

However, he stretched out his neck as Uath bade, and the stranger
raised his axe till it crashed upwards through the rafters of the
hall, like the crash of trees falling in a storm. When the axe came
down with a terrific sound all men looked fearfully at Cuchulain. The
descending axe had not even touched him; it had come down with the
blunt side on the ground, and the youth knelt there unharmed. Smiling
at him, and leaning on his axe, stood no terrible and hideous
stranger, but Curoi of Kerry, come to give his decision at last.

"Rise up, Cuchulain," said Curoi. "There is none among all the heroes
of Ulster to equal you in courage and loyalty and truth. The
Championship of the Heroes of Ireland is yours from this day forth,
and the Champion's Portion at all feasts; and to your wife I adjudge
the first place among all the women of Ulster. Woe to him who dares to
dispute this decision!" Thereupon Curoi vanished, and the Red Branch
warriors gathered around Cuchulain, and all with one voice acclaimed
him the Champion of the Heroes of all Ireland--a title which has clung
to him until this day.

CHAPTER X: THE TALE OF GAMELYN

The "Wicked Brothers" Theme

The tale of "Gamelyn" is a variant of the old fairy-tale subject of

the Wicked Elder Brothers, one of the oldest and most interesting
versions of which may still be read in the Biblical story of Joseph
and his brethren. Usually a father dies leaving three sons, of whom
the two elder are worthless and the youngest rises to high honour,
whereupon the elder brothers try to kill the youngest from envy at his
good fortune. A similar root-idea is found in "Cinderella" and other
fairy-tales of girls, but in these there may usually be found a cruel
stepmother and two contemptuous stepsisters--a noteworthy variation
which seems to point to some deep-rooted idea that the ties of blood
are stronger among women than among men.

Literary Influence of the "Gamelyn" Story

The story of "Gamelyn" has two great claims to our attention: it is,
through Lodge's "Euphues' Golden Legacy," the ultimate source of
Shakespeare's _As You Like It_, and it seems to be the earliest
presentment in English literature of the figure of "the noble outlaw."
In fact, Gamelyn is probably the literary ancestor of "bold Robin
Hood," and stands for an English ideal of justice and equity, against
legal oppression and wickedness in high places. He shows, too, the
love of free life, of the merry greenwood and the open road, which
reappears after so many centuries in the work of Robert Louis
Stevenson.

The Story

In the reign of King Edward I. there dwelt in Lincolnshire, near the

vast expanse of the Fens, a noble gentleman, Sir John of the Marches.
He was now old, but was still a model of all courtesy and a "very
perfect gentle knight." He had three sons, of whom the youngest,
Gamelyn, was born in his father's old age, and was greatly beloved by
the old man; the other two were much older than he, and John, the
eldest, had already developed a vicious and malignant character.
Gamelyn and his second brother, Otho, reverenced their father, but
John had no respect or obedience for the good gentleman, and was the
chief trouble of his declining years, as Gamelyn was his chief joy.

The Father Feels his End Approaching

At last old age and weakness overcame the worthy old Sir John, and he
was forced to take to his bed, where he lay sadly meditating on his
children's future, and wondering how to divide his possessions justly
among the three. There was no difficulty of inheritance or
primogeniture, for all the knight's lands were held in fee-simple, and
not in entail, so that he might bequeath them as he would. Sir John of
the Marches, fearing lest he should commit an injustice, sent
throughout the district for wise knights, begging them to come
hastily, if they wished to see him alive, and help him. When the
country squires and lords, his near neighbours, heard of his grave
condition, they hurried to the castle, and gathered in the bedchamber,
where the dying knight greeted them thus: "Lords and gentlemen, I warn
you in truth that I may no longer live; by the will of God death lays
his hand upon me." When they heard this they tried to encourage him,
by bidding him remember that God can provide a remedy for every
disease, and the good knight received their kindly words without
dispute. "That God can send remedy for an ill I will never deny; but
I beseech you, for my sake, to divide my lands among my three sons.
For the love of God deal justly, and forget not my youngest, Gamelyn.
Seldom does any heir to an estate help his brothers after his father's
death."

How Shall he Dispose of his Estate?

The friends whom Sir John had summoned deliberated long over the
disposal of the estate. The majority wished to give all to the eldest
son, but a strong minority urged the claims of the second, but all
agreed that Gamelyn might wait till his eldest brother chose to give
him a share of his father's lands. At last it was decided to divide
the inheritance between the two elder sons, and the knights returned
to the chamber where the brave old knight lay dying, and told him
their decision. He summoned up strength enough to protest against
their plan of distribution, and said:

"'Nay, by St. Martin, I can yet bequeath

My lands to whom I wish: they still are mine.
Then hearken, neighbours, while I make my will.
To John, my eldest son, and heir, I leave
Five ploughlands, my dead father's heritage;
My second, Otho, ploughlands five shall hold,
Which my good right hand won in valiant strife;
All else I own, in lands and goods and wealth,
To Gamelyn, my youngest, I devise;
And I beseech you, for the love of God,
Forsake him not, but guard his helpless youth
And let him not be plundered of his wealth.'"

Then Sir John, satisfied with having proclaimed his will, died with
Christian resignation, leaving his little son Gamelyn in the power of
the cruel eldest brother, now, in his turn, Sir John.

The Cruel Eldest Son

Since the boy was a minor, the new knight, as natural guardian,
assumed the control of Gamelyn's land, vassals, education, and
nurture; and full evilly he discharged his duties, for he clothed and
fed him badly, and neglected his lands, so that his parks and houses,
his farms and villages, fell into ruinous decay. The boy, when he grew
older, noticed this and resented it, but did not realize the power in
his own broad limbs and mighty sinews to redress his wrongs, though by
the time he fully understood his injuries no man would dare to face
him in fight when he was angry, so strong a youth had he become.

Gamelyn Resists

While Gamelyn, one day, walking in the hall, mused on the ruin of all
his inheritance, Sir John came blustering in, and, seeing him, called
out: "How now: is dinner ready?" Enraged at being addressed as if he
were a mere servant, he replied angrily: "Go and do your own baking; I
am not your cook."

[Illustration: "Go and do your own baking!"]

Sir John almost doubted the evidence of his ears. "What, my dear
brother, is that the way to answer? Thou hast never addressed me so
before!"

"No," replied Gamelyn; "until now I have never considered all the
wrong you have done me. My parks are broken open, my deer are driven
off; you have deprived me of my armour and my steeds; all that my
father bequeathed to me is falling into ruin and decay. God's curse
upon you, false brother!"

Sir John was now enraged beyond all measure, and shouted: "Stand
still, vagabond, and hold thy peace! What right hast thou to speak of
land or vassals? Thou shalt learn to be grateful for food and
raiment."

"A curse upon him that calls me vagabond! I am no worse than

yourself; I am the son of a lady and a good knight."

Gamelyn Terrifies the Household

In spite of all his anger, Sir John was a cautious man, with a prudent
regard for his own safety. He would not risk an encounter with
Gamelyn, but summoned his servants and bade them beat him well, till
he should learn better manners. But when the boy understood his
brother's intention he vowed that he would not be beaten alone--others
should suffer too, and Sir John not the least. Thereupon, leaping on
to the wall, he seized a pestle which lay there, and so boldly
attacked the timid servants, though they were armed with staves, that
he drove them in flight, and laid on furious strokes which quenched
the small spark of courage in them. Sir John had not even that small
amount of bravery: he fled to a loft and barred the door, while
Gamelyn cleared the hall with his pestle, and scoffed at the cowardly
grooms who fled so soon from the strife they had begun. When he sought
for his brother he could not see him at first, but afterwards
perceived his sorry countenance peeping from a window. "Brother," said
Gamelyn, "come a little nearer, and I will teach you how to play with
staff and buckler."

"Nay, by St. Richard, I will not descend till thou hast put down that
pestle. Brother, be no more enraged, and I will make peace with thee.
I swear it by the grace of God!"
"I was forced to defend myself," said Gamelyn, "or your menials would
have injured and degraded me: I could not let grooms beat a good
knight's son; but now grant me one boon, and we shall soon be
reconciled."

Sir John's Guile

"Yes, certainly, brother; ask thy boon, and I will grant it readily.
But indeed I was only testing thee, for thou art so young that I
doubted thy strength and manliness. It was only a pretence of beating
that I meant."

"This is my request," said the boy: "if there is to be peace between

us you must surrender to me all that my father bequeathed me while he
was alive."

To this Sir John consented with apparent willingness, and even

promised to repair the decayed mansions and restore the lands and
farms to their former prosperity; but though he feigned content with
the agreement and kissed his brother with outward affection yet he was
inwardly meditating plans of treachery against the unsuspecting youth.

A Wrestling Match

Shortly after this quarrel between the brothers a wrestling

competition was announced, the winner of which would become the owner
of a fine ram and a ring of gold, and Gamelyn determined to try his
powers. Accordingly he begged the loan of "a little courser" from Sir
John, who offered him his choice of all the steeds in the stable, and
then curiously questioned him as to his errand. The lad explained that
he wished to compete in the wrestling match, hoping to win honour by
bearing away the prize; then, springing on the beautiful courser that
was brought him ready saddled, he spurred his horse and rode away
merrily, while the false Sir John locked the gate behind him, praying
that he might get his neck broken in the contest. The boy rode along,
rejoicing in his youth and strength, singing as he went, till he drew
near the appointed place, and then he suddenly heard a man's voice
lamenting aloud and crying, "Wellaway! Alas!" and saw a venerable
yeoman wringing his hands. "Good man," said Gamelyn, "why art thou in
such distress? Can no man help thee?"

A Dreaded Champion

"Alas!" said the yeoman. "Woe to the day on which I was born! The
champion wrestler here has overthrown my two stalwart sons, and unless
God help them they must die of their grievous hurts. I would give ten
pounds to find a man to avenge on him the injuries done to my dear
sons."

"Good man, hold my horse while my groom takes my coat and shoes, and I
will try my luck and strength against this doughty champion."

"Thank God!" said the yeoman. "I will do it at once; I will guard thy
coat and shoes and good steed safely--and may Jesus Christ speed thee
well!"
Gamelyn Enters

When Gamelyn entered the ring, barefooted and stripped for wrestling,
all men gazed curiously at the rash youth who dared to challenge the
stalwart champion, and the great man himself, rising from the ground,
strolled across to meet Gamelyn and said haughtily: "Who is thy
father, and what is thy name? Thou art, forsooth, a young fool to come
here!"

Gamelyn answered equally haughtily: "Thou knewest well my father while

he lived: he was Sir John of the Marches, and I am his youngest son,
Gamelyn."

The champion replied: "Boy, I knew thy father well in his lifetime,
and I have heard of thee, and nothing good: thou hast always been in
mischief."

"Now I am older thou shalt know me better," said Gamelyn.

Defeats the Champion

The wrestling had lasted till late in the evening, and the moon was
shining on the scene when Gamelyn and the champion began their
struggle. The wrestler tried many wily tricks, but the boy was ready
for them all, and stood steady against all that his opponent could do.
Then, in his turn, he took the offensive, grasped his adversary round
the waist, and cast him so heavily to the ground that three ribs were
broken, and his left arm. Then the victor said mockingly:

"Shall we count that a cast, or not reckon it?"

"By heaven! whether it be one or no, any man in thy hand will never
thrive," said the champion painfully.

The yeoman, who had watched the match with great anxiety, now broke
out with blessings: "Blessed be thou, young sir, that ever thou wert
born!" and now taunting the fallen champion, said: "It was young
'Mischief' who taught thee this game."

"He is master of us all," said the champion. "In all my years of

wrestling I have never been mishandled so cruelly."

Now the victor stood in the ring, ready for more wrestling, but no man
would venture to compete with him, and the two judges who kept order
and awarded the prizes bade him retire, for no other competitor could
be found to face him.

But he was a little disappointed at this easy victory. "Is the fair
over? Why, I have not half sold my wares," he said.

The champion was still capable of grim jesting. "Now, as I value my

life, any purchaser of your wares is a fool; you sell so dearly."

"Not at all," broke in the yeoman; "you have bought your share full
cheap, and made a good bargain."
He Wins the Prizes

While this short conversation had been going on the judges had
returned to their seats, and formally awarded the prize to Gamelyn,
and now came to him, bearing the ram and the ring for his acceptance.

Gamelyn took them gladly, and went home the next morning, followed by
a cheering crowd of admirers; but when the cowardly Sir John saw the
people he bolted the castle doors against his more favourite and
successful brother.

He Overcomes his Brother's Servants

The porter, obeying his master's commands, refused Gamelyn entrance;

and the youth, enraged at this insult, broke down the door with one
blow, caught the fleeing porter, and flung him down the well in the
courtyard. His brother's servants fled from his anger, and the crowd
that had accompanied him swarmed into courtyard and hall, while the
knight took refuge in a little turret.

"Welcome to you all," said Gamelyn. "We will be masters here and ask
no man's leave. Yesterday I left five tuns of wine in the cellar; we
will drain them dry before you go. If my brother objects (as he well
may, for he is a miser) I will be butler and caterer and manage the
whole feast. Any person who dares to object may join the porter in the
well."

Naturally no objections were raised, and Gamelyn and his friends held
high revel for a week, while Sir John lay hidden in his turret,
terrified at the noise and revelry, and dreading what his brother
might do to him now he had so great a following.

A Reckoning with Sir John

However, the guests departed quietly on the eighth day, leaving

Gamelyn alone, and very sorrowful, in the hall where he had held high
revel. As he stood there, musing sadly, he heard a timid footstep, and
saw his brother creeping towards him. When he had attracted Gamelyn's
attention he spoke out loudly: "Who made thee so bold as to destroy
all my household stores?"

"Nay, brother, be not wroth," said the youth quietly. "If I have used
anything I have paid for it fully beforehand. For these sixteen years
you have had full use and profit of fifteen good ploughlands which my
father left me; you have also the use and increase of all my cattle
and horses; and now all this past profit I abandon to you, in return
for the expense of this feast of mine."

Then said the treacherous Sir John: "Hearken, my dear brother: I have
no son, and thou shalt be my heir--I swear by the holy St. John."

"In faith," said Gamelyn, "if that be the case, and if this offer be
made in all sincerity, may God reward you!" for it was impossible for
his generous disposition to suspect his brother of treachery and to
fathom the wiles of a crafty nature; hence it happened that he was so
soon and easily beguiled.
Gamelyn Allows Himself to be Chained

Sir John hesitated a moment, and then said doubtfully: "There is one
thing I must tell you, Gamelyn. When you threw my porter into the well
I swore in my wrath that I would have you bound hand and foot. That is
impossible now without your consent, and I must be forsworn unless you
will let yourself be bound for a moment, as a mere form, just to save
me from the sin of perjury."

So sincere Sir John seemed, and so simple did the whole thing appear,
that Gamelyn consented at once. "Why, certainly, brother, you shall
not be forsworn for my sake." So he sat down, and the servants bound
him hand and foot; and then Sir John looked mockingly at him as he
said: "So now, my fine brother, I have you caught at last." Then he
bade them bring fetters and rivet them on Gamelyn's limbs, and chain
him fast to a post in the centre of the hall. Then he was placed on
his feet with his back to the post and his hands manacled behind him,
and as he stood there the false brother told every person who entered
that Gamelyn had suddenly gone mad, and was chained for safety's sake,
lest he should do himself or others some deadly hurt. For two long
days and nights he stood there bound, with no food or drink, and grew
faint with hunger and weariness, for his fetters were so tight that he
could not sit or lie down; bitterly he lamented the carelessness which
made him fall such an easy prey to his treacherous brother's designs.

Adam Spencer to the Rescue

When all others had left the hall Gamelyn appealed to old Adam
Spencer, the steward of the household, a loyal old servant who had
known Sir John of the Marches, and had watched the boy grow up. "Adam
Spencer," quoth he, "unless my brother is minded to slay me, I am kept
fasting too long. I beseech thee, for the great love my father bore
thee, get the keys and release me from my bonds. I will share all my
free land with thee if thou wilt help me in this distress."

The poor old servant was greatly perplexed. He knew not how to
reconcile his grateful loyalty to his dead master with the loyalty due
to his present lord, and he said doubtfully: "I have served thy
brother for sixteen years, and if I release thee now he will
rightly call me a traitor." "Ah, Adam! thou wilt find him a false
rogue at the last, as I have done. Release me, dear friend Adam, and I
will be true to my agreement, and will keep my covenant to share my
land with thee." By these earnest words the steward was persuaded,
and, waiting till Sir John was safely in bed, managed to obtain
possession of the keys and release Gamelyn, who stretched his arms and
legs and thanked God for his liberty. "Now," said he, "if I were but
well fed no one in this house should bind me again to-night." So Adam
took him to a private room and set food before him; eagerly he ate and
drank till his hunger was satisfied and he began to think of revenge.
"What is your advice, Adam? Shall I go to my brother and strike off
his head? He well merits it."

A Plan of Escape

"No," answered Adam, "I know a better plan than that. Sir John is to
give a great feast on Sunday to many Churchmen and prelates; there
will be present a great number of abbots and priors and other holy
men. Do you stand as if bound by your post in the hall, and beseech
them to release you. If they will be surety for you, your liberty will
be gained with no blame to me; if they all refuse, you shall cast
aside the unlocked chains, and you and I, with two good staves, can
soon win your freedom. Christ's curse on him who fails his comrade!"

"Yes," quoth Gamelyn, "evil may I thrive if I fail in my part of the

bargain! But if we must needs help them to do penance for their sins,
you must warn me, brother Adam, when to begin."

"By St. Charity, master, I will give you good warning. When I wink at
you be ready to cast away your fetters at once and come to me."

"This is good advice of yours, Adam, and blessings on your head. If

these haughty Churchmen refuse to be surety for me I will give them
good strokes in payment."

A Great Feast

Sunday came, and after mass many guests thronged to the feast in the
great hall; they all stared curiously at Gamelyn as he stood with his
hands behind him, apparently chained to his post, and Sir John
explained sadly that he, after slaying the porter and wasting the
household stores, had gone mad, and was obliged to be chained, for his
fury was dangerous. The servants carried dainty dishes round the
table, and beakers of rich wines, but though Gamelyn cried aloud that
he was fasting no food was brought to him. Then he spoke pitifully and
humbly to the noble guests: "Lords, for Christ's sake help a poor
captive out of prison." But the guests were hard-hearted, and answered
cruelly, especially the abbots and priors, who had been deceived by
Sir John's false tales. So harshly did they reply to the youth's
humble petition that he grew angry. "Oh," said he, "that is all the
answer I am to have to my prayer! Now I see that I have no friends.
Cursed be he that ever does good to abbot or prior!"

[Illustration: "Lords, for Christ's sake help poor Gamelyn out of

prison!"]

The Banquet Disturbed

Adam Spencer, busied about the removal of the cloth, looked anxiously
at Gamelyn, and saw how angry he grew. He thought little more of his
service, but, making a pretext to go to the pantry, brought two good
oak staves, and stood them beside the hall door. Then he winked
meaningly at Gamelyn, who with a sudden shout flung off his chains,
rushed to the hall door, seized a staff, and began to lay about him
lustily, whirling his weapon as lightly as if it had been a holy
water sprinkler. There was a dreadful commotion in the hall, for the
portly Churchmen tried to escape, but the mere laymen loved Gamelyn,
and drew aside to give him free play, so that he was able to scatter
the prelates. Now he had no pity on these cruel Churchmen, as they had
been without pity for him; he knocked them over, battered them, broke
their arms and legs, and wrought terrible havoc among them; and during
this time Adam Spencer kept the door so that none might escape. He
called aloud to Gamelyn to respect the sanctity of men of Holy Church
and shed no blood, but if he should by chance break arms and legs
there would be no sacrilege, because no blood need be shed.

Sir John in Chains

Thus Gamelyn worked his will, laying hands on monks and friars, and
sent them home wounded in carts and waggons, while some of them
muttered: "We were better at home, with mere bread and water, than
here where we have had such a sorry feast!" Then Gamelyn turned his
attention to his false brother, who had been unable to escape, seized
him by the neck, broke his backbone with one blow from his staff, and
thrust him, sitting, into the fetters that yet hung from the post
where Gamelyn had stood. "Sit there, brother, and cool thy blood,"
said Gamelyn, as he and Adam sat down to a feast, at which the
servants waited on them eagerly, partly from love and partly from
fear.

The Sheriff's Men Appear

Now the sheriff happened to be only five miles away, and soon heard
the news of this disturbance, and how Gamelyn and Adam had broken the
king's peace; and, as his duty was, he determined to arrest the
law-breakers. Twenty-four of his best men were sent to the castle to
gain admittance and arrest Gamelyn and his steward; but the new
porter, a devoted adherent of Gamelyn, denied them entrance till he
knew their errand; when they refused to tell it, he sent a servant to
rouse Gamelyn and warn him that the sheriff's men stood before the
gate.

"Then answered Gamelyn: 'Good porter, go;

Delay my foes with fair speech at the gate
Till I relieve thee with some cunning wile.
If I o'erlive this strait, I will requite
Thy truth and loyalty. Adam,' quoth he,
'Our foes are on us, and we have no friend--
The sheriff's men surround us, and have sworn
A mighty oath to take us: we must go
Whither our safety calls us.' He replied:
'Go where thou wilt, I follow to the last
Or die forlorn: but this proud sheriffs troop
Will flee before our onset, to the fens.'"

The Sheriff Arrives

As Gamelyn and Adam looked round for weapons the former saw a
cart-staff, a stout post used for propping up the shafts; this he
seized, and ran out at the little postern gate, followed by Adam with
another staff. They caught the sheriff's twenty-four bold men in the
rear, and when Gamelyn had felled three, and Adam two, the rest took
to their heels. "What!" said Adam as they fled. "Drink a draught of my
good wine! I am steward here." "Nay," they shouted back; "such wine as
yours scatters a man's brains far too thoroughly." Now this little
fray was hardly ended before the sheriff came in person with a great
troop. Gamelyn knew not what to do, but Adam again had a plan ready.
"Let us stay no longer, but go to the greenwood: there we shall at
least be at liberty." The advice suited Gamelyn, and each drank a
draught of wine, mounted his steed, and lightly rode away, leaving
the empty nest for the sheriff, with no eggs therein. However, that
officer dismounted, entered the hall, and found Sir John fettered and
nearly dying. He released him, and summoned a leech, who healed his
grievous wound, and enabled him to do more mischief.

Gamelyn Goes to the Greenwood

Meanwhile Adam wandered with Gamelyn in the greenwood, and found it

very hard work, with little food. He complained aloud to his young
lord:

"'Would I were back in mine old stewardship--

Full blithe were I, the keys to bear and keep!
I like not this wild wood, with wounding thorns,
And nought of food or drink, or restful ease.'
'Ah! Adam,' answered Gamelyn, 'in sooth
Full many a good man's son feels bitter woe!
Then cheer thee, Adam.'"

[Illustration: "Then cheer thee, Adam"]

As they spoke sadly together Gamelyn heard men's voices near by, and,
looking through the bushes, saw seven score young men, sitting round a
plentiful feast, spread on the green grass. He rejoiced greatly,
bidding Adam remember that "Boot cometh after bale," and pointing out
to him the abundance of provisions near at hand. Adam longed for a
good meal, for they had found little to eat since they came to the
greenwood. At that moment the master-outlaw saw them in the underwood,
and bade his young men bring to him these new guests whom God had
sent: perchance, he said, there were others besides these two. The
seven bold youths who started up to do his will cried to the two
new-comers: "Yield and hand us your bows and arrows!" "Much sorrow may
he have who yields to you," cried Gamelyn. "Why, with five more ye
would be only twelve, and I could fight you all." When the outlaws
saw how boldly he bore himself they changed their tone, and said
mildly: "Come to our master, and tell him thy desire." "Who is your
master?" quoth Gamelyn. "He is the crowned king of the outlaws," quoth
they; and the two strangers were led away to the chief.

The master-outlaw, sitting on a rustic throne, with a crown of

oak-leaves on his head, asked them their business, and Gamelyn
replied: "He must needs walk in the wood who may not walk in the town.
We are hungry and faint, and will only shoot the deer for food, for we
are hard bestead and in great danger."

Gamelyn Joins the Outlaws

The outlaw leader had pity on their distress, and gave them food; and
as they ate ravenously the outlaws whispered one to another: "This is
Gamelyn!" "This is Gamelyn!" Understanding all the evils that had
befallen him, their leader soon made Gamelyn his second in command;
and when after three weeks the outlaw king was pardoned and allowed to
return home, Gamelyn was chosen to succeed him and was crowned king of
the outlaws. So he dwelt merrily in the forest, and troubled not
himself about the world outside.
The Law at Work

Meanwhile the treacherous Sir John had recovered, and in due course
had become sheriff, and indicted his brother for felony. As Gamelyn
did not appear to answer the indictment he was proclaimed an outlaw
and wolf's-head, and a price was set upon his life. Now his bondmen
and vassals were grieved at this, for they feared the cruelty of the
wicked sheriff; they therefore sent messengers to Gamelyn to tell him
the ill news, and deprecate his wrath. The youth's anger rose at the
tidings, and he promised to come and beard Sir John in his hall and
protect his own tenants.

Gamelyn Arrested

It was certainly a stroke of rash daring thus to venture into the

county where his brother was sheriff, but he strode boldly into the
moot-hall, with his hood thrown back, so that all might recognise him,
and cried aloud: "God save all you lordings here present! But, thou
broken-backed sheriff, evil mayst thou thrive! Why hast thou done me
such wrong and disgrace as to have me indicted and proclaimed an
outlaw?" Sir John did not hesitate to use his legal powers, but,
seeing his brother was quite alone, had him arrested and cast into
prison, whence it was his intention that only death should release
him.

Otho as Surety

All these years the second brother, Otho, had lived quietly on his own
lands and taken no heed of the quarrels of the two others; but now,
when news came to him of Sir John's deadly hatred to their youngest
brother, and Gamelyn's desperate plight, he was deeply grieved, roused
himself from his peaceful life, and rode to see if he could help his
brother. First he besought Sir John's mercy for the prisoner, for the
sake of brotherhood and family love; but he only replied that Gamelyn
must stay imprisoned till the justice should hold the next assize.
Then Otho offered to be bail, if only his young brother might be
released from his bonds and brought from the dismal dungeon where he
lay. To this Sir John finally consented, warning Otho that if the
accused failed to appear before the justice he himself must suffer the
penalty for the breach of bail. "I agree," said Otho. "Have him
released at once, and deliver him to me." Then Gamelyn was set free
on his brother's surety, and the two rode home to Otho's house,
talking sadly of all that had befallen, and how Gamelyn had become
king of the outlaws. The next morning Gamelyn asked Otho's permission
to go to the greenwood and see how his young men fared but Otho
pointed out so clearly how dreadful would be the consequences to him
if he did not return that the young man vowed:

"'I swear by James, the mighty saint of Spain,

That I will not desert thee, nor will fail
To stand my trial on the appointed day,
If God Almighty give me strength and health
And power to keep my vow. I will be there,
That I may show what bitter hate Sir John,
My cruel brother, holds against me.'"
Gamelyn Goes to the Woods

Thereupon Otho bade him go. "God shield thee from shame! Come when
thou seest it is the right time, and save us both from blame and
reproach." So Gamelyn went gaily to the merry greenwood, and found his
company of outlaws; and so much had they to tell of their work in his
absence, and so much had he to relate of his adventures, that time
slipped by, and he soon fell again into his former mode of life, and
his custom of robbing none but Churchmen, fat abbots and priors, monks
and canons, so that all others spoke good of him, and called him the
"courteous outlaw."

The Term Expires

Gamelyn stood one day looking out over the woods and fields, and it
suddenly came to his mind with a pang of self-reproach that he had
forgotten his promise to Otho, and the day of the assize was very
near. He called his young men (for he had learned not to trust
himself to the honour or loyalty of his brother the sheriff), and
bade them prepare to accompany him to the place of assize, sending
Adam on as a scout to learn tidings. Adam returned in great haste,
bringing sad news. The judge was in his place, a jury empanelled to
condemn Gamelyn to death, bribed thereto by the wicked sheriff, and
Otho was fettered in the gaol in place of his brother. The news
enraged Gamelyn, but Adam Spencer was even more infuriated; he would
gladly have held the doors of the moot-hall and slain every person
inside except Otho; but his master's sense of justice was too strong
for that. "Adam," he said, "we will not do so, but will slay the
guilty and let the innocent escape. I myself will have some
conversation with the justice in the hall; and meanwhile do ye, my
men, hold the doors fast. I will make myself justice to-day, and thou,
Adam, shalt be my clerk. We will give sentence this day, and God speed
our new work!" All his men applauded this speech and promised him
obedience, and the troop of outlaws hastened to surround the hall.

Gamelyn in the Court

Once again Gamelyn strode into the moot-hall in the midst of his
enemies, and was recognised by all. He released Otho, who said gently:
"Brother, thou hast nearly overstayed the time; the sentence has been
given against me that I shall be hanged."

"Brother," said Gamelyn, "this day shall thy foes and mine be hanged:
the sheriff, the justice, and the wicked jurors." Then Gamelyn turned
to the judge, who sat as if paralysed in his seat of judgment, and
said:

"'Come from the seat of justice: all too oft

Hast thou polluted law's clear stream with wrong;
Too oft hast taken reward against the poor;
Too oft hast lent thine aid to villainy,
And given judgment 'gainst the innocent.
Come down and meet thine own meed at the bar,
While I, in thy place, give more rightful doom
And see that justice dwells in law for once.'"

[Illustration: "Come from the seat of justice"]

A Scene

The justice sat still, dumb with astonishment, and Gamelyn struck him
fiercely, cut his cheek, and threw him over the bar so that his arm
broke; and no man durst withstand the outlaw, for fear of his company
standing at the doors. The youth sat down in the judge's seat, with
Otho beside him, and Adam in the clerk's desk; and he placed in the
dock the false sheriff, the justice, and the unjust jurors, and
accused them of wrong and attempted murder. In order to keep up the
forms of law, he empanelled a jury of his own young men, who brought
in a verdict of "Guilty," and the prisoners were all condemned to
death and hanged out of hand, though the false sheriff attempted to
appeal to the brotherly affection of which he had shown so little.

Honour from the King

After this high-handed punishment of their enemies Gamelyn and his

brother went to lay their case before King Edward, and he forgave
them, in consideration of all the wrongs and injuries Gamelyn had
suffered; and before they returned to their distant county the king
made Otho sheriff of the county, and Gamelyn chief forester of all his
free forests; his band of outlaws were all pardoned, and the king gave
them posts according to their capabilities. Now Gamelyn and his
brother settled down to a happy, peaceful life. Otho, having no son,
made Gamelyn his heir, and the latter married a beauteous lady, and
lived with her in joy till his life's end.

CHAPTER XI: WILLIAM OF CLOUDESLEE

Introduction

The outlaw of medi�val England has always possessed a potent charm for
the minds of less rebellious persons. No doubt now the attraction has
somewhat waned, for in the exploration of distant lands and the study
of barbaric tribes men can find that breadth of outlook, that escape
from narrow conventionalities, which they could formerly gain only by
the cult of the "noble outlaw." The romance of life for many a worthy
citizen must have been found in secret sympathy with Robin Hood and
his merry band of banished men, robbing the purse-proud to help the
needy and gaily defying law and authority.

To the poor, however, the outlaw was something more than an easy
entrance to the realms of romance; he was a real embodiment of the
spirit of liberty. Of all the unjust laws which the Norman conquerors
laid upon England, perhaps the most bitterly resented were the forest
laws, and resistance to them was the most popular form of national
independence. Hence it follows that we find outlaw heroes popular very
early in our history--heroes who stand in the mind of the populace for
justice and true liberty against the oppressive tyranny of subordinate
officials, and who are always taken into favour by the king, the fount
of true justice.
Famous Outlaws

There is some slight tinge of the "outlaw hero" in Hereward, but the
outlaw period of that patriot's life is but an episode in his defence
of England against William the Norman. There is a fully developed
outlaw hero, the ideal of the type, in Robin Hood, but he has been
somewhat idealized and ennobled by being transformed into a banished
Earl of Huntingdon. Less known, but equally heroic, is William of
Cloudeslee, the William Tell of England, whose fame is that of a good
yeoman, a good archer, and a good patriot.

The Outlaws

In the green forest of Englewood, in the "North Countree," not far

from the fortified town of Carlisle, dwelt a merry band of outlaws.
They were not evildoers, but sturdy archers and yeomen, whose outlawry
had been incurred only for shooting the king's deer. Indeed, to most
men of that time--that is, to most men who were not in the royal
service--the shooting of deer, and the pursuit of game in general,
were not only venial offences, but the most natural thing in life. The
royal claim to exclusive hunting in the vast forests of Epping,
Sherwood, Needwood, Barnesdale, Englewood, and many others seemed
preposterous to the yeomen who lived on the borders of the forests,
and they took their risks and shot the deer and made venison pasty,
convinced that they were wronging no one and risking only their own
lives. They had the help and sympathy of many a man who was himself a
law-abiding citizen, as well as the less understanding help of the
town mob and the labourers in the country.

The Leaders

While the outlaws of merry Sherwood recognised no chief but Robin Hood
and no foe but the Sheriff of Nottingham, the outlaws of Englewood
were under the headship of three famous archers, brothers-in-arms
sworn to stand by each other, but not brothers in blood. Their names
were Adam Bell, William of Cloudeslee, and Clym of the Cleugh; and of
the three William of Cloudeslee alone was married. His wife, fair
Alice of Cloudeslee, dwelt in a strong house within the walls of
Carlisle, with her three children, for they were not included in
William's outlawry. It was possible thus for her to send her husband
warning of any attack planned by the Sheriff of Carlisle on the
outlaws, and she had saved him and his comrades from surprise already.

William Goes to Carlisle

When the blithe spring had come, and the forest was beautiful with its
fresh green leaves, William began to long for his home and family; he
had not ventured into Carlisle for some time, and it was more than six
months since he had seen his wife's face. Little wonder was it, then,
that he announced his intention of visiting his home, at the risk of
capture by his old enemy the Sheriff. In vain his comrades dissuaded
him from the venture. Adam Bell was especially urgent in his advice
that William should remain in the greenwood.

"You shall not go to Carlisle, brother, by my advice, nor with my

consent. If the sheriff or the justice should know that you are in the
town short would be your shrift and soon your span of life would end.
Stay with us, and we will fetch you tidings of your wife."

William replied: "Nay, I must go myself; I cannot rest content with

tidings only. If all is well I will return by prime to-morrow, and if
I fail you at that hour you may be sure I am taken or slain; and I
pray you guard well my family, if that be so."

Taking leave of his brother outlaws, William made his way unobserved
into the town and came to his wife's dwelling. It was closely shut,
with doors strongly bolted, and he was forced to knock long on the
window before his wife opened the shutter to see who was the
importunate visitor.

"Let me in quickly, my own Alice," he said. "I have come to see you
and my three children. How have you fared this long time?"

"Alas!" she replied, hurriedly admitting him, and bolting the door
again, "why have you come now, risking your dear life to gain news of
us? Know you not that this house has been watched for more than six
months, so eager are the sheriff and the justice to capture and hang
you? I would have come to you in the forest, or sent you word of our
welfare. I fear--oh, how I fear!--lest your coming be known!"

The Old Woman's Treachery

"Now that I am here, let us make merry," quoth William. "No man has
seen me enter, and I would fain enjoy my short stay with you and my
children, for I must be back in the forest by prime to-morrow. Can you
not give a hungry outlaw food and drink?"

Then Dame Alice bustled about and prepared the best she had for her
husband; and when all was ready a very happy little family sat down to
the meal, husband and wife talking cheerily together, while the
children watched in wondering silence the father who had been away so
long and came to them so seldom.

There was one inmate of the house who saw in William's return a means
of making shameful profit. She was an old bedridden woman, apparently
paralysed, whom he had rescued from utter poverty seven years before.
During all that time she had lain on a bed near the fire, had shared
all the life of the family, and had never once moved from her couch.
Now, while husband and wife talked together and the darkness deepened
in the room, this old impostor slipped from her bed and glided
stealthily out of the house.

News Brought to the Sheriff

It happened that the king's assize was being held just then in
Carlisle, and the sheriff and his staunch ally the justice were
sitting together in the Justice Hall. Thither this treacherous old
woman hurried with all speed and pushed into the hall, forcing her way
through the crowd till she came near the sheriff. "Ha! what would you,
good woman?" asked he, surprised. "Sir, I bring tidings of great
value." "Tell your tidings, and I shall see if they be of value or no.
If they are I will reward you handsomely." "Sir, this night William of
Cloudeslee has come into Carlisle, and is even now in his wife's
house. He is all alone, and you can take him easily. Now what will you
pay me, for I am sure this news is much to you?" "You say truth, good
woman. That bold outlaw is the worst of all who kill the king's deer
in his forest of Englewood, and if I could but catch him I should be
well content. Dame, you shall not go without a recompense for your
journey here and for your loyalty." The sheriff then bade his men give
the old woman a piece of scarlet cloth, dyed in grain, enough for a
gown, and the treacherous hag hid the gift under her cloak, hastened
away to Alice's house, and slipped unperceived into her place again,
hiding the scarlet cloth under the bed-coverings.

The Hue and Cry

Immediately he had heard of Cloudeslee's presence in Carlisle the

sheriff sent out the hue and cry, and with all speed raised the whole
town, for though none hated the outlaws men dared not refuse to obey
the king's officer. The justice, too, joined the sheriff in the
congenial task of capturing an outlaw whose condemnation was already
pronounced. With all the forces at their disposal, sheriff and justice
took their way towards the house where William and Alice unconscious
of the danger besetting them, still talked lovingly together.

Suddenly the outlaw's ears, sharpened by woodcraft and by constant

danger, heard a growing noise coming nearer and nearer. He knew the
sound of the footsteps of many people, and among the casual shuffling
of feet recognised the ominous tramp of soldiers.

"Wife, we are betrayed," cried William. "Hither comes the sheriff to

take me."

The Siege of the House

Alice ran quickly up to her bedchamber and opened a window looking to

the back, and saw, to her despair, that soldiers beset the house on
every side and filled all the neighbouring streets. Behind them
pressed a great throng of citizens, who seemed inclined to leave the
capture of the outlaw to the guard. At the same moment William from
the front called to his wife that the sheriff and justice were
besieging the house on that side.

"Alas! dear husband, what shall we do?" cried Alice. "Accursed be all
treason! But who can have betrayed you to your foes? Go into my
bedchamber, dear William, and defend yourself there, for it is the
strongest room in the house. The children and I will go with you, and
I will guard the door while you defend the windows."

The plan was speedily carried out, and while William took his stand by
the window Alice seized a pole-axe and stationed herself by the door.
"No man shall enter this door alive while I live," said she.

The Attack

From the window Cloudeslee could perceive his mortal enemies the
justice and the sheriff; and drawing his good longbow, he shot with
deadly aim fair at the breast of the justice. It was well for the
latter then that he wore a suit of good chain-mail under his robes;
the arrow hit his breast and split in three on the mail.

"Beshrew the man that clad you with that mail coat! You would have
been a dead man now if your coat had been no thicker than mine," said
William.

"Yield yourself, Cloudeslee, and lay down your bow and arrows," said
the justice. "You cannot escape, for we have you safe."

"Never shall my husband yield; it is evil counsel you give," exclaimed

the brave wife from her post at the door.

The House is Burnt

The sheriff, who grew more angered as the hours passed on and
Cloudeslee was not taken, now cried aloud: "Why do we waste time
trifling here? The man is an outlaw and his life is forfeit. Let us
burn him and his house, and if his wife and children will not leave
him they shall all burn together, for it is their own choice."

This cruel plan was soon carried out. Fire was set to the door and
wooden shutters, and the flames spread swiftly; the smoke rolled up in
thick clouds into the lofty bedchamber, where the little children,
crouching on the ground, began to weep for fear.

"Alas! must we all die?" cried fair Alice, grieving for her children.

William opened the window and looked out, but there was no chance of
escape; his foes filled every street and lane around the house.
"Surely they will spare my wife and babes," he thought; and, tearing
the sheets from the bed, he made a rope, with which he let down to the
ground his children, and last of all his weeping wife.

He called aloud to the sheriff: "Sir Sheriff, here have I trusted to

you my chief treasures. For God's sake do them no harm, but wreak all
your wrath on me!"

Gentle hands received Alice and her babes, and friendly citizens led
them from the press; but Alice went reluctantly, in utter grief,
knowing that her husband must be burnt with his house or taken by his
foes; but for her children she would have stayed with him. William
continued his wonderful archery, never missing his aim, till all his
arrows were spent, and the flames came so close that his bowstring was
burnt in two. Great blazing brands came falling upon him from the
burning roof, and the floor was hot beneath his feet. "An evil death
is this!" thought he. "Better it were that I should take sword and
buckler and leap down amid my foes and so die, striking good blows in
the throng of enemies, than stay here and let them see me burn."

[Illustration: "William continued his wonderful archery"]

Thereupon he leaped lightly down, and fought so fiercely that he

nearly escaped through the throng, for the worthy citizens of Carlisle
were not anxious to capture him; but the soldiers, urged by the
sheriff and justice, threw doors and windows upon him, hampered his
blows, and seized and bound him, and cast him into a deep dungeon.
The Sheriff Gives Sentence

"Now, William of Cloudeslee," quoth the sheriff, "you shall be hanged

with speed, as soon as I can have a new gallows made. So noted an
outlaw merits no common gibbet; a new one is most fitting.
To-morrow at prime you shall die. There is no hope of rescue, for the
gates of the town shall be shut. Your dear friends, Adam Bell and Clym
of the Cleugh, would be helpless to save you, though they brought a
thousand more like themselves, or even all the devils in Hell."

Early next morning the justice arose, went to the soldiers who guarded
the gates, and forbade them to open till the execution was over; then
he went to the market-place and superintended the erection of a
specially lofty gallows, beside the pillory.

News is Brought to the Greenwood

Among the crowd who watched the gallows being raised was a little lad,
the town swineherd, who asked a bystander the meaning of the new
gibbet.

"It is put up to hang a good yeoman, William of Cloudeslee, more's the

pity! He has done no wrong but kill the King's deer, and that merits
not hanging. It is a foul shame that such injustice can be wrought in
the king's name."

The little lad had often met William of Cloudeslee in the forest, and
had carried him messages from his wife; William had given the boy many
a dinner of venison, and now he determined to help his friend if he
could. The gates were shut and no man could pass out, but the boy
stole along the wall till he found a crevice, by which he clambered
down outside. Then he hastened to the forest of Englewood, and met
Adam Bell and Clym of the Cleugh.

"Come quickly, good yeomen; ye tarry here too long. While you are at
ease in the greenwood your friend, William of Cloudeslee, is taken,
condemned to death, and ready to be hanged. He needs your help this
very hour."

Adam Bell groaned. "Ah! if he had but taken our advice he would have
been here in safety with us now. In the greenwood there is no sorrow
or care, but when William went to the town he was running into
trouble." Then, bending his bow, he shot with unerring aim a hart,
which he gave to the lad as recompense for his labour and goodwill.

The Outlaws Go to Carlisle

"Come," said Clym to Adam Bell, "let us tarry no longer, but take our
bows and arrows and see what we can do. By God's grace we will rescue
our brother, though we may abide it full dearly ourselves. We will go
to Carlisle without delay."

The morning was fair as the two yeomen strode from the deep green
shades of Englewood Forest along the hard white road leading to
Carlisle Town. They were in time as yet, but when they drew near the
wall they were amazed to see that no entrance or exit was possible;
the gates were shut fast.

Stepping back into the green thickets beside the road, the two outlaws
consulted together. Adam Bell was for a valiant attempt to storm the
gate, but Clym suddenly bethought him of a wiser plan.

Clym's Stratagem

Said he: "Let us pretend to be messengers from the king, with urgent
letters to the justice. Surely that should win us admission. But alas!
I forgot. How can we bear out our pretence, for I am no learned clerk.
I cannot write."

Quoth Adam Bell: "I can write a good clerkly hand. Wait one instant
and I will speedily have a letter written; then we can say we have the
king's seal. The plan will do well enough, for I hold the gate-keeper
no learned clerk, and this will deceive him."

[Illustration: Adam Bell writes the letter]

Indeed, the letter which he quickly wrote and folded and sealed was
very well and clearly written, and addressed to the Justice of
Carlisle. Then the two bold outlaws hastened up the road and thundered
on the town gates.

They Enter the Town

So long and loud they knocked that the warder came in great wrath,
demanding who dared to make such clamour.

Adam Bell replied: "We are two messengers come straight from our lord
the king." Clym of the Cleugh added: "We have a letter for the justice
which we must deliver into his own hands. Let us in speedily to
perform our errand, for we must return to the king in haste."

"No," the warder replied, "that I cannot do. No man may enter these
gates till a false thief and outlaw be safely hanged. He is William of
Cloudeslee, who has long deserved death."

Now Clym saw that matters were becoming desperate, and time was
passing too quickly, so he adopted a more violent tone. "Ah, rascal,
scoundrel, madman!" quoth he. "If we be delayed here any longer thou
shalt be hanged for a false thief! To keep the king's messengers
waiting thus! Canst thou not see the king's seal? Canst thou not read
the address of the royal letter? Ah, blockhead, thou shalt dearly
abide this delay when my lord knows thereof."

Thus speaking, he flourished the forged letter, with its false seal,
in the porter's face; and the man, seeing the seal and the writing,
believed what was told him. Reverently he took off his hood and bent
the knee to the king's messengers, for whom he opened wide the gates,
and they entered, walking warily.

They Keep the Gates

"At last we are within Carlisle walls, and glad thereof are we," said
Adam Bell, "but when and how we shall go out again Christ only knows,
who harrowed Hell and brought out its prisoners."

"Now if we had the keys ourselves we should have a good chance of

life," said Clym, "for then we could go in and out at our own will."
"Let us call the warder," said Adam. When he came running at their
call both the yeomen sprang upon him, flung him to the ground, bound
him hand and foot, and cast him into a dark cell, taking his bunch of
keys from his girdle. Adam laughed and shook the heavy keys. "Now I am
gate-ward of merry Carlisle. See, here are my keys. I think I shall be
the worst warder they have had for three hundred years. Let us bend
our bows and hold our arrows ready, and walk into the town to deliver
our brother."

The Fight in the Market-place

When they came to the market-place they found a dense crowd of

sympathizers watching pityingly the hangman's cart, in which lay
William of Cloudeslee, bound hand and foot, with a rope round his
neck. The sheriff and the justice stood near the gallows, and
Cloudeslee would have been hanged already, but that the sheriff was
hiring a man to measure the outlaw for his grave. "You shall have the
dead man's clothes, good fellow, if you make his grave," said he.

Cloudeslee's courage was still undaunted. "I have seen as great a

marvel ere now," quoth he, "as that a man who digs a grave for another
may lie in it himself, in as short a time as from now to prime."

"You speak proudly, my fine fellow, but hanged you shall be, if I do
it with my own hand," retorted the sheriff furiously.

Now the cart moved a little nearer to the scaffold, and William was
raised up to be ready for execution. As he looked round the dense mass
of faces his keen sight soon made him aware of his friends. Adam Bell
and Clym of the Cleugh stood at one corner of the market-place with
arrow on string, and their deadly aim bent at the sheriff and justice,
whose horses raised them high above the murmuring throng. Cloudeslee
showed no surprise, but said aloud: "Lo! I see comfort, and hope to
fare well in my journey. Yet if I might have my hands free I would
care little what else befell me."

The Rescue

Now Adam said quietly to Clym: "Brother, do you take the justice, and
I will shoot the sheriff. Let us both loose at once and leave them
dying. It is an easy shot, though a long one."

Thus, while the sheriff yet waited for William to be measured for his
grave, suddenly men heard the twang of bowstrings and the whistling
flight of arrows through the air, and at the same moment both sheriff
and justice fell writhing from their steeds, with the grey goose
feathers standing in their breasts. All the bystanders fled from the
dangerous neighbourhood, and left the gallows, the fatal cart, and the
mortally wounded officials alone. The two bold outlaws rushed to
release their comrade, cut his bonds, and lifted him to his feet.
William seized an axe from a soldier and pursued the fleeing guard,
while his two friends with their deadly arrows slew a man at each
shot.

The Mayor of Carlisle

When the arrows were all used Adam Bell and Clym of the Cleugh threw
away their bows and took to sword and buckler. The fight continued
till midday for in the narrow streets the three comrades protected
each other, and drew gradually towards the gate. Adam Bell still
carried the keys at his girdle, and they could pass out easily if they
could but once reach the gateway. By this time the whole town was in a
commotion; again the hue and cry had been raised against the outlaws,
and the Mayor of Carlisle came in person with a mighty troop of armed
citizens, angered now at the fighting in the streets of the town.

The three yeomen retreated as steadily as they could towards the gate,
but the mayor followed valiantly armed with a pole-axe, with which he
clove Cloudeslee's shield in two. He soon perceived the object of the
outlaws, and bade his men guard the gates well, so that the three
should not escape.

The Escape from Carlisle

Terrible was the din in the town now, for trumpets blew, church-bells
were rung backward, women bewailed their dead in the streets, and over
all resounded the clash of arms, as the fighting drew nigh the gate.
When the gatehouse came in sight the outlaws were fighting
desperately, with diminishing strength, but the thought of safety
outside the walls gave them force to make one last stand. With backs
to the gate and faces to the foe, Adam and Clym and William made a
valiant onslaught on the townsfolk, who fled in terror, leaving a
breathing-space in which Adam Bell turned the key, flung open the
great ponderous gate, and flung it to again, when the three had passed
through.

[Illustration: The fight at the gate]

Adam and the Keys

As Adam locked the door they could hear inside the town the
hurrying footsteps of the rallying citizens, whose furious attack on
the great iron-studded door came too late. The door was locked, and
the three friends stood in safety outside, with their pleasant forest
home within easy reach. The change of feeling was so intense that Adam
Bell, always the man to seize the humorous point of a situation,
laughed lightly. He called through the barred wicket:

"Here are your keys. I resign my office as warder--one half-day's work

is enough for me; and as I have resigned, and the former gate-ward is
somewhat damaged and has disappeared, I advise you to find a new one.
Take your keys, and much good may you get from them. Next time I
advise you not to stop an honest yeoman from coming to see his own
wife and have a chat with her."

Thereupon he flung the keys over the gate on the heads of the crowd,
and the three brethren slipped away into the forest to their own
haunts, where they found fresh bows and arrows in such abundance that
they longed to be back in fair Carlisle with their foes before them.

William of Cloudeslee and his Wife Meet

While they were yet discussing all the details of the rescue they
heard a woman's pitiful lament and the crying of little children.
"Hark!" said Cloudeslee, and they all heard in the silence the words
she said. It was William's wife, and she cried: "Alas! why did I not
die before this day? Woe is me that my dear husband is slain! He is
dead, and I have no friend to lament with me. If only I could see his
comrades and tell what has befallen him my heart would be eased of
some of its pain."

William, as he listened, was deeply touched, and walked gently to

fair Alice, as she hid her face in her hands and wept. "Welcome, wife,
to the greenwood!" quoth he. "By heaven, I never thought to see you
again when I lay in bonds last night." Dame Alice sprang up most
joyously. "Oh, all is well with me now you are here; I have no care or
woe." "For that you must thank my dear brethren, Adam and Clym," said
he; and Alice began to load them with her thanks, but Adam cut short
the expression of her gratitude. "No need to talk about a little
matter like that," he said gruffly. "If we want any supper we had
better kill something, for the meat we must eat is yet running wild."

With three such good archers game was easily shot and a merry meal was
quickly prepared in the greenwood, and all joyfully partook of venison
and other dainties. Throughout the repast William devotedly waited on
his wife with deepest love and reverence, for he could not forget how
she had defended him and risked her life to stand by him.

William's Proposed Visit to London

When the meal was over, and they reclined on the green turf round the
fire, William began thoughtfully:

"It is in my mind that we ought speedily to go to London and try to

win our pardon from the king. Unless we approach him before news can
be brought from Carlisle he will assuredly slay us. Let us go at once,
leaving my dear wife and my two youngest sons in a convent here; but I
would fain take my eldest boy with me. If all goes well he can bring
good news to Alice in her nunnery, and if all goes ill he shall bring
her my last wishes. But I am sure I am not meant to die by the law."
His brethren approved the plan, and they took fair Alice and her two
youngest children to the nunnery, and then the three famous archers
with the little boy of seven set out at their best speed for London,
watching the passers-by carefully, that no news of the doings in
Carlisle should precede them to the king.

Outlaws in the Royal Palace

The three yeomen, on arriving in London, made their way at once to the
king's palace, and walked boldly into the hall, regardless of the
astonished and indignant shouts of the royal porter. He followed them
angrily into the hall, and began reproaching them and trying to induce
them to withdraw, but to no purpose. Finally an usher came and said:
"Yeomen, what is your wish? Pray tell me, and I will help you if I
can; but if you enter the king's presence thus unmannerly you will
cause us to be blamed. Tell me now whence you come."

William fearlessly answered: "Sir, we will tell the truth without

deceit. We are outlaws from the king's forests, outlawed for killing
the king's deer, and we come to beg for pardon and a charter of peace,
to show to the sheriff of our county."

The King and the Outlaws

The usher went to an inner room and begged to know the king's will,
whether he would see these outlaws or not. The king was interested in
these bold yeomen, who dared to avow themselves law-breakers, and bade
men bring them to audience with him. The three comrades, with the
little boy, on being introduced into the royal presence, knelt down
and held up their hands, beseeching pardon for their offences.

"Sire, we beseech your pardon for our breach of your laws. We are
forest outlaws, who have slain your fallow deer in many parts of your
royal forests." "Your names? Tell me at once," said the king. "Adam
Bell, Clym of the Cleugh, and William of Cloudeslee," they replied.

The king was very wrathful. "Are you those bold robbers of whom men
have told me? Do you now dare to come to me for pardon? On mine honour
I vow that you shall all three be hanged without mercy, as I am
crowned king of this realm of England. Arrest them and lay them in
bonds." There was no resistance possible, and the yeomen submitted
ruefully to their arrest. Adam Bell was the first to speak. "As I hope
to thrive, this game pleases me not at all," he said. "Sire, of your
mercy, we beg you to remember that we came to you of our own free
will, and to let us pass away again as freely. Give us back our
weapons and let us have free passage till we have left your palace; we
ask no more; we shall never ask another favour, however long we live."

The king was obdurate, however; he only replied: "You speak proudly
still, but you shall all three be hanged."

The Queen Intercedes

The queen, who was sitting beside her husband, now spoke for the first
time. "Sire, it were a pity that such good yeomen should die, if they
might in any wise be pardoned." "There is no pardon," said the king.
She then replied: "My lord, when I first left my native land and came
into this country as your bride you promised to grant me at once the
first boon I asked. I have never needed to ask one until to-day, but
now, sire, I claim one, and I beg you to grant it." "With all my
heart; ask your boon, and it shall be yours willingly." "Then, I pray
you, grant me the lives of these good yeomen." "Madam, you might have
had half my kingdom, and you ask a worthless trifle." "Sire, it seems
not worthless to me; I beg you to keep your promise." "Madam, it vexes
me that you have asked so little; yet since you will have these three
outlaws, take them." The queen rejoiced greatly. "Many thanks, my lord
and husband. I will be surety for them that they shall be true men
henceforth. But, good my lord, give them a word of comfort, that they
may not be wholly dismayed by your anger."
News Comes to the King

The king smiled at his wife. "Ah, madam! you will have your own way,
as all women will. Go, fellows, wash yourselves, and find places at
the tables, where you shall dine well enough, even if it be not on
venison pasty from the king's own forests."

The outlaws did reverence to the king and queen, and found seats with
the king's guard at the lower tables in the hall. They were still
satisfying their appetites when a messenger came in haste to the king;
and the three North Countrymen looked at one another uneasily, for
they knew the man was from Carlisle. The messenger knelt before the
king and presented his letters. "Sire, your officers greet you well."

"How fare they? How does my valiant sheriff? And the prudent justice?
Are they well?"

"Alas! my lord, they have been slain, and many another good officer
with them."

"Who hath done this?" questioned the king angrily.

"My lord, three bold outlaws, Adam Bell, Clym of the Cleugh, and
William of Cloudeslee."

"What! these three whom I have just pardoned? Ah, sorely I repent that
I forgave them! I would give a thousand pounds if I could have them
hanged all three; but I cannot."

The King's Test

As the king read the letters his anger and surprise increased. It
seemed impossible that three men should overawe a whole town, should
slay sheriff, justice, mayor, and nearly every official in the town,
forge a royal letter with the king's seal, and then lock the gates and
escape safely. There was no doubt of the fact, and the king raged
impotently against his own foolish mercy in giving them a free pardon.
It had been granted, however, and he could do nought but grieve over
the ruin they had wrought in Carlisle. At last he sprang up, for he
could endure the banquet no longer.

"Call my archers to go to the butts," he commanded. "I will see these

bold outlaws shoot, and try if their archery is so fine as men say."

Accordingly the king's archers and the queen's archers arrayed

themselves, and the three yeomen took their bows and looked well to
their silken bowstrings; and then all made their way to the butts
where the targets were set up. The archers shot in turn, aiming at an
ordinary target, but Cloudeslee soon grew weary of this childish
sport, and said aloud: "I shall never call a man a good archer who
shoots at a target as large as a buckler. We have another sort of butt
in my country, and that is worth shooting at."

William of Cloudeslee's Archery

"Make ready your own butts," the king commanded, and the three outlaws
went to a bush in a field close by and returned bearing hazel-rods,
peeled and shining white. These rods they set up at four hundred
yards apart, and, standing by one, they said to the king: "We should
account a man a fair archer if he could split one wand while standing
beside the other." "It cannot be done; the feat is too great,"
exclaimed the king. "Sire, I can easily do it," quoth Cloudeslee, and,
taking aim very carefully, he shot, and the arrow split the wand in
two. "In truth," said the king, "you are the best archer I have ever
seen. Can you do greater wonders?" "Yes," quoth Cloudeslee, "one thing
more I can do, but it is a more difficult feat. Nevertheless I will
try it, to show you our North Country shooting." "Try, then," the king
replied; "but if you fail you shall be hanged without mercy, because
of your boasting."

Cloudeslee Shoots the Apple from his Son's Head

Now Cloudeslee stood for a few moments as if doubtful of himself, and

the South Country archers watched him, hoping for a chance to retrieve
their defeat, when William suddenly said: "I have a son, a dear son,
seven years of age. I will tie him to a stake and place an apple on
his head. Then from a distance of a hundred and twenty yards I will
split the apple in two with a broad arrow." "By heaven!" the king
cried, "that is a dreadful feat. Do as you have said, or by Him who
died on the Cross I will hang you high. Do as you have said, but if
you touch one hair of his head, or the edge of his gown, I will hang
you and your two companions." "I have never broken my pledged word,"
said the North Country bowman, and he at once made ready for the
terrible trial. The stake was set in the ground, the boy tied to it,
with his face turned from his father, lest he should give a start and
destroy his aim. Cloudeslee then paced the hundred and twenty yards,
anxiously felt his string, bent his bow, chose his broadest arrow, and
fitted it with care.

[Illustration: William of Cloudeslee and his son]

The Last Shot

It was an anxious moment. The throng of spectators felt sick with

expectation, and many women wept and prayed for the father and his
innocent son. But Cloudeslee showed no fear. He addressed the crowd
gravely: "Good folk, stand all as still as may be. For such a shot a
man needs a steady hand, and your movements may destroy my aim and
make me slay my son. Pray for me."

Then, in an unbroken silence of breathless suspense, the bold marksman

shot, and the apple fell to the ground, cleft into two absolutely
equal halves. A cheer from every spectator burst forth deafeningly,
and did not die down till the king beckoned for silence.

The King and Queen Show Favour

"God forbid that I should ever be your target," quoth he. "You shall
be my chief forester in the North Country, with daily wage, and daily
right of killing venison; your two brethren shall become yeomen of my
guard, and I will advance the fortunes of your family in every way."

The queen smiled graciously upon William, and she bestowed a pension
upon him, and bade him bring his wife, fair Alice, to court, to take
up the post of chief woman of the bedchamber to the royal children.

Overwhelmed with these favours, the three yeomen became conscious of

their own offences, more than they had told to the royal pair; their
awakened consciences sent them to a holy bishop, who heard their
confessions, gave them penance and bade them live well for the
future, and then absolved them. When they had returned to Englewood
Forest and had broken up the outlaw band they came back to the royal
court, and spent the rest of their lives in great favour with the king
and queen.

CHAPTER XII: BLACK COLIN OF LOCH AWE

Introduction

In considering the hero-myths of Scotland we are at once confronted

with two difficulties. The first, and perhaps the greater, is this,
that the only national heroes of Lowland Scotland are actual
historical persons, with very little of the mythical character about
them. The mention of Scottish heroes at once suggests Sir William
Wallace, Robert Bruce, the Black Douglas, Sir Andrew Barton, and many
more, whose exploits are matter of serious chronicle and sober record
rather than subject of tradition and myth. These warriors are too much
in reach of the fierce white searchlight of historic inquiry to be
invested with mythical interest or to show any developments of ancient
legend.

The second difficulty is of a different nature, and yet almost equally

perplexing. In the old ballads and poems of the Gaelic Highlands there
are mythical heroes in abundance, such as Fingal and Ossian, Comala,
and a host of shadowy chieftains and warriors, but they are not
distinctively Scotch. They are only Highland Gaelic versions of the
Irish Gaelic hero-legends, Scotch embodiments of Finn and Oisin, whose
real home was in Ireland, and whose legends were carried to the
Western Isles and the Highlands by conquering tribes of Scots from
Erin. These heroes are at bottom Irish, the champions of the Fenians
and of the Red Branch, and in the Scotch legends they have lost much
of their original beauty and chivalry.

The Highland Clans

It is rather in the private history of the country, as it were, than

in its national records that we are likely to find a hero who will
have something of the mythical in his story, something of the romance
of the Middle Ages. The wars and jealousies of the clans, the
adventures of a chief among hostile tribesmen, the raids and forays,
the loves and hatreds of rival families, form a good background for a
romantic legend; and such a legend occurs in the story of Black Colin
of Loch Awe, a warrior of the great Campbell clan in the fourteenth
century. The tale is common in one form or another to all European
lands where the call of the Crusades was heard, and the romantic
Crusading element has to a certain extent softened the occasionally
ferocious nature of Highland stories in general, so that there is no
bloodthirsty vengeance, no long blood-feud, to be recorded of Black
Colin Campbell.

The Knight of Loch Awe

During the wars between England and Scotland in the reigns of Edward
I. and Edward II. one of the chief leaders in the cause of Scottish
independence was Sir Nigel Campbell. The Knight of Loch Awe, as he was
generally called, was a schoolfellow and comrade of Sir William
Wallace, and a loyal and devoted adherent of Robert Bruce. In return
for his services in the war of independence Bruce rewarded him with
lands belonging to the rebellious MacGregors, including Glenurchy, the
great glen at the head of Loch Awe through which flows the river
Orchy. It was a wild and lonely district, and Sir Nigel Campbell had
much conflict before he finally expelled the MacGregors and settled
down peaceably in Glenurchy. There his son was born, and named Colin,
and as years passed he won the nickname of Black Colin, from his
swarthy complexion, or possibly from his character, which showed
tokens of unusual fierceness and determination.

Black Colin's Youth

Sir Nigel Campbell, as all Highland chiefs did, sent his son to a
farmer's family for fosterage. The boy became a child of his
foster-family in every way; he lived on the plain food of the
clansmen, oatmeal porridge and oatcake, milk from the cows, and beef
from the herds; he ran and wrestled and hunted with his
foster-brothers, and learnt woodcraft and warlike skill, broadsword
play and the use of dirk and buckler, from his foster-father. More
than all, he won a devoted following in the clan, for a man's
foster-parents were almost dearer to him than his own father and
mother, and his foster-brethren were bound to fight and die for him,
and to regard him more than their own blood-relations. The
foster-parents of Black Colin were a farmer and his wife, Patterson by
name, living at Socach, in Glenurchy, and well and truly they
fulfilled their trust.

He Goes on Crusade

In course of time Sir Nigel Campbell died, and Black Colin, his son,
became Knight of Loch Awe, and lord of all Glenurchy and the country
round. He was already noted for his strength and his dark complexion,
which added to his beauty in the eyes of the maidens, and he soon
found a lovely and loving bride. They dwelt on the Islet in Loch Awe,
and were very happy for a short time, but Colin was always restless,
because he would fain do great deeds of arms, and there was peace just
then in the land.

At last one day a messenger arrived at the castle on the Islet bearing
tidings that another crusade was on foot. This messenger was a palmer
who had been in the Holy Land, and had seen all the holy places in
Jerusalem. He told Black Colin how the Saracens ruled the country,
and hindered men from worshipping at the sacred shrines; and he told
how he had come home by Rome, where the Pope had just proclaimed
another Holy War. The Pope had declared that his blessing would rest
on the man who should leave wife and home and kinsfolk, and go forth
to fight for the Lord against the infidel. As the palmer spoke Black
Colin became greatly moved by his words, and when the old man had made
an end he raised the hilt of his dirk and swore by the cross thereon
that he would obey the summons and go on crusade.

The Lady of Loch Awe

Now Black Colin's wife was greatly grieved, and wept sorely, for she
was but young, and had been wedded no more than a year, and it seemed
to her hard that she must be left alone. She asked her husband: "How
far will you go on this errand?" "I will go as far as Jerusalem, if
the Pope bids me, when I have come to Rome," said he. "Alas! and how
long will you be away from me?" "That I know not, but it may be for
years if the heathen Saracens will not surrender the Holy Land to the
warriors of the Cross." "What shall I do during those long, weary
years?" asked she. "Dear love, you shall dwell here on the Islet and
be Lady of Glenurchy till I return again. The vassals and clansmen
shall obey you in my stead, and the tenants shall pay you their rents
and their dues, and in all things you shall hold my land for me."

The Token

The Lady of Loch Awe sighed as she asked: "But if you die away in that
distant land how shall I know? What will become of me if at last such
woeful tidings should be brought?"

"Wait for me seven years, dear wife," said Colin, "and if I do not
return before the end of that time you may marry again and take a
brave husband to guard your rights and rule the glen, for I shall be
dead in the Holy Land."

[Illustration: "Wait for me seven years, dear wife"]

"That I will never do. I will be the Lady of Glenurchy till I die, or
I will become the bride of Heaven and find peace for my sorrowing soul
in a nunnery. No second husband shall wed me and hold your land. But
give me now some token that we may share it between us; and you shall
swear that on your deathbed you will send it to me; so shall I know
indeed that you are no longer alive."

"It shall be as you say," answered Black Colin, and he went to the
smith of the clan and bade him make a massive gold ring, on which
Colin's name was engraved, as well as that of the Lady of Loch Awe.
Then, breaking the ring in two, Colin gave to his wife the piece with
his name and kept the other piece, vowing to wear it near his heart
and only to part with it when he should be dying. In like manner she
with bitter weeping swore to keep her half of the ring, and hung it on
a chain round her neck; and so, with much grief and great mourning
from the whole clan, Black Colin and his sturdy following of Campbell
clansmen set out for the Holy Land.

The Journey

Sadly at first the little band marched away from all their friends and
their homes; bagpipes played their loudest marching tunes, and plaids
fluttered in the breeze, and the men marched gallantly, but with heavy
hearts, for they knew not when they would return, and they feared
to find supplanters in their homes when they came back after many
years. Their courage rose, however, as the miles lengthened behind
them, and by the time they had reached Edinburgh and had taken ship at
Leith all was forgotten but the joy of fighting and the eager desire
to see Rome and the Pope, the Holy Land and the Holy Sepulchre.
Journeying up the Rhine, the Highland clansmen made their way through
Switzerland and over the passes of the Alps down into the pleasant
land of Italy, where the splendour of the cities surpassed their
wildest imaginations; and so they came at last, with many other bands
of Crusaders, to Rome.

The Crusade

At Rome the Knight of Loch Awe was so fortunate as to have an audience

of the Pope himself, who was touched by the devotion which brought
these stern warriors so far from their home. Black Colin knelt in
reverence before the aged pontiff, whom he held in truth to be the
Vicar of Christ on earth, and received his blessing, and commands to
continue his journey to Rhodes, where the Knights of St. John would
give him opportunity to fight for the faith. The small band of
Campbells went on to Rhodes, and there took service with the Knights,
and won great praise from the Grand Master; but, though they fought
the infidel, and exalted the standard of the Cross above the Crescent,
Colin was still not at all satisfied. He left Rhodes after some years
with a much-diminished band, and made his way as a pilgrim to
Jerusalem. There he stayed until he had visited all the shrines in the
Holy Land and prayed at every sacred spot. By this time the seven
years of his proposed absence were ended, and he was still far from
his home and the dear glen by Loch Awe.

The Lady's Suitor

While the seven years slowly passed away his sad and lonely wife dwelt
in the castle on the Islet, ruling her lord's clan in all gentle ways,
but fighting boldly when raiders came to plunder her clansmen. Yearly
she claimed her husband's dues and watched that he was not defrauded
of his rights. But though thus firm, she was the best help in trouble
that her clan ever had, and all blessed the name of the Lady of Loch
Awe.

So fair and gentle a lady, so beloved by her clan, was certain to have
suitors if she were a widow, and even before the seven years had
passed away there were men who would gladly have persuaded her that
her husband was dead and that she was free. She, however, steadfastly
refused to hear a word of another marriage, saying: "When Colin parted
from me he gave me two promises, one to return, if possible, within
seven years, and the other to send me, on his deathbed, if he died
away from me, a sure token of his death. I have not yet waited seven
years, nor have I had the token of his death. I am still the wife of
Black Colin of Loch Awe."

This steadfastness gradually daunted her suitors and they left her
alone, until but one remained, the Baron Niel MacCorquodale, whose
lands bordered on Glenurchy, and who had long cast covetous eyes on
the glen and its fair lady, and longed no less for the wealth she was
reputed to possess than for the power this marriage would give him.
The Baron's Plot

When the seven years were over the Baron MacCorquodale sought the Lady
of Loch Awe again, wooing her for his wife. Again she refused,
saying, "Until I have the token of my husband's death I will be wife
to no other man." "And what is this token, lady?" asked the Baron, for
he thought he could send a false one. "I will never tell that,"
replied the lady. "Do you dare to ask the most sacred secret between
husband and wife? I shall know the token when it comes." The Baron was
not a little enraged that he could not discover the secret, but he
determined to wed the lady and her wealth notwithstanding; accordingly
he wrote by a sure and secret messenger to a friend in Rome, bidding
him send a letter with news that Black Colin was assuredly dead, and
that certain words (which the Baron dictated) had come from him.

A Forged Letter

One day the Lady of Loch Awe, looking out from her castle, saw the
Baron coming, and with him a palmer whose face was bronzed by Eastern
suns. She felt that the palmer would bring tidings, and welcomed the
Baron with his companion. "Lady, this palmer brings you sad news,"
quoth the Baron. "Let him tell it, then," replied she, sick with fear.
"Alas! fair dame, if you were the wife of that gallant knight Colin of
Loch Awe, you are now his widow," said the palmer sadly, as he handed
her a letter. "What proof have you?" asked Black Colin's wife before
she read the letter. "Lady, I talked with the soldier who brought the
tidings," replied the stranger.

The letter was written from Rome to "The Right Noble Dame the Lady of
Loch Awe," and told how news had come from Rhodes, brought by a man of
Black Colin's band, that the Knight of Loch Awe had been mortally
wounded in a fight against the Saracens. Dying, he had bidden his
clansmen return to their lady, but they had all perished but one,
fighting for vengeance against the infidels. This man, who had held
the dying Knight tenderly upon his knee, said that Colin bade his wife
farewell, bade her remember his injunction to wed again and find a
protector, gasped out, "Take her the token I promised; it is here,"
and died; but the Saracens attacked the Christians again, drove them
back, and plundered the bodies of the slain, and when the one survivor
returned to search for the precious token there was none! The body was
stripped of everything of value, and the clansman wound it in the
plaid and buried it on the battlefield.

The Lady's Stratagem

There seemed no reason for the lady to doubt this news, and her grief
was very real and sincere. She clad herself in mourning robes and
bewailed her lost husband, but yet she was not entirely satisfied, for
she still wore the broken half of the engraved ring on the chain round
her neck, and still the promised death-token had not come. The Baron
now pressed his suit with greater ardour than before, and the Lady of
Loch Awe was hard put to it to find reasons for refusing him. It was
necessary to keep him on good terms with the clan, for his lands
bordered on those of Glenurchy, and he could have made war on the
people in the glen quite easily, while the knowledge that their chief
was dead would have made them a broken clan. So the lady turned to
guile, as did Penelope of old in similar distress. "I will wed you,
now that my Colin is dead," she replied at last, "but it cannot be
immediately; I must first build a castle that will command the head of
Glenurchy and of Loch Awe. The MacGregors knew the best place for a
house, there on Innis Eoalan; there, where the ruins of MacGregor's
White House now stand, will I build my castle. When it is finished the
time of my mourning will be over, and I will fix the bridal day." With
this promise the Baron had perforce to be contented, and the castle
began to rise slowly at the head of Loch Awe; but its progress was not
rapid, because the lady secretly bade her men build feebly, and often
the walls fell down, so that the new castle was very long in coming to
completion.

Black Colin Hears the News

In the meantime all who loved Black Colin grieved to know that the
Lady of Loch Awe would wed again, and his foster-mother sorrowed most
of all, for she felt sure that her beloved Colin was not dead. The
death-token had not been sent, and she sorely mistrusted the Baron
MacCorquodale and doubted the truth of the palmer's message. At last,
when the new castle was nearly finished and shone white in the rays of
the sun, she called one of her sons and bade him journey to Rome to
find the Knight of Loch Awe, if he were yet alive, and to bring sure
tidings of his death if he were no longer living. The young Patterson
set off secretly, and reached Rome in due course, and there he met
Black Colin, just returned from Jerusalem. The Knight had at last
realized that he had spent seven years away from his home, and that
now, in spite of all his haste, he might reach Glenurchy too late to
save his wife from a second marriage. He comforted himself, however,
with the thought that the token was still safe with him, and that his
wife would be loyal; great, therefore, was his horror when he met his
foster-brother and heard how the news of his death had been brought to
the glen. He heard also how his wife had reluctantly promised to marry
the Baron MacCorquodale, and had delayed her wedding by stratagem,
and he vowed that he would return to Glenurchy in time to spoil the
plans of the wicked baron.

Black Colin's Return

Travelling day and night, Black Colin, with his faithful clansman,
came near to Glenurchy, and sent his follower on in advance to bring
back news. The youth returned with tidings that the wedding had been
fixed for the next day, since the castle was finished and no further
excuse for delay could be made. Then Colin's anger was greatly roused,
and he vowed that the Baron MacCorquodale, who had stooped to deceit
and forgery to gain his ends, should pay dearly for his baseness.
Bidding his young clansman show no sign of recognition when he
appeared, the Knight of Loch Awe sent him to the farm in the glen,
where the anxious foster-mother eagerly awaited the return of the
wanderer. When she saw her son appear alone she was plunged into
despair, for she concluded, not that Black Colin was dead, but that he
would return too late. When he, in the beggar's disguise which he
assumed, came down the Glen he saw the smoke from the castle on the
Islet, and said: "I see smoke from my house, and it is the smoke of a
wedding feast in preparation, but I pray God who sent us light and
love that I may reap the fruit of the love that is there."
The Foster-Mother's Recognition

The Knight then went to his foster-mother's house, knocked at the

door, and humbly craved food and shelter, as a beggar. "Come in, good
man," quoth the mistress of the house; "sit down in the
chimney-corner, and you shall have your fill of oatcake and milk."
Colin sat down heavily, as if he were overwearied, and the farmer's
wife moved about slowly, putting before him what she had; and the
Knight saw that she did not recognise him, and that she had been
weeping quite recently. "You are sad, I can see," he said. "What is
the cause of your grief?" "I am not minded to tell that to a wandering
stranger," she replied. "Perhaps I can guess what it is," he
continued; "you have lost some dear friend, I think." "My loss is
great enough to give me grief," she answered, weeping. "I had a dear
foster-son, who went oversea to fight the heathen. He was dearer to me
than my own sons, and now news has come that he is dead in that
foreign land. And the Lady of Loch Awe, who was his wife, is to wed
another husband to-morrow. Long she waited for him, past the seven
years he was to be away, and now she would not marry again, but that a
letter has come to assure her of his death. Even yet she is fretting
because she has not had the token he promised to send her; and she
will only marry because she dare no longer delay."

"What is this token?" asked Colin. "That I know not: she has never
told," replied the foster-mother; "but oh! if he were now here
Glenurchy would never fall under the power of Baron MacCorquodale."
"Would you know Black Colin if you were to see him?" the beggar asked
meaningly; and she replied: "I think I should, for though he has been
away for years, I nursed him, and he is my own dear fosterling." "Look
well at me, then, good mother of mine, for I am Colin of Loch Awe."

The mistress of the farm seized the beggar-man by the arm, drew him
out into the light, and looked earnestly into his face; then, with a
scream of joy, she flung her arms around him, and cried: "O Colin!
Colin! my dear son, home again at last! Glad and glad I am to see you
here in time! Weary have the years been since my nursling went away,
but now you are home all will be well." And she embraced him and
kissed him and stroked his hair, and exclaimed at his bronzed hue and
his ragged attire.

The Foster-Mother's Plan

At last Colin stopped her raptures. "Tell me, mother, does my wife
seem to wish for this marriage?" he asked; and his foster-mother
answered: "Nay, my son, she would not wed now but that, thinking you
are dead, she fears the Baron's anger if she continues to refuse him.
But if you doubt her heart, follow my counsel, and you shall be
assured of her will in this matter." "What do you advise?" asked he.
She answered: "Stay this night with me here, and to-morrow go in your
beggar's dress to the castle on the Islet. Stand with other beggars at
the door, and refuse to go until the bride herself shall bring you
food and drink. Then you can put your token in the cup the Lady of
Loch Awe will hand you, and by her behaviour you shall learn if her
heart is in this marriage or not." "Dear mother, your plan is good,
and I will follow it," quoth Colin. "This night I will rest here, and
on the morrow I will seek my wife."
The Beggar at the Wedding

Early next day Colin arose, clad himself in the disguise of a sturdy
beggar, took a kindly farewell of his foster-mother, and made his way
to the castle. Early as it was, all the servants were astir, and the
whole place was in a bustle of preparation, while vagabonds of every
description hung round the doors, begging for food and money in honour
of the day. The new-comer acted much more boldly: he planted himself
right in the open doorway and begged for food and drink in such a
lordly tone that the servants were impressed by it, and one of them
brought him what he asked--oatcake and buttermilk--and gave it to him,
saying, "Take this and begone." Colin took the alms and drank the
buttermilk, but put the cake into his wallet, and stood sturdily right
in the doorway, so that the servants found it difficult to enter.
Another servant came to him with more food and a horn of ale, saying,
"Now take this second gift of food and begone, for you are in our way
here, and hinder us in our work."

The Beggar's Demand

But he stood more firmly still, with his stout travelling-staff

planted on the threshold, and said: "I will not go." Then a third
servant approached, who said: "Go at once, or it will be the worse for
you. We have given you quite enough for one beggar. Leave quickly now,
or you will get us and yourself into trouble." The disguised Knight
only replied: "I will not go until the bride herself comes out to give
me a drink of wine," and he would not move, for all they could say.
The servants at last grew so perplexed that they went to tell their
mistress about this importunate beggar. She laughed as she said: "It
is not much for me to do on my last day in the old house," and she
bade a servant attend her to the door, bringing a large jug full of
wine.

The Token

As the unhappy bride came out to the beggar-man he bent his head in
greeting, and she noticed his travel-stained dress and said: "You have
come from far, good man"; and he replied: "Yes, lady, I have seen many
distant lands." "Alas! others have gone to see distant lands and have
not returned," said she. "If you would have a drink from the hands of
the bride herself, I am she, and you may take your wine now"; and,
holding a bowl in her hands, she bade the servant fill it with wine,
and then gave it to Colin. "I drink to your happiness," said he, and
drained the bowl. As he gave it back to the lady he placed within it
the token, the half of the engraved ring. "I return it richer than I
took it, lady," said he, and his wife looked within and saw the token.

The Recognition

Trembling violently, she snatched the tiny bit of gold from the bottom
of the bowl, which fell to the ground and broke at her feet, and then
she saw her own name engraved upon it. She looked long and long at the
token, and then, pulling a chain at her neck, drew out her half of the
ring with Colin's name engraved on it. "O stranger, tell me, is my
husband dead?" she asked, grasping the beggar's arm. "Dead?" he
questioned, gazing tenderly at her; and at his tone she looked
straight into his eyes and knew him. "My husband!" was all that she
could say, but she flung her arms around his neck and was clasped
close to his heart. The servants stood bewildered, but in a moment
their mistress had turned to them, saying, "Run, summon all the
household, bring them all, for this is my husband, Black Colin of Loch
Awe, come home to me again." When all in the castle knew it there was
great excitement and rejoicing, and they feasted bountifully, for the
wedding banquet had been prepared.

The Baron's Flight

While the feast was in progress, and the happy wife sat by her
long-lost husband and held his hand, as though she feared to let him
leave her, a distant sound of bagpipes was heard, and the lady
remembered that the Baron MacCorquodale would be coming for his
wedding, which she had entirely forgotten in her joy. She laughed
lightly to herself, and, beckoning a clansman, bade him go and tell
the Baron that she would take no new husband, since her old one had
come back to her, and that there would be questions to be answered
when time served. The Baron MacCorquodale, in his wedding finery, with
a great party of henchmen and vassals and pipers blowing a wedding
march, had reached the mouth of the river which enters the side of
Loch Awe; the party had crossed the river, and were ready to take boat
across to the Islet, when they saw a solitary man rowing towards them
with all speed. "It is some messenger from my lady," said the Baron,
and he waited eagerly to hear the message. With dreadful consternation
he listened to the unexpected words as the clansman delivered them,
and then bade the pipers cease their music. "We must return; there
will be no wedding to-day, since Black Colin is home again," quoth he;
and the crestfallen party retraced their steps, quickening them more
and more as they thought of the vengeance of the long-lost chieftain;
but they reached their home in safety.

Castle Kilchurn

In the meantime Colin had much to tell his wife of his adventures, and
to ask her of her life all these years. They told each other all, and
Colin saw the false letter that had been sent to the Lady of Loch Awe,
and guessed who had plotted this deceit. His anger grew against the
bad man who had wrought this wrong and had so nearly gained his end,
and he vowed that he would make the Baron dearly abide it. His wife
calmed his fury somewhat by telling him how she had waited even
beyond the seven years, and what stratagem she had used, and at last
he promised not to make war on the Baron, but to punish him in other
ways.

"Tell me what you have done with the rents of Glenurchy these seven
years," said he. Then the happy wife replied: "With part I have lived,
with part I have guarded the glen, and with part have I made a cairn
of stones at the head of Loch Awe. Will you come with me and see it?"
And Colin went, deeply puzzled. When they came to the head of Loch
Awe, there stood the new castle, on the site of the old house of the
MacGregors; and the proud wife laughed as she said: "Do you like my
cairn of stones? It has taken long to build." Black Colin was much
pleased with the beautiful castle she had raised for him, and renamed
it Kilchurn Castle, which title it still keeps. True to his vow, he
took no bloody vengeance on the Baron MacCorquodale, but when a few
years after he fell into his power the Knight of Loch Awe forced him
to resign a great part of his lands to be united with those of
Glenurchy.

CHAPTER XIII: THE MARRIAGE OF SIR GAWAYNE

Introduction

The heroes of chivalry, from Roland the noble paladin to Spenser's

Red-Cross Knight, have many virtues to uphold, and their
characteristics are as varied as are the races which adopted chivalry
and embodied it in their hero-myths. It is a far cry from the loyalty
of Roland, in which love for his emperor is the predominant
characteristic, to the tender and graceful reverence of Sir Calidore;
but medi�val Wales, which has preserved the Arthurian legend most free
from alien admixture, had a knight of courtesy quite equal to Sir
Calidore. Courage was one quality on the possession of which these
medi�val knights never prided themselves, because they could not
imagine life without courage, but gentle courtesy was, unhappily,
rare, and many a heroic legend is spoilt by the insolence of the hero
to people of lower rank. Again, the legends often look lightly on the
ill-treatment of maidens; yet the true hero is one who is never
tempted to injure a defenceless woman. Similarly, a broken oath to a
heathen or mere churl is excused as a trifling matter, but the ideal
hero sweareth and breaketh not, though it be to his own hindrance.

Sir Gawayne

The true Knight of Courtesy is Sir Gawayne, King Arthur's nephew, who
in many ways overshadows his more illustrious uncle. It is remarkable
that the King Arthur of the medi�val romances is either a mere
ordinary conqueror or a secondary figure set in the background to
heighten the achievements of his more warlike followers. The latter is
the conception of Arthur which we find in this legend of the gentle
and courteous Sir Gawayne.

King Arthur Keeps Christmas

One year the noble King Arthur was keeping his Christmas at Carlisle
with great pomp and state. By his side sat his lovely Queen Guenever,
the brightest and most beauteous bride that a king ever wedded, and
about him were gathered the Knights of the Round Table. Never had a
king assembled so goodly a company of valiant warriors as now sat in
due order at the Round Table in the great hall of Carlisle Castle, and
King Arthur's heart was filled with pride as he looked on his heroes.
There sat Sir Lancelot, not yet the betrayer of his lord's honour and
happiness, with Sir Bors and Sir Banier, there Sir Bedivere, loyal to
King Arthur till death, there surly Sir Kay, the churlish steward of
the king's household, and King Arthur's nephews, the young and gallant
Sir Gareth, the gentle and courteous Sir Gawayne, and the false,
gloomy Sir Mordred, who wrought King Arthur's overthrow. The knights
and ladies were ranged in their fitting degrees and ranks, the
servants and pages waited and carved and filled the golden goblets,
and the minstrels sang to their harps lays of heroes of the olden
time.

His Discontent

Yet in the midst of all this splendour the king was ill at ease, for
he was a warlike knight and longed for some new adventure, and of late
none had been known. Arthur sat moodily among his knights and drained
the wine-cup in silence, and Queen Guenever, gazing at her husband,
durst not interrupt his gloomy thoughts. At last the king raised his
head, and, striking the table with his hand, exclaimed fiercely: "Are
all my knights sluggards or cowards, that none of them goes forth to
seek adventures? You are better fitted to feast well in hall than
fight well in field. Is my fame so greatly decayed that no man cares
to ask for my help or my support against evildoers? I vow here, by the
boar's head and by Our Lady, that I will not rise from this table till
some adventure be undertaken." "Sire, your loyal knights have gathered
round you to keep the holy Yuletide in your court," replied Sir
Lancelot; and Sir Gawayne said: "Fair uncle, we are not cowards, but
few evildoers dare to show themselves under your rule; hence it is
that we seem idle. But see yonder! By my faith, now cometh an
adventure."

The Damsel's Request

Even as Sir Gawayne spoke a fair damsel rode into the hall, with
flying hair and disordered dress, and, dismounting from her steed,
knelt down sobbing at Arthur's feet. She cried aloud, so that all
heard her: "A boon, a boon, King Arthur! I beg a boon of you!" "What
is your request?" said the king, for the maiden was in great distress,
and her tears filled his heart with pity. "What would you have of me?"
"I cry for vengeance on a churlish knight, who has separated my love
from me." "Tell your story quickly," said King Arthur; and all the
knights listened while the lady spoke.

"I was betrothed to a gallant knight," she said, "whom I loved dearly,
and we were entirely happy until yesterday. Then as we rode out
together planning our marriage we came, through the moorland ways,
unnoticing, to a fair lake, Tarn Wathelan, where stood a great castle,
with streamers flying, and banners waving in the wind. It seemed a
strong and goodly place, but alas! it stood on magic ground, and
within the enchanted circle of its shadow an evil spell fell on every
knight who set foot therein. As my love and I looked idly at the
mighty keep a horrible and churlish warrior, twice the size of mortal
man, rushed forth in complete armour; grim and fierce-looking he was,
armed with a huge club, and sternly he bade my knight leave me to him
and go his way alone. Then my love drew his sword to defend me, but
the evil spell had robbed him of all strength, and he could do nought
against the giant's club; his sword fell from his feeble hand, and the
churlish knight, seizing him, caused him to be flung into a dungeon.
He then returned and sorely ill-treated me, though I prayed for mercy
in the name of chivalry and of Mary Mother. At last, when he set me
free and bade me go, I said I would come to King Arthur's court and
beg a champion of might to avenge me, perhaps even the king himself.
But the giant only laughed aloud. 'Tell the foolish king,' quoth he,
'that here I stay his coming, and that no fear of him shall stop my
working my will on all who come. Many knights have I in prison, some
of them King Arthur's own true men; wherefore bid him fight with me,
if he will win them back.' Thus, laughing and jeering loudly at you,
King Arthur, the churlish knight returned to his castle, and I rode to
Carlisle as fast as I could."

King Arthur's Vow

When the lady had ended her sorrowful tale all present were greatly
moved with indignation and pity, but King Arthur felt the insult most
deeply. He sprang to his feet in great wrath, and cried aloud: "I vow
by my knighthood, and by the Holy Rood, that I will go forth to find
that proud giant, and will never leave him till I have overcome him."
The knights applauded their lord's vow, but Queen Guenever looked
doubtfully at the king, for she had noticed the damsel's mention of
magic, and she feared some evil adventure for her husband. The damsel
stayed in Carlisle that night, and in the morning, after he had heard
Mass, and bidden farewell to his wife, King Arthur rode away. It was a
lonely journey to Tarn Wathelan, but the country was very beautiful,
though wild and rugged, and the king soon saw the little lake gleaming
clear and cold below him, while the enchanted castle towered up above
the water, with banners flaunting defiantly in the wind.

The Fight

The king drew his sword Excalibur and blew a loud note on his bugle.
Thrice his challenge note resounded, but brought no reply, and then he
cried aloud: "Come forth, proud knight! King Arthur is here to punish
you for your misdeeds! Come forth and fight bravely. If you are
afraid, then come forth and yield yourself my thrall."

[Illustration: "The King blew a loud note on his bugle"]

The churlish giant darted out at the summons, brandishing his massive
club, and rushed straight at King Arthur. The spell of the enchanted
ground seized the king at that moment, and his hand sank down. Down
fell his good sword Excalibur, down fell his shield, and he found
himself ignominiously helpless in the presence of his enemy.

The Ransom

Now the giant cried aloud: "Yield or fight, King Arthur; which will
you do? If you fight I shall conquer you, for you have no power to
resist me; you will be my prisoner, with no hope of ransom, will lose
your land and spend your life in my dungeon with many other brave
knights. If you yield I will hold you to ransom, but you must swear
to accept the terms I shall offer."

"What are they," asked King Arthur. The giant replied: "You must swear
solemnly, by the Holy Rood, that you will return here on New Year's
Day and bring me a true answer to the question, 'What thing is it that
all women most desire?' If you fail to bring the right answer your
ransom is not paid, and you are yet my prisoner. Do you accept my
terms?" The king had no alternative: so long as he stood on the
enchanted ground his courage was overborne by the spell and he could
only hold up his hand and swear by the Sacred Cross and by Our Lady
that he would return, with such answers as he could obtain, on New
Year's Day.

The King's Search

Ashamed and humiliated, the king rode away, but not back to
Carlisle--he would not return home till he had fulfilled his task; so
he rode east and west and north and south, and asked every woman and
maid he met the question the churlish knight had put to him. "What is
it all women most desire?" he asked, and all gave him different
replies: some said riches, some splendour, some pomp and state; others
declared that fine attire was women's chief delight, yet others voted
for mirth or flattery; some declared that a handsome lover was the
cherished wish of every woman's heart; and among them all the king
grew quite bewildered. He wrote down all the answers he received, and
sealed them with his own seal, to give to the churlish knight when he
returned to the Castle of Tarn Wathelan; but in his own heart King
Arthur felt that the true answer had not yet been given to him. He was
sad as he turned and rode towards the giant's home on New Year's Day,
for he feared to lose his liberty and lands, and the lonely journey
seemed much more dreary than it had before, when he rode out from
Carlisle so full of hope and courage and self-confidence.

The Loathly Lady

Arthur was riding mournfully through a lonely forest when he heard a

woman's voice greeting him: "God save you, King Arthur! God save and
keep you!" and he turned at once to see the person who thus addressed
him. He saw no one at all on his right hand, but as he turned to the
other side he perceived a woman's form clothed in brilliant scarlet;
the figure was seated between a holly-tree and an oak, and the berries
of the former were not more vivid than her dress, and the brown leaves
of the latter not more brown and wrinkled than her cheeks. At first
sight King Arthur thought he must be bewitched--no such nightmare of a
human face had ever seemed to him possible. Her nose was crooked and
bent hideously to one side, while her chin seemed to bend to the
opposite side of her face; her one eye was set deep under her beetling
brow, and her mouth was nought but a gaping slit. Round this awful
countenance hung snaky locks of ragged grey hair, and she was deadly
pale, with a bleared and dimmed blue eye. The king nearly swooned when
he saw this hideous sight, and was so amazed that he did not answer
her salutation. The loathly lady seemed angered by the insult: "Now
Christ save you, King Arthur! Who are you to refuse to answer my
greeting and take no heed of me? Little of courtesy have you and your
knights in your fine court in Carlisle if you cannot return a lady's
greeting. Yet, Sir King, proud as you are, it may be that I can help
you, loathly though I be; but I will do nought for one who will not be
courteous to me."

The Lady's Secret

King Arthur was ashamed of his lack of courtesy, and tempted by the
hint that here was a woman who could help him. "Forgive me, lady,"
said he; "I was sorely troubled in mind, and thus, and not for want of
courtesy, did I miss your greeting. You say that you can perhaps help
me; if you would do this, lady, and teach me how to pay my ransom, I
will grant anything you ask as a reward." The deformed lady said:
"Swear to me, by Holy Rood, and by Mary Mother, that you will grant me
whatever boon I ask, and I will help you to the secret. Yes, Sir King,
I know by secret means that you seek the answer to the question, 'What
is it all women most desire?' Many women have given you many replies,
but I alone, by my magic power, can give you the right answer. This
secret I will tell you, and in truth it will pay your ransom, when you
have sworn to keep faith with me." "Indeed, O grim lady, the oath I
will take gladly," said King Arthur; and when he had sworn it, with
uplifted hand, the lady told him the secret, and he vowed with great
bursts of laughter that this was indeed the right answer.

The Ransom

When the king had thoroughly realized the wisdom of the answer he rode
on to the Castle of Tarn Wathelan, and blew his bugle three times. As
it was New Year's Day, the churlish knight was ready for him, and
rushed forth, club in hand, ready to do battle. "Sir Knight," said the
king, "I bring here writings containing answers to your question; they
are replies that many women have given, and should be right; these I
bring in ransom for my life and lands." The churlish knight took the
writings and read them one by one, and each one he flung aside, till
all had been read; then he said to the king: "You must yield yourself
and your lands to me, King Arthur, and rest my prisoner; for though
these answers be many and wise, not one is the true reply to my
question; your ransom is not paid, and your life and all you have is
forfeit to me." "Alas! Sir Knight," quoth the king, "stay your hand,
and let me speak once more before I yield to you; it is not much to
grant to one who risks life and kingdom and all. Give me leave to try
one more reply." To this the giant assented, and King Arthur
continued: "This morning as I rode through the forest I beheld a lady
sitting, clad in scarlet, between an oak and a holly-tree; she says,
'All women will have their own way, and this is their chief desire.'
Now confess that I have brought the true answer to your question, and
that I am free, and have paid the ransom for my life and lands."

The Price of the Ransom

The giant waxed furious with rage, and shouted: "A curse upon that
lady who told you this! It must have been my sister, for none but she
knew the answer. Tell me, was she ugly and deformed?" When King Arthur
replied that she was a loathly lady, the giant broke out: "I vow to
heaven that if I can once catch her I will burn her alive; for she has
cheated me of being King of Britain. Go your ways, Arthur; you have
not ransomed yourself, but the ransom is paid and you are free."

Gladly the king rode back to the forest where the loathly lady awaited
him, and stopped to greet her. "I am free now, lady, thanks to you!
What boon do you ask in reward for your help? I have promised to
grant it you, whatever it may be." "This is my boon King Arthur, that
you will bring some young and courteous knight from your court in
Carlisle to marry me, and he must be brave and handsome too. You have
sworn to fulfil my request, and you cannot break your word." These
last words were spoken as the king shook his head and seemed on the
point of refusing a request so unreasonable; but at this reminder he
only hung his head and rode slowly away, while the unlovely lady
watched him with a look of mingled pain and glee.

King Arthur's Return

On the second day of the new year King Arthur came home to Carlisle.
Wearily he rode along and dismounted at the castle, and wearily he
went into his hall, where sat Queen Guenever. She had been very
anxious during her husband's absence, for she dreaded magic arts, but
she greeted him gladly and said: "Welcome, my dear lord and king,
welcome home again! What anxiety I have endured for you! But now you
are here all is well. What news do you bring, my liege? Is the
churlish knight conquered? Where have you had him hanged, and where is
his head? Placed on a spike above some town-gate? Tell me your
tidings, and we will rejoice together." King Arthur only sighed
heavily as he replied: "Alas! I have boasted too much; the churlish
knight was a giant who has conquered me, and set me free on
conditions." "My lord, tell me how this has chanced." "His castle is
an enchanted one, standing on enchanted ground, and surrounded with a
circle of magic spells which sap the bravery from a warrior's mind and
the strength from his arm. When I came on his land and felt the power
of his mighty charms, I was unable to resist him, but fell into his
power, and had to yield myself to him. He released me on condition
that I would fulfil one thing which he bade me accomplish, and this I
was enabled to do by the help of a loathly lady; but that help was
dearly bought, and I cannot pay the price myself."

Sir Gawayne's Devotion

By this time Sir Gawayne, the king's favourite nephew, had entered the
hall, and greeted his uncle warmly; then, with a few rapid questions,
he learnt the king's news, and saw that he was in some distress. "What
have you paid the loathly lady for her secret, uncle?" he asked.
"Alas! I have paid her nothing; but I promised to grant her any boon
she asked, and she has asked a thing impossible." "What is it?" asked
Sir Gawayne. "Since you have promised it, the promise must needs be
kept. Can I help you to perform your vow?" "Yes, you can, fair nephew
Gawayne, but I will never ask you to do a thing so terrible," said
King Arthur. "I am ready to do it, uncle, were it to wed the loathly
lady herself." "That is what she asks, that a fair young knight should
marry her. But she is too hideous and deformed; no man could make her
his wife." "If that is all your grief," replied Sir Gawayne, "things
shall soon be settled; I will wed this ill-favoured dame, and will be
your ransom." "You know not what you offer," answered the king. "I
never saw so deformed a being. Her speech is well enough, but her face
is terrible, with crooked nose and chin, and she has only one eye."
"She must be an ill-favoured maiden; but I heed it not," said Sir
Gawayne gallantly, "so that I can save you from trouble and care."
"Thanks, dear Gawayne, thanks a thousand times! Now through your
devotion I can keep my word. To-morrow we must fetch your bride from
her lonely lodging in the greenwood; but we will feign some pretext
for the journey. I will summon a hunting party, with horse and hound
and gallant riders, and none shall know that we go to bring home so
ugly a bride." "Gramercy, uncle," said Sir Gawayne. "Till to-morrow I
am a free man."

The Hunting Party

The next day King Arthur summoned all the court to go hunting in the
greenwood close to Tarn Wathelan; but he did not lead the chase near
the castle: the remembrance of his defeat and shame was too strong for
him to wish to see the place again. They roused a noble stag and
chased him far into the forest, where they lost him amid close
thickets of holly and yew interspersed with oak copses and hazel
bushes--bare were the hazels, and brown and withered the clinging oak
leaves, but the holly looked cheery, with its fresh green leaves and
scarlet berries. Though the chase had been fruitless, the train of
knights laughed and talked gaily as they rode back through the forest,
and the gayest of all was Sir Gawayne; he rode wildly down the forest
drives, so recklessly that he drew level with Sir Kay, the churlish
steward, who always preferred to ride alone. Sir Lancelot, Sir
Stephen, Sir Banier, and Sir Bors all looked wonderingly at the
reckless youth; but his younger brother, Gareth, was troubled, for he
knew all was not well with Gawayne, and Sir Tristram, buried in his
love for Isolde, noticed nothing, but rode heedlessly wrapped in sad
musings.

Sir Kay and the Loathly Lady

Suddenly Sir Kay reined up his steed, amazed; his eye had caught the
gleam of scarlet under the trees, and as he looked he became aware of
a woman, clad in a dress of finest scarlet, sitting between a
holly-tree and an oak. "Good greeting to you, Sir Kay," said the lady,
but the steward was too much amazed to answer. Such a face as that of
the lady he had never even imagined, and he took no notice of her
salutation. By this time the rest of the knights had joined him, and
they all halted, looking in astonishment on the misshapen face of the
poor creature before them. It seemed terrible that a woman's figure
should be surmounted by such hideous features, and most of the knights
were silent for pity's sake; but the steward soon recovered from his
amazement, and his rude nature began to show itself. The king had not
yet appeared, and Sir Kay began to jeer aloud. "Now which of you would
fain woo yon fair lady?" he asked. "It takes a brave man, for methinks
he will stand in fear of any kiss he may get, it must needs be such an
awesome thing. But yet I know not; any man who would kiss this
beauteous damsel may well miss the way to her mouth, and his fate is
not quite so dreadful after all. Come, who will win a lovely bride!"
Just then King Arthur rode up, and at sight of him Sir Kay was silent;
but the loathly lady hid her face in her hands, and wept that he
should pour such scorn upon her.

The Betrothal

Sir Gawayne was touched with compassion for this uncomely woman alone
among these gallant and handsome knights, a woman so helpless and
ill-favoured, and he said: "Peace, churl Kay, the lady cannot help
herself; and you are not so noble and courteous that you have the
right to jeer at any maiden; such deeds do not become a knight of
Arthur's Round Table. Besides, one of us knights here must wed this
unfortunate lady." "Wed her?" shouted Kay. "Gawayne, you are mad!" "It
is true, is it not, my liege?" asked Sir Gawayne, turning to the king;
and Arthur reluctantly gave token of assent, saying, "I promised her
not long since, for the help she gave me in a great distress, that I
would grant her any boon she craved, and she asked for a young and
noble knight to be her husband. My royal word is given, and I will
keep it; therefore have I brought you here to meet her." Sir Kay burst
out with, "What? Ask me perchance to wed this foul quean? I'll none of
her. Where'er I get my wife from, were it from the fiend himself, this
hideous hag shall never be mine." "Peace, Sir Kay," sternly said the
king; "you shall not abuse this poor lady as well as refuse her. Mend
your speech, or you shall be knight of mine no longer." Then he turned
to the others and said: "Who will wed this lady and help me to keep my
royal pledge? You must not all refuse, for my promise is given, and
for a little ugliness and deformity you shall not make me break my
plighted word of honour." As he spoke he watched them keenly, to see
who would prove sufficiently devoted, but the knights all began to
excuse themselves and to depart. They called their hounds, spurred
their steeds, and pretended to search for the track of the lost stag
again; but before they went Sir Gawayne cried aloud: "Friends, cease
your strife and debate, for I will wed this lady myself. Lady, will
you have me for your husband?" Thus saying, he dismounted and knelt
before her.

The Lady's Words

The poor lady had at first no words to tell her gratitude to Sir
Gawayne, but when she had recovered a little she spoke: "Alas! Sir
Gawayne, I fear you do but jest. Will you wed with one so ugly and
deformed as I? What sort of wife should I be for a knight so gay and
gallant, so fair and comely as the king's own nephew? What will Queen
Guenever and the ladies of the Court say when you return to Carlisle
bringing with you such a bride? You will be shamed, and all through
me." Then she wept bitterly, and her weeping made her seem even more
hideous; but King Arthur, who was watching the scene, said: "Lady, I
would fain see that knight or dame who dares mock at my nephew's
bride. I will take order that no such unknightly discourtesy is shown
in my court," and he glared angrily at Sir Kay and the others who had
stayed, seeing that Sir Gawayne was prepared to sacrifice himself and
therefore they were safe. The lady raised her head and looked keenly
at Sir Gawayne, who took her hand, saying: "Lady, I will be a true and
loyal husband to you if you will have me; and I shall know how to
guard my wife from insult. Come, lady, and my uncle will announce the
betrothal." Now the lady seemed to believe that Sir Gawayne was in
earnest, and she sprang to her feet, saying: "Thanks to you! A
thousand thanks, Sir Gawayne, and blessings on your head! You shall
never rue this wedding, and the courtesy you have shown. Wend we now
to Carlisle."

The Journey to Carlisle

A horse with a side-saddle had been brought for Sir Gawayne's bride,
but when the lady moved it became evident that she was lame and halted
in her walk, and there was a slight hunch on her shoulders. Both of
these deformities showed little when she was seated, but as she moved
the knights looked at one another, shrugged their shoulders and pitied
Sir Gawayne, whose courtesy had bound him for life to so deformed a
wife. Then the whole train rode away together, the bride between King
Arthur and her betrothed, and all the knights whispering and sneering
behind them. Great was the excitement in Carlisle to see that ugly
dame, and greater still the bewilderment in the court when they were
told that this loathly lady was Sir Gawayne's bride.
The Bridal

Only Queen Guenever understood, and she showed all courtesy to the
deformed bride, and stood by her as her lady-of-honour when the
wedding took place that evening, while King Arthur was groomsman to
his nephew. When the long banquet was over, and bride and bridegroom
no longer need sit side by side, the tables were cleared and the hall
was prepared for a dance, and then men thought that Sir Gawayne would
be free for a time to talk with his friends; but he refused. "Bride
and bridegroom must tread the first dance together, if she wishes it,"
quoth he, and offered his lady his hand for the dance. "I thank you,
sweet husband," said the grim lady as she took it and moved forward to
open the dance with him; and through the long and stately measure that
followed, so perfect was his dignity, and the courtesy and grace with
which he danced, that no man dreamt of smiling as the deformed lady
moved clumsily through the figures of the dance.

Sir Gawayne's Bride

At last the long evening was over, the last measure danced, the last
wine-cup drained, the bride escorted to her chamber, the lights out,
the guests separated in their rooms, and Gawayne was free to think of
what he had done, and to consider how he had ruined his whole hope of
happiness. He thought of his uncle's favour, of the poor lady's
gratitude, of the blessing she had invoked upon him, and he determined
to be gentle with her, though he could never love her as his wife. He
entered the bride-chamber with the feeling of a man who has made up
his mind to endure, and did not even look towards his bride, who sat
awaiting him beside the fire. Choosing a chair, he sat down and looked
sadly into the glowing embers and spoke no word.

"Have you no word for me, husband? Can you not even give me a glance?"
asked the lady, and Sir Gawayne turned his eyes to her where she sat;
and then he sprang up in amazement, for there sat no loathly lady, no
ugly and deformed being, but a maiden young and lovely, with black
eyes and long curls of dark hair, with beautiful face and tall and
graceful figure. "Who are you, maiden?" asked Sir Gawayne; and the
fair one replied: "I am your wife, whom you found between the oak and
the holly-tree, and whom you wedded this night."

Sir Gawayne's Choice

"But how has this marvel come to pass?" asked he, wondering, for the
fair maiden was so lovely that he marvelled that he had not known her
beauty even under that hideous disguise. "It is an enchantment to
which I am in bondage," said she. "I am not yet entirely free from it,
but now for a time I may appear to you as I really am. Is my lord
content with his loving bride?" asked she, with a little smile, as she
rose and stood before him. "Content!" he said, as he clasped her in
his arms. "I would not change my dear lady for the fairest dame in
Arthur's court, not though she were Queen Guenever herself. I am the
happiest knight that lives, for I thought to save my uncle and help a
hapless lady, and I have won my own happiness thereby. Truly I shall
never rue the day when I wedded you, dear heart." Long they sat and
talked together, and then Sir Gawayne grew weary, and would fain have
slept, but his lady said: "Husband, now a heavy choice awaits you. I
am under the spell of an evil witch, who has given me my own face and
form for half the day, and the hideous appearance in which you first
saw me for the other half. Choose now whether you will have me fair by
day and ugly by night, or hideous by day and beauteous by night. The
choice is your own."

The Dilemma

Sir Gawayne was no longer oppressed with sleep; the choice before him
was too difficult. If the lady remained hideous by day he would have
to endure the taunts of his fellows; if by night, he would be unhappy
himself. If the lady were fair by day other men might woo her, and he
himself would have no love for her; if she were fair to him alone, his
love would make her look ridiculous before the court and the king.
Nevertheless, acting on the spur of the moment, he spoke: "Oh, be fair
to me only--be your old self by day, and let me have my beauteous wife
to myself alone." "Alas! is that your choice?" she asked. "I only must
be ugly when all are beautiful, I must be despised when all other
ladies are admired; I am as fair as they, but I must seem foul to all
men. Is this your love, Sir Gawayne?" and she turned from him and
wept. Sir Gawayne was filled with pity and remorse when he heard her
lament, and began to realize that he was studying his own pleasure
rather than his lady's feelings, and his courtesy and gentleness again
won the upper hand. "Dear love, if you would rather that men should
see you fair, I will choose that, though to me you will be always
as you are now. Be fair before others and deformed to me alone, and
men shall never know that the enchantment is not wholly removed."

Sir Gawayne's Decision

Now the lady looked pleased for a moment, and then said gravely: "Have
you thought of the danger to which a young and lovely lady is exposed
in the court? There are many false knights who would woo a fair dame,
though her husband were the king's favourite nephew; and who can
tell?--one of them might please me more than you. Sure I am that many
will be sorry they refused to wed me when they see me to-morrow morn.
You must risk my beauty under the guard of my virtue and wisdom, if
you have me young and fair." She looked merrily at Sir Gawayne as she
spoke; but he considered seriously for a time, and then said: "Nay,
dear love, I will leave the matter to you and your own wisdom, for you
are wiser in this matter than I. I remit this wholly unto you, to
decide according to your will. I will rest content with whatsoever you
resolve."

The Lady's Story

Now the fair lady clapped her hands lightly, and said: "Blessings on
you, dear Gawayne, my own dear lord and husband! Now you have released
me from the spell completely, and I shall always be as I am now, fair
and young, till old age shall change my beauty as he doth that of all
mortals. My father was a great duke of high renown who had but one son
and one daughter, both of us dearly beloved, and both of goodly
appearance. When I had come to an age to be married my father
determined to take a new wife, and he wedded a witch-lady. She
resolved to rid herself of his two children, and cast a spell upon us
both, whereby I was transformed from a fair lady into the hideous
monster whom you wedded, and my gallant young brother into the
churlish giant who dwells at Tarn Wathelan. She condemned me to keep
that awful shape until I married a young and courtly knight who would
grant me all my will. You have done all this for me, and I shall be
always your fond and faithful wife. My brother too is set free from
the spell, and he will become again one of the truest and most gentle
knights alive, though none can excel my own true knight, Sir Gawayne."

[Illustration: "Now you have released me from the spell completely"]

The Surprise of the Knights

The next morning the knight and his bride descended to the great hall,
where many knights and ladies awaited them, the former thinking
scornfully of the hideous hag whom Gawayne had wedded, the latter
pitying so young and gallant a knight, tied to a lady so ugly. But
both scorn and pity vanished when all saw the bride. "Who is this fair
dame?" asked Sir Kay. "Where have you left your ancient bride?" asked
another, and all awaited the answer in great bewilderment. "This is
the lady to whom I was wedded yester evening," replied Sir Gawayne.
"She was under an evil enchantment, which has vanished now that she
has come under the power of a husband, and henceforth my fair wife
will be one of the most beauteous ladies of King Arthur's court.
Further, my lord King Arthur, this fair lady has assured me that the
churlish knight of Tarn Wathelan, her brother, was also under a spell,
which is now broken, and he will be once more a courteous and gallant
knight, and the ground on which his fortress stands will have
henceforth no magic power to quell the courage of any knight alive.
Dear liege and uncle, when I wedded yesterday the loathly lady I
thought only of your happiness, and in that way I have won my own
lifelong bliss."

King Arthur's joy at his nephew's fair hap was great for he had
grieved sorely over Gawayne's miserable fate, and Queen Guenever
welcomed the fair maiden as warmly as she had the loathly lady, and
the wedding feast was renewed with greater magnificence, as a fitting
end to the Christmas festivities.

CHAPTER XIV: KING HORN

Introduction

Among the hero-legends which are considered to be of native English

growth and to have come down to us from the times of the Danish
invasions is the story of King Horn; but although "King Horn," like
"Havelok the Dane," was originally a story of Viking raids, it has
been so altered that the Norse element has been nearly obliterated. In
all but the bare circumstances of the tale, "King Horn" is a romance
of chivalry, permeated with the Crusading spirit, and reflecting the
life and customs of the thirteenth century, instead of the more
barbarous manners of the eighth or ninth centuries. The hero's desire
to obtain knighthood and do some deed worthy of the honour, the
readiness to leave his betrothed for long years at the call of honour
or duty, the embittered feeling against the Saracens, are all typical
of the romance of the Crusades. Another curious point which shows a
later than Norse influence is the wooing of the reluctant youth by the
princess, of which there are many instances in medi�val literature; it
reveals a consciousness of feudal rank which did not exist in early
times, and a certain recognition of the privileges of royal birth
which were not granted before the days of romantic chivalry. King Horn
himself is a hero of the approved chivalric type, whose chief
distinguishing feature is his long indifference to the misfortunes of
the sorely-tried princess to whom he was betrothed.

The Royal Family of Suddene

There once lived and ruled in the pleasant land of Suddene a noble
king named Murry, whose fair consort, Queen Godhild, was the most
sweet and gentle lady alive, as the king was a pattern of all
knightly virtues. This royal pair had but one child, a son, named
Horn, now twelve years old, who had been surrounded from his birth
with loyal service and true devotion. He had a band of twelve chosen
companions with whom he shared sports and tasks, pleasures and griefs,
and the little company grew up well trained in chivalrous exercises
and qualities. Childe Horn had his favourites among the twelve. Athulf
was his dearest friend, a loving and devoted companion; and next to
him in Horn's affection stood Fikenhild, whose outward show of love
covered his inward envy and hatred. In everything these two were
Childe Horn's inseparable comrades, and it seemed that an equal bond
of love united the three.

The Saracen Invasion

One day as King Murry was riding over the cliffs by the sea with only
two knights in attendance he noticed some unwonted commotion in a
little creek not far from where he was riding, and he at once turned
his horse's head in that direction and galloped down to the shore. On
his arrival in the small harbour he saw fifteen great ships of strange
build, and their crews, Saracens all armed for war, had already
landed, and were drawn up in warlike array. The odds against the king
were terrible, but he rode boldly to the invaders and asked: "What
brings you strangers here? Why have you sought our land?" A Saracen
leader, gigantic of stature, spoke for them all and replied: "We are
here to win this land to the law of Mahomet and to drive out the
Christian law. We will slay all the inhabitants that believe on
Christ. Thou thyself shalt be our first conquest, for thou shalt not
leave this place alive." Thereupon the Saracens attacked the little
band, and though the three Christians fought valiantly they were soon
slain. The Saracens then spread over the land, slaying, burning, and
pillaging, and forcing all who loved their lives to renounce the
Christian faith and become followers of Mahomet. When Queen Godhild
heard of her husband's death and saw the ruin of her people she fled
from her palace and all her friends and betook herself to a solitary
cave, where she lived unknown and undiscovered, and continued her
Christian worship while the land was overrun with pagans. Ever she
prayed that God would protect her dear son, and bring him at last to
his father's throne.

[Illustration: Queen Godhild prays ever for her son Horn]

Horn's Escape

Soon after the king's death the Saracens had captured Childe Horn and
his twelve comrades, and the boys were brought before the pagan emir.
They would all have been slain at once or flayed alive, but for the
beauty of Childe Horn, for whose sake their lives were spared. The old
emir looked keenly at the lads, and said: "Horn, thou art a bold and
valiant youth, of great stature for thine age, and of full strength,
yet I know thou hast not yet reached thy full growth. If we release
thee with thy companions, in years to come we shall dearly rue it, for
ye will become great champions of the Christian law and will slay many
of us. Therefore ye must die. But we will not slay you with our own
hands, for ye are noble lads, and shall have one feeble chance for
your lives. Ye shall be placed in a boat and driven out to sea, and if
ye all are drowned we shall not grieve overmuch. Either ye must die or
we, for I know we shall dearly abide your king's death if ye youths
survive." Thereupon the lads were all taken to the shore, and, weeping
and lamenting, were thrust into a rudderless boat, which was towed
out to sea and left helpless.

Arrival in Westernesse

The other boys sat lamenting and bewailing their fate, but Childe
Horn, looking round the boat, found a pair of oars, and as he saw that
the boat was in the grasp of some strong current he rowed in the same
direction, so that the boat soon drifted out of sight of land. The
other lads were a dismal crew, for they thought their death was
certain, but Horn toiled hard at his rowing all night, and with the
dawn grew so weary that he rested for a little on his oars. When the
rising sun made things clear, and he could see over the crests of the
waves, he stood up in the boat and uttered a cry of joy. "Comrades,"
cried he, "dear friends, I see land not far away. I hear the sweet
songs of birds and see the soft green grass. We have come to some
unknown land and have saved our lives." Then Athulf took up the glad
tidings and began to cheer the forlorn little crew, and under Horn's
skilful guidance the little boat grounded gently and safely on the
sands of Westernesse. The boys sprang on shore, all but Childe Horn
having no thought of the past night and the journey; but he stood by
the boat, looking sadly at it.

Farewell to the Boat

"'Boat,' quoth he, 'which hast borne me on my way,

Have thou good days beside a summer sea!
May never wave prevail to sink thee deep!
Go, little boat, and when thou comest home
Greet well my mother, mournful Queen Godhild;
Tell her, frail skiff, her dear son Horn is safe.
Greet, too, the pagan lord, Mahomet's thrall,
The bitter enemy of Jesus Christ,
And bid him know that I am safe and well.
Say I have reached a land beyond the sea,
Whence, in God's own good time, I will return
Then he shall feel my vengeance for my sire.'"

Then sorrowfully he pushed the boat out into the ocean, and the ebbing
tide bore it away, while Horn and his companions set their faces
resolutely towards the town they could see in the distance.

King Ailmar and Childe Horn

As the little band were trudging wearily towards the town they saw a
knight riding towards them, and when he came nearer they became aware
that he must be some noble of high rank. When he halted and began to
question them, Childe Horn recognised by his tone and bearing that
this must be the king. So indeed it was, for King Ailmar of
Westernesse was one of those noble rulers who see for themselves the
state of their subjects and make their people happy by free,
unrestrained intercourse with them. When the king saw the forlorn
little company he said: "Whence are ye, fair youths, so strong and
comely of body? Never have I seen so goodly a company of thirteen
youths in the realm of Westernesse. Tell me whence ye come, and what
ye seek." Childe Horn assumed the office of spokesman, for he was
leader by birth, by courage, and by intellect. "We are lads of noble
families in Suddene, sons of Christians and of men of lofty station.
Pagans have taken the land and slain our parents, and we boys fell
into their hands. These heathen have slain and tortured many Christian
men, but they had pity upon us, and put us into an old boat with no
sail or rudder. So we drifted all night, until I saw your land at
dawn, and our boat came to the shore. Now we are in your power, and
you may do with us what you will, but I pray you to have pity on us
and to feed us, that we may not perish utterly."

Ailmar's Decision

King Ailmar was touched as greatly by the simple boldness of the

spokesman as by the hapless plight of the little troop, and he
answered, smiling: "Thou shalt have nought but help and comfort, fair
youth. But, I pray thee, tell me thy name." Horn answered readily:
"King, may all good betide thee! I am named Horn, and I have come
journeying in a boat on the sea--now I am here in thy land." King
Ailmar replied: "Horn! That is a good name: mayst thou well enjoy it.
Loud may this Horn sound over hill and dale till the blast of so
mighty a Horn shall be heard in many lands from king to king, and its
beauty and strength be known in many countries. Horn, come thou with
me and be mine, for I love thee and will not forsake thee."

Childe Horn at Court

The king rode home, and all the band of stranger youths followed him
on foot, but for Horn he ordered a horse to be procured, so that the
lad rode by his side; and thus they came back to the court. When they
entered the hall he summoned his steward, a noble old knight named
Athelbrus, and gave the lads in charge to him, saying, "Steward, take
these foundlings of mine, and train them well in the duties of pages,
and later of squires. Take especial care with the training of Childe
Horn, their chief; let him learn all thy knowledge of woodcraft and
fishing, of hunting and hawking, of harping and singing; teach him how
to carve before me, and to serve the cup solemnly at banquets; make
him thy favourite pupil and train him to be a knight as good as
thyself. His companions thou mayst put into other service, but Horn
shall be my own page, and afterwards my squire." Athelbrus obeyed the
king's command, and the thirteen youths soon found themselves set to
learn the duties of court life, and showed themselves apt scholars,
especially Childe Horn, who did his best to satisfy the king and his
steward on every point.

The Princess Rymenhild

When Childe Horn had been at court for six years, and was now a
squire, he became known to all courtiers, and all men loved him for
his gentle courtesy and his willingness to do any service. King Ailmar
made no secret of the fact that Horn was his favourite squire, and the
Princess Rymenhild, the king's fair daughter, loved him with all her
heart. She was the heir to the throne, and no man had ever gainsaid
her will, and now it seemed to her unreasonable that she should not be
allowed to wed a good and gallant youth whom she loved. It was
difficult for her to speak alone with him, for she had six maiden
attendants who waited on her continually, and Horn was engaged with
his duties either in the hall, among the knights, or waiting on the
king. The difficulties only seemed to increase her love, and she grew
pale and wan, and looked miserable. It seemed to her that if she
waited longer her love would never be happy, and in her impatience she
took a bold step.

Athelbrus Deceives the Princess

She kept her chamber, called a messenger, and said to him: "Go quickly
to Athelbrus the steward, and bid him come to me at once. Tell him to
bring with him the squire Childe Horn, for I am lying ill in my room,
and would be amused. Say I expect them quickly, for I am sad in mind,
and have need of cheerful converse." The messenger bowed, and,
withdrawing, delivered the message exactly as he had received it to
Athelbrus, who was much perplexed thereby. He wondered whence came
this sudden illness, and what help Childe Horn could give. It was an
unusual thing for the squire to be asked into a lady's bower, and
still more so into that of a princess, and Athelbrus had already felt
some suspicion as to the sentiments of the royal lady towards the
gallant young squire. Considering all these things, the cautious
steward deemed it safer not to expose young Horn to the risks that
might arise from such an interview, and therefore induced Athulf to
wait upon the princess and to endeavour to personate his more
distinguished companion. The plan succeeded beyond expectation in the
dimly lighted room, and the infatuated princess soon startled the
unsuspecting squire by a warm and unreserved declaration of her
affection. Recovering from his natural amazement, he modestly
disclaimed a title to the royal favour and acknowledged his identity.

On discovering her mistake the princess was torn by conflicting

emotions, but finally relieved the pressure of self-reproach and the
confusion of maiden modesty by overwhelming the faithful steward with
denunciation and upbraiding, until at last, in desperation, the poor
man promised, against his better judgment, to bring about a meeting
between his love-lorn mistress and the favoured squire.

Athelbrus Summons Horn

When Rymenhild understood that Athelbrus would fulfil her desire she
was very glad and joyous; her sorrow was turned into happy
expectation, and she looked kindly upon the old steward as she said:
"Go now quickly, and send him to me in the afternoon. The king will
go to the wood for sport and pastime, and Horn can easily remain
behind; then he can stay with me till my father returns at eve. No one
will betray us; and when I have met my beloved I care not what men may
say."

Then the steward went down to the banqueting-hall, where he found

Childe Horn fulfilling his duties as cup-bearer, pouring out and
tasting the red wine in the king's golden goblet. King Ailmar asked
many questions about his daughter's health, and when he learnt that
her malady was much abated he rose in gladness from the table and
summoned his courtiers to go with him into the greenwood. Athelbrus
bade Horn tarry, and when the gay throng had passed from the hall the
steward said gravely: "Childe Horn, fair and courteous, my beloved
pupil, go now to the bower of the Princess Rymenhild, and stay there
to fulfil all her commands. It may be thou shalt hear strange things,
but keep rash and bold words in thy heart, and let them not be upon
thy tongue. Horn, dear lad, be true and loyal now, and thou shalt
never repent it."

Horn and Rymenhild

Horn listened to this unusual speech with great astonishment, but,

since Sir Athelbrus spoke so solemnly, he laid all his words to heart,
and thus, marvelling greatly, departed to the royal bower. When he had
knocked at the door, and had been bidden to come in, entering, he
found Rymenhild sitting in a great chair, intently regarding him as he
came into the room. He knelt down to make obeisance to her, and kissed
her hand, saying, "Sweet be thy life and soft thy slumbers, fair
Princess Rymenhild! Well may it be with thy gentle ladies of honour! I
am here at thy command, lady, for Sir Athelbrus the steward, bade me
come to speak with thee. Tell me thy will, and I will fulfil all thy
desires." She arose from her seat, and, bending towards him as he
knelt, took him by the hand and lifted him up, saying, "Arise and sit
beside me, Childe Horn, and we will drink this cup of wine together."
In great astonishment the youth did as the princess bade, and sat
beside her, and soon, to his utter amazement, Rymenhild avowed her
love for him, and offered him her hand. "Have pity on me, Horn, and
plight me thy troth, for in very truth I love thee, and have loved
thee long, and if thou wilt I will be thy wife."

Horn Refuses the Princess

Now Horn was in evil case, for he saw full well in what danger he
would place the princess, Sir Athelbrus, and himself if he accepted
the proffer of her love. He knew the reason of the steward's warning,
and tried to think what he might say to satisfy the princess and yet
not be disloyal to the king. At last he replied: "Christ save and keep
thee, my lady Rymenhild, and give thee joy of thy husband, whosoever
he may be! I am too lowly born to be worthy of such a wife; I am a
mere foundling, living on thy father's bounty. It is not in the course
of nature that such as I should wed a king's daughter, for there can
be no equal match between a princess and a landless squire."

Rymenhild was so disheartened and ashamed at this reply to her loving

appeal that her colour changed, she turned deadly pale, began to sigh,
flung her arms out wildly, and fell down in a swoon. Childe Horn
lifted her up, full of pity for her deep distress, and began to
comfort her and try to revive her. As he held her in his arms he
kissed her often, and said:

"'Lady, dear love, take comfort and be strong!

For I will yield me wholly to thy guidance
If thou wilt compass one great thing for me.
Plead with King Ailmar that he dub me knight,
That I may prove me worthy of thy love.
Soon shall my knighthood be no idle dream,
And I will strive to do thy will, dear heart.'"

Now at these words Rymenhild awoke from her swoon, and made him repeat
his promise. She said: "Ah! Horn, that shall speedily be done. Ere the
week is past thou shalt be Sir Horn, for my father loves thee, and
will grant the dignity most willingly to one so dear to him. Go now
quickly to Sir Athelbrus, give him as a token of my gratitude this
golden goblet and this ring; pray him that he persuade the king to dub
thee knight. I will repay him with rich rewards for his gentle
courtesy to me. May Christ help him to speed thee in thy desires!"
Horn then took leave of Rymenhild with great affection, and found
Athelbrus, to whom he delivered the gifts and the princess's message,
which the steward received with due reverence.

Horn Becomes a Knight

This plan seemed to Athelbrus very good, for it raised Horn to be a

member of the noble Order of Knights, and would give him other chances
of distinguishing himself. Accordingly he went to the king as he sat
over the evening meal, and spoke thus: "Sir King, hear my words, for I
have counsel for thee. To-morrow is the festival of thy birth, and the
whole realm of Westernesse must rejoice in its master's joy. Wear thou
thy crown in solemn state, and I think it were nought amiss if thou
shouldst knight young Horn, who will become a worthy defender of thy
throne." "That were well done," said King Ailmar. "The youth pleases
me, and I will knight him with my own sword. Afterwards he shall
knight his twelve comrades the same day."

The next day the ceremony of knighting was performed with all
solemnity, and at its close a great banquet was prepared and all men
made merry. But Princess Rymenhild was somewhat sad. She could not
descend to the hall and take her customary place, for this was a feast
for knights alone, and she would not be without her betrothed one
moment longer, so she sent a messenger to fetch Sir Horn to her bower.

Horn and Athulf Go to Rymenhild

Now that Horn was a newly dubbed knight he would not allow the
slightest shadow of dishonour to cloud his conduct; accordingly, when
he obeyed Rymenhild's summons he was accompanied by Athulf. "Welcome,
Sir Horn and Sir Athulf," she cried, holding out her hands in
greeting. "Love, now that thou hast thy will, keep thy plighted word
and make me thy wife; release me from my anxiety and do as thou hast
said."
 "'Dear Rymenhild, hold thou thyself at peace,'
Quoth young Sir Horn; 'I will perform my vow.
But first I must ride forth to prove my might;
Must conquer hardships, and my own worse self,
Ere I can hope to woo and wed my bride.
We are but new-fledged knights of one day's growth,
And yet we know the custom of our state
Is first to fight and win a hero's name,
Then afterwards to win a lady's heart.
This day will I do bravely for thy love
And show my valour and my deep devotion
In prowess 'gainst the foes of this thy land.
If I come back in peace, I claim my wife.'"

Rymenhild protested no longer, for she saw that where honour was
concerned Horn was inflexible. "My true knight," said she, "I must in
sooth believe thee, and I feel that I may. Take this ring engraved
with my name, wrought by the most skilled worker of our court, and
wear it always, for it has magic virtues. The gems are of such saving
power that thou shalt fear no strokes in battle, nor ever be cast down
if thou gaze on this ring and think of thy love. Athulf, too, shall
have a similar ring. And now, Horn, I commend thee to God, and may
Christ give thee good success and bring thee back in safety!"

Horn's First Exploit

After taking an affectionate farewell of Rymenhild, Horn went down to

the hall, and, seeing all the other new-made knights going in to the
banquet, he slipped quietly away and betook himself to the stables.
There he armed himself secretly and mounted his white charger, which
pranced and reared joyfully as he rode away; and Horn began to sing
for joy of heart, for he had won his chief desire, and was happy in
the love of the king's daughter. As he rode by the shore he saw a
stranger ship drawn up on the beach, and recognised the banner and
accoutrements of her Saracen crew, for he had never forgotten the
heathens who had slain his father. "What brings you here?" he asked
angrily, and as fearlessly as King Murry had done, and received the
same answer: "We will conquer this land and slay the inhabitants."
Then Horn's anger rose, he gripped his sword, and rushed boldly at the
heathens, and slew many of them, striking off a head at each blow. The
onslaught was so sudden that the Saracens were taken by surprise at
first, but then they rallied and surrounded Horn, so that matters
began to look dangerous for him. Then he remembered the betrothal
ring, and looked on it, thinking earnestly of Rymenhild, his dear
love, and such courage came to him that he was able to defeat the
pagans and slay their leader. The others, sorely wounded--for none
escaped unhurt--hurried on board ship and put to sea, and Horn,
bearing the Saracen leader's head on his sword's point, rode back to
the royal palace. Here he related to King Ailmar this first exploit of
his knighthood, and presented the head of the foe to the king, who
rejoiced greatly at Horn's valour and success.

[Illustration: Horn kills the Saracen leader]

Rymenhild's Dream

The next day the king and all the court rode out hunting, but Horn
made an excuse to stay behind with the princess, and the false and
wily Fikenhild was also left at home, and he crept secretly to
Rymenhild's bower to spy on her. She was sitting weeping bitterly when
Sir Horn entered. He was amazed. "Love, for mercy's sake, why weepest
thou so sorely?" he asked; and she replied: "I have had a mournful
dream. I dreamt that I was casting a net and had caught a great fish,
which began to burst the net. I greatly fear that I shall lose my
chosen fish." Then she looked sadly at Horn. But the young knight was
in a cheery mood, and replied: "May Christ and St. Stephen turn thy
dream to good! If I am thy fish, I will never deceive thee nor do
aught to displease thee, and hereto I plight thee my troth. But I
would rather interpret thy dream otherwise. This great fish which
burst thy net is some one who wishes us ill, and will do us harm
soon." Yet in spite of Horn's brave words it was a sad betrothal, for
Rymenhild wept bitterly, and her lover could not stop her tears.

Fikenhild's False Accusation

Fikenhild had listened to all their conversation with growing envy

and anger, and now he stole away silently, and met King Ailmar
returning from the chase.

"'King Ailmar,' said the false one, 'see, I bring

A needed warning, that thou guard thyself,
For Horn will take thy life; I heard him vow
To slay thee, or by sword or fire, this night.
If thou demand what cause of hate he has,
Know that the villain wooes thine only child,
Fair Rymenhild, and hopes to wear thy crown.
E'en now he tarries in the maiden's bower,
As he has often done, and talks with her
With guileful tongue, and cunning show of love.
Unless thou banish him thou art not safe
In life or honour, for he knows no law.'"

The king at first refused to believe the envious knight's report, but,
going to Rymenhild's bower, he found apparent confirmation, for Horn
was comforting the princess, and promising to wed her when he should
have done worthy feats of arms. The king's wrath knew no bounds, and
with words of harsh reproach he banished Horn at once, on pain of
death. The young knight armed himself quickly and returned to bid
farewell to his betrothed.

Horn's Banishment

"Dear heart," said he, "now thy dream has come true, and thy fish must
needs break the net and be gone. The enemy whom I foreboded has
wrought us woe. Farewell, mine own dear Rymenhild; I may no longer
stay, but must wander in alien lands. If I do not return at the end of
seven years take thyself a husband and tarry no longer for me. And now
take me in your arms and kiss me, dear love, ere I go!" So they kissed
each other and bade farewell, and Horn called to him his comrade
Athulf, saying, "True and faithful friend, guard well my dear love.
Thou hast never forsaken me; now do thou keep Rymenhild for me." Then
he rode away, and, reaching the haven, hired a good ship and sailed
for Ireland, where he took service with King Thurston, under the name
of Cuthbert. In Ireland he became sworn brother to the king's two
sons, Harold and Berild, for they loved him from the first moment they
saw him, and were in no way jealous of his beauty and valour.

Horn Slays the Giant Emir

When Christmas came, and King Thurston sat at the banquet with all his
lords, at noontide a giant strode into the hall, bearing a message of
defiance. He came from the Saracens, and challenged any three Irish
knights to fight one Saracen champion. If the Irish won the pagans
would withdraw from Ireland; if the Irish chiefs were slain the
Saracens would hold the land. The combat was to be decided the next
day at dawn. King Thurston accepted the challenge, and named Harold,
Berild, and Cuthbert (as Horn was called) as the Christian champions,
because they were the best warriors in Ireland; but Horn begged
permission to speak, and said: "Sir King, it is not right that one man
should fight against three, and one heathen hound think to resist
three Christian warriors. I will fight and conquer him alone, for I
could as easily slay three of them." At last the king allowed Horn to
attempt the combat alone, and spent the night in sorrowful musing on
the result of the contest, while Horn slept well and arose and armed
himself cheerily. He then aroused the king, and the Irish troop rode
out to a fair and level green lawn, where they found the emir with
many companions awaiting them. The combat began at once, and Horn gave
blows so mighty that the pagan onlookers fell swooning through very
fear, till Horn said: "Now, knights, rest for a time, if it pleases
you." Then the Saracens spoke together, saying aloud that no man had
ever so daunted them before except King Murry of Suddene.

This mention of his dead father aroused Horn, who now realized that he
saw before him his father's murderers. His anger was kindled, he
looked at his ring and thought of Rymenhild, and then, drawing his
sword again, he rushed at the heathen champion. The giant fell pierced
through the heart, and his companions fled to their ships, hotly
pursued by Horn and his company. Much fighting there was, and in the
hot strife near the ships the king's two sons, Harold and Berild, were
both slain.

Horn Refuses the Throne

Sadly they were laid on a bier and brought back to the palace, their
sorrowful father lamenting their early death; and when he had wept his
fill the mournful king came into the hall where all his knights
silently awaited him. Slowly he came up to Horn as he sat a little
apart from the rest, and said: "Cuthbert, wilt thou fulfil my desire?
My heirs are slain, and thou art the best knight in Ireland for
strength and beauty and valour; I implore thee to wed Reynild, my only
daughter (now, alas! my only child), and to rule my realm. Wilt thou
do so, and lift the burden of my cares from my weary shoulders?" But
Horn replied: "O Sir King, it were wrong for me to receive thy fair
daughter and heir and rule thy realm, as thou dost offer. I shall do
thee yet better service, my liege, before I die; and I know that thy
grief will change ere seven years have passed away. When that time is
over, Sir King, give me my reward: thou shalt not refuse me thy
daughter when I desire her." To this King Thurston agreed, and Horn
dwelt in Ireland for seven years, and sent no word or token to
Rymenhild all the time.
Rymenhild's Distress

In the meantime Princess Rymenhild was in great perplexity and

trouble, for a powerful ruler, King Modi of Reynes, wooed her for his
wife, and her own betrothed sent her no token of his life or love. Her
father accepted the new suitor for her hand, and the day of the
wedding was fixed, so that Rymenhild could no longer delay her
marriage. In her extremity she besought Athulf to write letters to
Horn, begging him to return and claim his bride and protect her; and
these letters she delivered to several messengers, bidding them search
in all lands until they found Sir Horn and gave the letters into his
own hand. Horn knew nought of this, till one day in the forest he met
a weary youth, all but exhausted, who told how he had sought Horn in
vain. When Horn declared himself, the youth broke out into loud
lamentations over Rymenhild's unhappy fate, and delivered the letter
which explained all her distress. Now it was Horn's turn to weep
bitterly for his love's troubles, and he bade the messenger return to
his mistress and tell her to cease her tears, for Horn would be there
in time to rescue her from her hated bridegroom. The youth returned
joyfully, but as his boat neared the shore of Westernesse a storm
arose and the messenger was drowned; so that Rymenhild, opening her
tower door to look for expected succour, found her messenger lying
dead at the foot of the tower, and felt that all hope was gone. She
wept and wrung her hands, but nothing that she could do would avert
the evil day.

Horn and King Thurston

As soon as Horn had read Rymenhild's letter he went to King Thurston

and revealed the whole matter to him. He told of his own royal
parentage, his exile, his knighthood, his betrothal to the princess,
and his banishment; then of the death of the Saracen leader who had
slain King Murry, and the vengeance he had taken. Then he ended:

"'King Thurston, be thou wise, and grant my boon;

Repay the service I have yielded thee;
Help me to save my princess from this woe.
I will take counsel for fair Reynild's fate,
For she shall wed Sir Athulf, my best friend,
My truest comrade and my doughtiest knight.
If ever I have risked my life for thee
And proved myself in battle, grant my prayer.'"

To this the king replied: "Childe Horn, do what thou wilt."

Horn Returns on the Wedding-day

Horn at once invited Irish knights to accompany him to Westernesse to

rescue his love from a hateful marriage, and many came eagerly to
fight in the cause of the valiant Cuthbert who had defended Ireland
for seven years. Thus it was with a goodly company that Horn took
ship, and landed in King Ailmar's realm; and he came in a happy hour,
for it was the wedding-day of Princess Rymenhild and King Modi of
Reynes. The Irish knights landed and encamped in a wood, while Horn
went on alone to learn tidings. Meeting a palmer, he asked the news,
and the palmer replied: "I have been at the wedding of Princess
Rymenhild, and a sad sight it was, for the bride was wedded against
her will, vowing she had a husband though he is a banished man. She
would take no ring nor utter any vows; but the service was read, and
afterwards King Modi took her to a strong castle, where not even a
palmer was given entrance. I came away, for I could not endure the
pity of it. The bride sits weeping sorely, and if report be true her
heart is like to break with grief."

Horn Is Disguised as a Palmer

"Come, palmer," said Horn, "lend me your cloak and scrip. I must see
this strange bridal, and it may be I shall make some there repent of
the wrong they have done to a helpless maiden. I will essay to enter."
The change was soon made, and Horn darkened his face and hands as if
bronzed with Eastern suns, bowed his back, and gave his voice an old
man's feebleness, so that no man would have known him; which done, he
made his way to King Modi's new castle. Here he begged admittance for
charity's sake, that he might share the broken bits of the wedding
feast; but he was churlishly refused by the porter, who would not be
moved by any entreaties. At last Horn lost all patience, and broke
open the door, and threw the porter out over the drawbridge into the
moat; then, once more assuming his disguise, he made his way into the
hall and sat down in the beggars' row.

The Recognition

Rymenhild was weeping still, and her stern husband seemed only angered
by her tears. Horn looked about cautiously, but saw no sign of Athulf,
his trusted comrade; for he was at this time eagerly looking for his
friend's coming from the lofty watch-tower, and lamenting that he
could guard the princess no longer. At last, when the banquet was
nearly over, Rymenhild rose to pour out wine for the guests, as the
custom was then; and she bore a horn of ale or wine along the benches
to each person there. Horn, sitting humbly on the ground, called out:
"Come, courteous Queen, turn to me, for we beggars are thirsty folk."
Rymenhild smiled sadly, and, setting down the horn, filled a bowl with
brown ale, for she thought him a drunkard. "Here, drink this, and more
besides, if thou wilt; I never saw so bold a beggar," she said. But
Horn refused. He handed the bowl to the other beggars, and said:
"Lady, I will drink nought but from a silver cup, for I am not what
you think me. I am no beggar, but a fisher, come from afar to fish at
thy wedding feast. My net lies near by, and has lain there for seven
years, and I am come to see if it has caught any fish. Drink to me,
and drink to Horn from thy horn, for far have I journeyed."

When the palmer spoke of fishing, and his seven-year-old net,

Rymenhild felt cold at heart; she did not recognise him, but wondered
greatly when he bade her drink "to Horn." She filled her cup and gave
it to the palmer, saying, "Drink thy fill, and then tell me if thou
hast ever seen Horn in thy wanderings." As the palmer drank, he
dropped his ring into the cup; then he returned it to Rymenhild,
saying, "Queen, seek out what is in thy draught." She said nothing
then, but left the hall with her maidens and went to her bower, where
she found the well-remembered ring she had given to Horn in token of
betrothal. Greatly she feared that Horn was dead, and sent for the
palmer, whom she questioned as to whence he had got the ring.
Horn's Stratagem

Horn thought he would test her love for him, since she had not
recognised him, so he replied: "By St. Giles, lady, I have wandered
many a mile, far into realms of the West, and there I found Sir Horn
ready prepared to sail home to your land. He told me that he planned
to reach the realm of Westernesse in time to see you before seven
years had passed, and I embarked with him. The winds were favourable
and we had a quick voyage, but, alas! he fell ill and died. When he
lay dying he begged me piteously, 'Take this ring, from which I have
never been parted, to my dear lady Rymenhild,' and he kissed it many
times and pressed it to his breast. May God give his soul rest in
Paradise!"

When Rymenhild heard those terrible tidings she sighed deeply and
said: "O heart, burst now, for thou shalt never more have Horn, for
love of whom thou hast been tormented so sorely!" Then she fell upon
her bed, and grasped the dagger which she had concealed there; for if
Horn did not come in time she had planned to slay both her hateful
lord and herself that very night. Now, in her misery, she set the
dagger to her heart, and would have slain herself at once, had not the
palmer interrupted her. Rushing forward, he exclaimed: "Dear Queen and
lady, I am Horn, thine own true love. Dost thou not recognise me? I am
Childe Horn of Westernesse. Take me in thy arms, dear love, and kiss
me welcome home." As Rymenhild stared incredulously at him, letting
the dagger fall from her trembling hand, he hurriedly cast away his
disguise, brushed off the disfiguring stain he had put on his cheeks,
and stood up straight and strong, her own noble knight and lover. What
joy they had together! How they told each other of all their
adventures and troubles, and how they embraced and kissed each other!

Horn Slays King Modi

When their joy had become calmer, Horn said to his lady: "Dear
Rymenhild, I must leave thee now, and return to my knights, who are
encamped in the forest. Within an hour I will return to the feast and
give the king and his guests a stern lesson." Then he flung away the
palmer's cloak, and went forth in knightly array; while the princess
went up to the watch-tower, where Athulf still scanned the sea for
some sign of Horn's coming. Rymenhild said: "Sir Athulf, true friend,
go quickly to Horn, for he has arrived, and with him he brings a great
army." The knight gladly hastened to the courtyard, mounted his steed,
and soon overtook Horn. They were greatly rejoiced to meet again, and
had much to tell each other and to plan for that day's work.

In the evening Horn and his army reached the castle, where they found
the gates undone for them by their friends within, and in a short but
desperate conflict King Modi and all the guests at the banquet were
slain, except Rymenhild, her father, and Horn's twelve comrades. Then
a new wedding was celebrated, for King Ailmar durst not refuse his
daughter to the victor, and the bridal was now one of real rejoicing,
though the king was somewhat bitter of mood.

Horn's Departure

When the hours wore on to midnight, Horn, sitting beside his bride,
called for silence in the hall, and addressed the king thus: "Sir
King, I pray thee listen to my tale, for I have much to say and much
to explain. My name is in sooth Horn, and I am the son of King Murry
of Suddene, who was slain by the Saracens. Thou didst cherish me and
give me knighthood, and I proved myself a true knight on the very day
when I was dubbed. Thou didst love me then, but evil men accused me to
thee and I was banished. For seven years I have lived in a strange
land; but now that I have returned, I have won thy fair daughter as
my bride. But I cannot dwell here in idleness while the heathen hold
my father's land. I vow by the Holy Rood that I will not rest, and
will not claim my wife, until I have purified Suddene from the infidel
invaders, and can lay its crown at Rymenhild's feet. Do thou, O King,
guard well my wife till my return."

The king consented to this proposal, and, in spite of Rymenhild's

grief, Horn immediately bade her farewell, and with his whole army
embarked for Suddene, this time accompanied by Athulf, but leaving the
rest of his comrades for the protection of his wife.

The Apostate Knight

The wind blew fair for Suddene, and the fleet reached the port. The
warriors disembarked, and marched inland, to encamp for the night in a
wood, where they could be hidden. Horn and Athulf set out at midnight
to endeavour to obtain news of the foe, and soon found a solitary
knight sleeping. They awoke him roughly, saying, "Knight, awake! Why
sleepest thou here? What dost thou guard?" The knight sprang lightly
from the ground, saw their faces and the shining crosses on their
shields, and cast down his eyes in shame, saying, "Alas! I have served
these pagans against my will. In time gone by I was a Christian, but
now I am a coward renegade, who forsook his God for fear of death at
the hands of the Saracens! I hate my infidel masters, but I fear them
too, and they have forced me to guard this district and keep watch
against Horn's return. If he should come to his own again how glad I
should be! These infidels slew his father, and drove him into exile,
with his twelve comrades, among whom was my own son, Athulf, who loved
the prince as his own life. If the prince is yet alive, and my son
also, God grant that I may see them both again! Then would I joyfully
die."

The Recognition

Horn answered quickly: "Sir Knight, be glad and rejoice, for here are
we, Horn and Athulf, come to avenge my father and retake my realm from
the heathen." Athulf's father was overcome with joy and shame; he
hardly dared to embrace his son, yet the bliss of meeting was so great
that he clasped Athulf in his arms and prayed his forgiveness for the
disgrace he had brought upon him. The two young knights said nothing
of his past weakness, but told him all their own adventures, and at
last he said: "What is your true errand hither? Can you two alone slay
the heathen? Dear Childe Horn, what joy this will be to thy mother
Godhild, who still lives in a solitary retreat, praying for thee and
for the land!" Horn broke in on his speech with "Blessed be the hour
when I returned! Thank God that my mother yet lives! We are not alone,
but I have an army of valiant Irish warriors, who will help me to
regain my realm."
The Reconquest of Suddene

Now the king blew his horn, and his host marched out from the wood and
prepared to attack the Saracens. The news soon spread that Childe Horn
had returned, and many men who had accepted the faith of Mahomet for
fear of death now threw off the hated religion, joined the true king's
army, and were rebaptized. The war was not long, for the Saracens had
made themselves universally hated, and the inhabitants rose against
them; so that in a short time the country was purged of the infidels,
who were slain or fled to other lands. Then Horn brought his mother
from her retreat, and together they purified the churches which had
been desecrated, and restored the true faith. When the land of Suddene
was again a Christian realm King Horn was crowned with solemn rites,
and a great coronation feast was held, which lasted too long for
Horn's true happiness.

Fikenhild Imprisons Rymenhild

During Horn's absence from Westernesse, his comrades watched carefully

over Rymenhild; but her father, who was growing old, had fallen much
under the influence of the plausible Fikenhild. From the day when
Fikenhild had falsely accused Horn to the king, Ailmar had held him in
honour as a loyal servant, and now he had such power over the old
ruler that when he demanded Rymenhild's hand in marriage, saying that
Horn was dead in Suddene, the king dared not refuse, and the princess
was bidden to make ready for a new bridal. For this day Fikenhild had
long been prepared; he had built a massive fortress on a promontory,
which at high tide was surrounded by the sea, but was easy of access
at the ebb; thither he now led the weeping princess, and began a
wedding feast which was to last all day, and to end only with the
marriage ceremony at night.

Horn's Dream

That same night, before the feast, King Horn had a terrible dream. He
thought he saw his wife taken on board ship; soon the ship began to
sink, and Rymenhild held out her hands for rescue, but Fikenhild,
standing in safety on shore, beat her back into the waves with his
sword. With the agony of the sight Horn awoke, and, calling his
comrade Athulf, said: "Friend, we must depart to-day. My wife is in
danger from false Fikenhild, whom I have trusted too much. Let us
delay no longer, but go at once. If God will, I hope to release her,
and to punish Fikenhild. God grant we come in time!" With some few
chosen knights, King Horn and Athulf set out, and the ship drove
darkling through the sea, they knew not whither. All the night they
drifted on, and in the morning found themselves beneath a newly built
castle, which none of them had seen before.

Horn's Disguise

While they were seeking to moor their boat to the shore, one of the
castle windows looking out to sea opened, and they saw a knight
standing and gazing seaward, whom they speedily recognised; it was
Athulf's cousin, Sir Arnoldin, one of the twelve comrades, who had
accompanied the princess thither in the hope that he might yet save
her from Fikenhild; he was now looking, as a forlorn hope, over the
sea, though he believed Horn was dead. His joy was great when he saw
the knights, and he came out to them and speedily told them of
Rymenhild's distress and the position of affairs in the castle. King
Horn was not at a loss for an expedient even in this distress. He
quickly disguised himself and a few of his comrades as minstrels,
harpers, fiddlers, and jugglers. Then, rowing to the mainland, he
waited till low tide, and made his way over the beach to the castle,
accompanied by his disguised comrades. Outside the castle walls they
began to play and sing, and Rymenhild heard them, and, asking what the
sounds were, gave orders that the minstrels should be admitted. They
sat on benches low down the hall, tuning their harps and fiddles and
watching the bride, who seemed unhappy and pale. When Horn sang a lay
of true love and happiness, Rymenhild swooned for grief, and the
king was touched to the heart with bitter remorse that he had tried
her constancy so long, and had allowed her to endure such hardships
and misery for his sake.

[Illustration: Horn and his followers disguised as minstrels]

Death of Fikenhild

King Horn now glanced down and saw the ring of betrothal on his
finger, where he had worn it ever, except that fateful day when he had
given it as a token of recognition to Rymenhild. He thought of his
wife's sufferings, and his mind was made up. Springing from the
minstrels' bench, he strode boldly up the hall, throwing off his
disguise, and, shouting, "I am King Horn! False Fikenhild, thou shalt
die!" he slew the villain in the midst of his men. Horn's comrades
likewise flung off their disguise, and soon overpowered the few of the
household who cared to fight in their dead master's cause. The castle
was taken for King Ailmar, who was persuaded to nominate Sir Arnoldin
his heir, and the baronage of Westernesse did homage to him as the
next king. Horn and his fair wife begged the good old steward Sir
Athelbrus to go with them to Suddene, and on the way they touched at
Ireland, where Reynild, the king's fair daughter, was induced to look
favourably on Sir Athulf and accept him for her husband. The land of
King Modi, which had now no ruler, was committed to the care of Sir
Athelbrus, and Horn and Rymenhild at last reached Suddene, where the
people received their fair queen with great joy, and where they dwelt
in happiness till their lives' end.

CHAPTER XV: ROBIN HOOD

Introduction

England during the twelfth, thirteenth, and fourteenth centuries was

slowly taught the value of firm administrative government. In Saxon
England, the keeping of the peace and the maintenance of justice had
been left largely to private and family enterprise and to local and
trading communities. In Norman England, the royal authority was
asserted throughout the kingdom, though as yet the king had to depend
in large measure upon the co-operation of his barons and the help of
the burghers to supply the lack of a standing army and an adequate
police. Under the Plantagenets, the older chivalry was slowly breaking
up, and a new, wealthy burgher and trading community was rapidly
gaining influence in the land; whilst the clergy, corrupted by excess
of wealth and power, had strained, almost to breaking, the controlling
force of religion. It was therefore natural that in these latter days
a class of men should arise to avail themselves of the unique
opportunities of the time--men who, loving liberty and hating
oppression, took the law into their own hands and executed a rough and
ready justice between the rich and the poor which embodied the best
traditions of knight-errantry, whilst they themselves lived a free and
merry life on the tolls they exacted from their wealthy victims. Such
a man may well have been the original Robin Hood, a man who, when once
he had captured the popular imagination, soon acquired heroic
reputation and was credited with every daring deed and every
magnanimous action in two centuries of 'freebooting.'

Robin Hood Seeks a Guest

At one time Robin Hood lived in the noble forest of Barnesdale, in

Yorkshire. He had but few of his merry men with him, for his
headquarters were in the glorious forest of Sherwood. Just now,
however, the Sheriff of Nottinghamshire was less active in his
endeavours to put down the band of outlaws, and the leader had
wandered farther north than usual. Robin's companions were his three
dearest comrades and most loyal followers, Little John (so called
because of his great stature), Will Scarlet, Robin's cousin, and Much,
the miller's son. These three were all devoted to their leader, and
never left his side, except at such times as he sent them away on his
business.

On this day Robin was leaning against a tree, lost in thought, and his
three followers grew impatient; they knew that before dinner could be
served there were the three customary Masses to hear, and their leader
gave no sign of being ready for Mass. Robin always heard three Masses
before his dinner, one of the Father, one of the Holy Spirit, and the
last of Our Lady, who was his patron saint and protector. As the three
yeomen were growing hungry, Little John ventured to address him.
"Master, it would do you good if you would dine early to-day, for you
have fasted long." Robin aroused himself and smiled. "Ah, Little John,
methinks care for thine own appetite hath a share in that speech, as
well as care for me. But in sooth I care not to dine alone. I would
have a stranger guest, some abbot or bishop or baron, who would pay us
for our hospitality. I will not dine till a guest be found, and I
leave it to you three to find him." Robin turned away, laughing at the
crestfallen faces of his followers, who had not counted on such a
vague commission; but Little John, quickly recovering himself, called
to him: "Master, tell us, before we leave you, where we shall meet,
and what sort of people we are to capture and bring to you in the
greenwood."

The Outlaws' Rules

"You know that already," said their master. "You are to do no harm to
women, nor to any company in which a woman is travelling; this is in
honour of our dear Lady. You are to be kind and gentle to husbandmen
and toilers of all degrees, to worthy knights and yeomen, to gallant
squires, and to all children and helpless people; but sheriffs
(especially him of Nottingham), bishops, and prelates of all kinds,
and usurers in Church and State, you may regard as your enemies, and
may rob, beat, and despoil in any way. Meet me with your guest at our
great trysting oak in the forest, and be speedy, for dinner must wait
until the visitor has arrived." "Now may God send us a suitable
traveller soon," said Little John, "for I am hungry for dinner now."
"So am I," said each of the others, and Robin laughed again. "Go ye
all three, with bows and arrows in hand, and I will stay alone at the
trysting tree and await your coming. As no man passes this way, you
can walk up to the willow plantation and take your stand on Watling
Street; there you will soon meet with likely travellers, and I will
accept the first who appears. I will find means to have dinner ready
against your return, and we will hope that our visitor's generosity
will compensate us for the trouble of cooking his dinner."

Robin Hood's Guest

The three yeomen, taking their longbows in hand and arrows in their
belts, walked up through the willow plantation to a place on Watling
Street where another road crossed it; but there was no one in sight.
As they stood with bows in hand, looking towards the forest of
Barnesdale, they saw in the distance a knight riding in their
direction. As he drew nearer they were struck by his appearance, for
he rode as a man who had lost all interest in life; his clothes were
disordered, he looked neither to right nor left, but drooped his head
sadly, while one foot hung in the stirrup and the other dangled
slackly in the air. The yeomen had never seen so doleful a rider; but,
sad as he was, this was a visitor and must be taken to Robin;
accordingly Little John stepped forward and caught the horse by the
bridle.

[Illustration: "Little John caught the horse by the bridle"]

Little John Escorts the Knight

The knight raised his head and looked blankly at the outlaw, who at
once doffed his cap, saying, "Welcome, Sir Knight! I give you, on my
master's behalf, a hearty welcome to the greenwood. Gentle knight,
come now to my master, who hath waited three hours, fasting, for your
approach before he would dine. Dinner is prepared, and only tarries
your courteous appearance." The stranger knight seemed to consider
this address carefully, for he sighed deeply, and then said: "I cry
thee mercy, good fellow, for the delay, though I wot not how I am the
cause thereof. But who is thy master?" Little John replied: "My
master's name is Robin Hood, and I am sent to guide you to him." The
knight said: "So Robin Hood is thy leader? I have heard of him, and
know him to be a good yeoman; therefore I am ready to accompany thee,
though, in good sooth, I had intended to eat my midday meal at Blythe
or Doncaster to-day. But it matters little where a broken man dines!"

Robin Hood's Feast

The three yeomen conducted the knight along the forest ways to the
trysting oak where Robin awaited them. As they went they observed
that the knight was weeping silently for some great distress, but
their courtesy forbade them to make any show of noticing his grief.
When the appointed spot was reached, Robin stepped forward and
courteously greeted his guest, with head uncovered and bended knee,
and welcomed him gladly to the wild greenwood. "Welcome, Sir Knight,
to our greenwood feast! I have waited three hours for a guest, and now
Our Lady has sent you to me we can dine, after we have heard Mass."
The knight said nothing but, "God save you, good Robin, and all your
merry men"; and then very devoutly they heard the three Masses, sung
by Friar Tuck. By this time others of the outlaw band had appeared,
having returned from various errands, and a gay company sat down to a
banquet as good as any the knight had ever eaten.

Robin Converses with the Knight

There was abundance of good things--venison and game of all kinds,

swans and river-fowl and fish, with bread and good wine. Every one
seemed joyous, and merry jests went round that jovial company, till
even the careworn guest began to smile, and then to laugh outright. At
this Robin was well pleased, for he saw that his visitor was a good
man, and was glad to have lifted the burden of his care, even if only
for a few minutes; so he smiled cheerfully at the knight and said: "Be
merry, Sir Knight, I pray, and eat heartily of our food, for it is
with great goodwill that we offer it to you." "Thanks, good Robin,"
replied the knight. "I have enjoyed my dinner to-day greatly; for
three weeks I have not had so good a meal. If I ever pass by this way
again I will do my best to repay you in kind; as good a dinner will I
try to provide as you have given me."

Robin Demands Payment

The outlaw chief seemed to be affronted by this suggestion, and

replied, with a touch of pride in his manner: "Thanks for your
proffer, Sir Knight, but, by Heaven! no man has ever yet deemed me a
glutton. While I eat one dinner I am not accustomed to look eagerly
for another--one is enough for me. But as for you, my guest, I think
it only fitting that you should pay before you go; a yeoman was never
meant to pay for a knight's banquet." The knight blushed, and looked
confused for a moment, and then said: "True, Robin, and gladly would I
reward you for my entertainment, but I have no money worth offering;
even all I have would not be worthy of your acceptance, and I should
be shamed in your eyes, and those of your men."

[Illustration: "I have no money worth offering"]

The Knight's Poverty

"Is that the truth?" asked Robin, making a sign to Little John, who
arose, and, going to the knight's steed, unstrapped a small coffer,
which he brought back and placed before his master. "Search it, Little
John," said he, and "You, sir, tell me the very truth, by your honour
as a belted knight." "It is truth, on my honour, that I have but ten
shillings," replied the knight, "and if Little John searches he will
find no more." "Open the coffer," said Robin, and Little John took it
away to the other side of the trysting oak, where he emptied its
contents on his outspread cloak, and found exactly ten shillings.
Returning to his master, who sat at his ease, drinking and gaily
conversing with his anxious guest, Little John whispered: "The knight
has told the truth," and thereupon Robin exclaimed aloud: "Sir Knight,
I will not take one penny from you; you may rather borrow of me if
you have need of more money, for ten shillings is but a miserable sum
for a knight. But tell me now, if it be your pleasure, how you come to
be in such distress." As he looked inquiringly at the stranger, whose
blush had faded once, only to be renewed as he found his word of
honour doubted, he noticed how thin and threadbare were his clothes
and how worn his russet leather shoes; and he was grieved to see so
noble-seeming a man in such a plight.

The Knight's Story

Yet Robin meant to fathom the cause of the knight's trouble, for then,
perhaps, he would be able to help him, so he continued pitilessly:
"Tell me just one word, which I will keep secret from all other men:
were you driven by compulsion to take up knighthood, or urged to beg
it by reason of the ownership of some small estate; or have you wasted
your old inheritance with fines for brawling and strife, or in
gambling and riotousness, or in borrowing at usury? All of these are
fatal to a good estate."

The knight replied: "Alas! good Robin, none of these hath been my
undoing. My ancestors have all been knights for over a hundred years,
and I have not lived wastefully, but soberly and sparely. As short a
time ago as last year I had over four hundred pounds saved, which I
could spend freely among my neighbours, and my income was four hundred
pounds a year, from my land; but now my only possessions are my wife
and children. This is the work of God's hand, and to Him I commit me
to amend my estate in His own good time."

How the Money was Lost

"But how have you so soon lost this great wealth?" asked Robin
incredulously; and the knight replied sadly: "Ah, Robin, you have no
son, or you would know that a father will give up all to save his
first-born. I have one gallant son, and when I went on the Crusade
with our noble Prince Edward I left him at home to guard my lands, for
he was twenty years old, and was a brave and comely youth. When I
returned, after two years' absence, it was to find him in great
danger, for in a public tournament he had slain in open fight a knight
of Lancashire and a bold young squire. He would have died a shameful
death had I not spent all my ready money and other property to save
him from prison, for his enemies were mighty and unjust; and even that
was not enough, for I was forced to mortgage my estates for more
money. All my land lies in pledge to the abbot of St. Mary's Abbey, in
York, and I have no hope to redeem it. I was riding to York when your
men found me."

The Sum Required

"For what sum is your land pledged?" asked the master-outlaw; and the
knight replied: "The Abbot lent me four hundred pounds, though the
value of the land is far beyond that." "What will you do if you fail
to redeem your land?" asked Robin. "I shall leave England at once, and
journey once more to Jerusalem, and tread again the sacred Hill of
Calvary, and never more return to my native land. That will be my
fate, for I see no likelihood of repaying the loan, and I will not
stay to see strangers holding my father's land. Farewell, my friend
Robin, farewell to you all! Keep the ten shillings; I would have paid
more if I could, but that is the best I can give you." "Have you no
friends at home?" asked Robin; and the knight said: "Many friends I
thought I had, sir. They were very kind and helpful in my days of
prosperity, when I did not need them; now they will not know me, so
much has my poverty seemed to alter my face and appearance."

Robin Offers a Loan

This pitiful story touched the hearts of the simple and kindly
outlaws; they wept for pity, and cared not to hide their tears from
each other, until Robin made them all pledge their guest in bumpers of
good red wine. Then their chief asked, as if continuing his own train
of thought: "Have you any friends who will act as sureties for the
repayment of the loan?" "None at all," replied the knight hopelessly,
"but God Himself, who suffered on the Tree for us." This last reply
angered Robin, who thought it savoured too much of companionship with
the fat and hypocritical monks whom he hated, and he retorted sharply:
"No such tricks for me! Do you think I will take such a surety, or
even one of the saints, in return for good solid gold? Get some more
substantial surety, or no gold shall you have from me. I cannot afford
to waste my money."

The Knight Offers Surety

The knight replied, sighing heavily: "If you will not take these I
have no earthly surety to offer; and in Heaven there is only our dear
Lady. I have served her truly, and she has never failed me till now,
when her servant, the abbot, is playing me so cruel a trick." "Do you
give Our Lady as your surety?" said Robin Hood. "I would take her bond
for any sum, for throughout all England you could find no better
surety than our dear Lady, who has always been gracious to me. She is
enough security. Go, Little John, to my treasury and bring me four
hundred pounds, well counted, with no false or clipped coin therein."

Robin Hood's Gifts

Little John, accompanied by Much, the careful treasurer of the band,

went quickly to the secret place where the master-outlaw kept his
gold. Very carefully they counted out the coins, testing each, to see
that it was of full weight and value. Then, on the suggestion of
Little John, they provided the knight with new clothing, even to boots
and spurs, and finally supplied him with two splendid horses, one for
riding and one to carry his baggage and the coffer of gold.

The guest watched all these preparations with bewildered eyes, and
turned to Robin, crying, "Why have you done all this for me, a perfect
stranger?" "You are no stranger, but Our Lady's messenger. She sent
you to me, and Heaven grant you may prove true."

The Bond of Repayment

"God grant it," echoed the knight. "But, Robin, when shall I repay
this loan, and where? Set me a day, and I will keep it." "Here,"
replied the outlaw, "under this greenwood tree, and in a twelvemonth's
time; so will you have time to regain your friends and gather your
rents from your redeemed lands. Now farewell, Sir Knight; and since it
is not meet for a worthy knight to journey unattended, I will lend you
also my comrade, Little John, to be your squire, and to do you yeoman
service, if need be." The knight bade farewell to Robin and his
generous followers, and was turning to ride away, when he suddenly
stopped and addressed the master-outlaw: "In faith, good Robin, I had
forgotten one thing. You know not my name. I am Sir Richard of the
Lea, and my land lies in Uterysdale." "As for that," said Robin Hood,
"I trouble not myself. You are Our Lady's messenger; that is enough
for me." So Sir Richard rode gladly away, blessing the generous outlaw
who lent him money to redeem his land, and a stout yeoman to defend
the loan.

Sir Richard's Journey

As the knight and his new servant rode on, Sir Richard called to his
man, saying, "I must by all means be in York to-morrow, to pay the
abbot of St. Mary's four hundred pounds; if I fail of my day I shall
lose my land and lordship for ever"; and Little John answered: "Fear
not, master; we will surely be there in time enough." Then they rode
on, and reached York early on the last day of the appointed time.

The Abbot and Prior of St. Mary's

In the meantime the abbot of St. Mary's was counting that Sir
Richard's lands were safely his; he had no pity for the poor unlucky
knight, but rather exulted in the legal cruelty which he could
inflict. Very joyfully he called aloud, early that morn: "A
twelvemonth ago to-day we lent four hundred pounds to a needy knight,
Sir Richard of the Lea, and unless he comes by noon to-day to repay
the money he will lose all his land and be disinherited, and our abbey
will be the richer by a fat estate, worth four hundred pounds a year.
Our Lady grant that he keep not his day." "Shame on you!" cried the
prior. "This poor knight may be ill, or beyond the sea; he may be in
hunger and cold as well as poverty, and it will be a foul wrong if you
declare his land forfeit."

"This is the set day," replied the abbot, "and he is not here." "You
dare not escheat his estates yet," replied the prior stubbornly. "It
is too early in the day; until noon the lands are still Sir Richard's,
and no man shall take them ere the clock strikes. Shame on your
conscience and your greed, to do a good knight such foul wrong! I
would willingly pay a hundred pounds myself to prevent it."

"Beshrew your meddlesome temper!" cried the abbot. "You are always
crossing me! But I have with me the Lord Chief Justice, and he will
declare my legal right." Just at that moment the high cellarer of the
abbey entered to congratulate the abbot on Sir Richard's absence. "He
is dead or ill, and we shall have the spending of four hundred pounds
a year," quoth he.

Sir Richard Returns

On his arrival Sir Richard had quietly gone round to his old tenants
in York, and had a goodly company of them ready to ride with him, but
he was minded to test the charity and true religion of the abbot, and
bade his followers assume pilgrims' robes. Thus attired, the company
rode to the abbey gate, where the porter recognised Sir Richard, and
the news of his coming, carried to the abbot and justice, caused them
great grief; but the prior rejoiced, hoping that a cruel injustice
would be prevented. As they dismounted the porter loudly called grooms
to lead the horses into the stable and have them relieved of their
burdens, but Sir Richard would not allow it, and left Little John to
watch over them at the abbey portal.

The Abbot and Sir Richard

Then Sir Richard came humbly into the hall, where a great banquet was
in progress, and knelt down in courteous salutation to the abbot and
his guests; but the prelate, who had made up his mind what conduct to
adopt, greeted him coldly, and many men did not return his salutation
at all. Sir Richard spoke aloud: "Rejoice, Sir Abbot, for I am come to
keep my day." "That is well," replied the monk, "but hast thou brought
the money?" "No money have I, not one penny," continued Sir Richard
sadly. "Pledge me in good red wine, Sir Justice," cried the abbot
callously; "the land is mine. And what dost thou here, Sir Richard, a
broken man, with no money to pay thy debt?" "I am come to beg you to
grant me a longer time for repayment." "Not one minute past the
appointed hour," said the exultant prelate. "Thou hast broken pledge,
and thy land is forfeit."

[Illustration: "Sir Richard knelt in courteous salutation"]

Sir Richard Implores the Justice

Still kneeling, Sir Richard turned to the justice and said: "Good Sir
Justice, be my friend and plead for me." "No," he replied, "I hold to
the law, and can give thee no help." "Gentle abbot, have pity on me,
and let me have my land again, and I will be the humble servant of
your monastery till I have repaid in full your four hundred pounds."
Then the cruel prelate swore a terrible oath that never should the
knight have his land again, and no one in the hall would speak for
him, kneeling there poor, friendless, and alone; so at last he began
to threaten violence. "Unless I have my land again," quoth he, "some
of you here shall dearly abide it. Now may I see the poor man has no
friends, for none will stand by me in my need."

The Justice Suggests a Compromise

The hint of violence made the abbot furiously angry, and, secure in
his position and the support of the justice, he shouted loudly: "Out,
thou false knight! Out of my hall!" Then at last Sir Richard rose to
his feet in just wrath. "Thou liest, Sir Abbot; foully thou liest! I
was never a false knight. In joust and tourney I have adventured as
far and as boldly as any man alive. There is no true courtesy in thee,
abbot, to suffer a knight to kneel so long." The quarrel now seemed so
serious that the justice intervened, saying to the angry prelate,
"What will you give me if I persuade him to sign a legal deed of
release? Without it you will never hold this land in peace." "You
shall have a hundred pounds for yourself," said the abbot, and the
justice nodded in token of assent.

Sir Richard Pays the Money

Now Sir Richard thought it was time to drop the mask, for noon was
nigh, and he would not risk his land again. Accordingly he cried:
"Nay, but not so easily shall ye have my lands. Even if you were to
pay a thousand pounds more you should not hold my father's estate.
Have here your money back again"; and, calling for Little John, he
bade him bring into the hall his coffer with the bags inside. Then he
counted out on the table four hundred good golden pounds, and said
sternly: "Abbot, here is your money again. Had you but been courteous
to me I would have rewarded you well; now take your money, give me a
quittance, and I will take my lands once more. Ye are all witnesses
that I have kept my day and have paid in full." Thereupon Sir Richard
strode haughtily out of the hall, and rode home gladly to his
recovered lands in Uterysdale, where he and his family ever prayed for
Robin Hood. The abbot of St. Mary's was bitterly enraged, for he had
lost the fair lands of Sir Richard of the Lea and had received a bare
four hundred pounds again. As for Little John, he went back to the
forest and told his master the whole story, to Robin Hood's great
satisfaction, for he enjoyed the chance of thwarting the schemes of a
wealthy and usurious prelate.

Sir Richard Sets Out to Repay the Loan

When a year had passed all but a few days, Sir Richard of the Lea said
to his wife: "Lady, I must shortly go to Barnesdale to repay Robin
Hood the loan which saved my lands, and would fain take him some small
gift in addition; what do you advise?" "Sir Richard, I would take a
hundred bows of Spanish yew and a hundred sheaves of arrows,
peacock-feathered, or grey-goose-feathered; methinks that will be to
Robin a most acceptable gift."

Sir Richard followed his wife's advice, and on the morning of the
appointed day set out to keep his tryst at the outlaws' oak in
Barnesdale, with the money duly counted, and the bows and arrows for
his present to the outlaw chief.

The Wrestling

As he rode, however, at the head of his troop he passed through a

village where there was a wrestling contest, which he stayed to watch.
He soon saw that the victorious wrestler, who was a stranger to the
village, would be defrauded of his well-earned prize, which consisted
of a white bull, a noble charger gaily caparisoned, a gold ring, a
pipe of wine, and a pair of embroidered gloves. This seemed so wrong
to Sir Richard that he stayed to defend the right, for love of Robin
Hood and of justice, and kept the wrestling ring in awe with his
well-appointed troop of men, so that the stranger was allowed to claim
his prize and carry it off. Sir Richard, anxious not to arouse the
hostility of the villagers, bought the pipe of wine from the winner,
and, setting it abroach, allowed all who would to drink; and so, in a
tumult of cheers and blessings, he rode away to keep his tryst. By
this time, however, it was nearly three in the afternoon, and he
should have been there at twelve. He comforted himself with the
thought that Robin would forgive the delay, for the sake of its cause,
and so rode on comfortably enough at the head of his gallant company.

Robin's Impatience

In the meantime Robin had waited patiently at the trysting tree till
noon, but when the hour passed and Sir Richard had not appeared he
began to grow impatient. "Master, let us dine," said Little John. "I
cannot; I fear Our Lady is angered with me, for she has not sent me my
money," returned the leader; but his follower replied: "The money is
not due till sunset, master, and Our Lady is true, and so is Sir
Richard; have no fear." "Do you three walk up through the willow
plantation to Watling Street, as you did last year, and bring me a
guest," said Robin Hood. "He may be a messenger, a minstrel, a poor
man, but he will come in God's name."

The Monks Approach

Again the three yeomen, Little John, Will Scarlet, and Much the
miller's son, took bow in hand and set out for Watling Street; but
this time they had not long to wait, for they at once saw a little
procession approaching. Two black monks rode at the head; then
followed seven sumpter-mules and a train of fifty-two men, so that the
clerics rode in almost royal state. "Seest thou yon monks?" said
Little John. "I will pledge my soul that they have brought our pay."
"But they are fifty-four, and we are but three," said Scarlet. "Unless
we bring them to dinner we dare not face our master," cried Little
John. "Look well to your bows, your strings and arrows, and have stout
hearts and steady hands. I will take the foremost monk, for life or
death."

The Capture of the Black Monk

The three outlaws stepped out into the road from the shelter of the
wood; they bent their bows and held their arrows on the string, and
Little John cried aloud: "Stay, churlish monk, or thou goest to thy
death, and it will be on thine own head! Evil on thee for keeping our
master fasting so long." "Who is your master?" asked the bewildered
monk; and Little John replied: "Robin Hood." The monk tossed his head.
"He is a foul thief," cried he, "and will come to a bad end. I have
heard no good of him all my days." So speaking, he tried to ride
forward and trample down the three yeomen; but Little John cried:
"Thou liest, churlish monk, and thou shalt rue the lie. He is a good
yeoman of this forest, and has bidden thee to dine with him this day";
and Much, drawing his bow, shot the monk to the heart, so that he fell
to the ground dead. The other black monk was taken, but all his
followers fled, except a little page, and a groom who tended the
sumpter-mules; and thus, with Little John's help and guidance, the
panic-stricken cleric and his train of baggage were brought to Robin
under the trysting tree.

[Illustration: "Much shot the monk to the heart"]

The Outlaws' Feast

Robin Hood doffed his cap and greeted his guest with all courtesy, but
the monk would not reply, and Little John's account of their meeting
made it evident that he was a churlish and unwilling guest. However,
he was obliged to celebrate the three usual Masses, was given water
for his ablutions before the banquet, and then when the whole
fellowship was assembled he was set in the place of honour at the
feast, and reverently served by Robin himself. "Be of good cheer, Sir
Monk," said Robin. "Where is your abbey when you are at home, and who
is your patron saint?" "I am of St. Mary's Abbey, in York, and, simple
though I be, I am the high cellarer."

The High Cellarer and the Suretyship

"For Our Lady's sake," said Robin, "we will give this monk the best of
cheer. Drink to me, Sir Monk; the wine is good. But I fear Our Lady is
wroth with me, for she has not sent me my money." "Fear not, master,"
returned Little John; "this monk is her cellarer, and no doubt she has
made him her messenger and he carries our money with him." "That is
likely," replied Robin. "Sir Monk, Our Lady was surety for a little
loan between a good knight and me, and to-day the money was to be
repaid. If you have brought it, pay it to me now, and I will thank you
heartily." The monk was quite amazed, and cried aloud: "I have never
heard of such a suretyship"; and as he spoke he looked so anxiously at
his sumpter-mules that Robin guessed there was gold in their
pack-saddles.

The Monk is Searched

Accordingly the leader feigned sudden anger. "Sir Monk, how dare you
defame our dear Lady? She is always true and faithful, and as you say
you are her servant, no doubt she has made you her messenger to bring
my money. Tell me truly how much you have in your coffers, and I will
thank you for coming so punctually." The monk replied: "Sir, I have
only twenty marks in my bags"; to which Robin answered: "If that be
all, and you have told the truth I will not touch one penny; rather
will I lend you some if you need it; but if I find more, I will leave
none, Sir Monk, for a religious man should have no silver to spend in
luxury." Now the monk looked very greatly alarmed, but he dared make
no protest, as Little John began to search his bags and coffers.

Success of the Search

When Little John opened the first coffer he emptied its contents, as
before, into his cloak, and counted eight hundred pounds, with which
he went to Robin Hood, saying, "Master, the monk has told the truth;
here are twenty marks of his own, and eight hundred pounds which Our
Lady has sent you in return for your loan." When Robin heard that he
cried to the miserable monk: "Did I not say so, monk? Is not Our Lady
the best surety a man could have? Has she not repaid me twice? Go back
to your abbey and say that if ever St. Mary's monks need a friend they
shall find one in Robin Hood."

The Monk Departs

"Where were you journeying?" asked the outlaw leader. "To settle
accounts with the bailiffs of our manors," replied the cellarer; but
he was in truth journeying to London, to obtain powers from the king
against Sir Richard of the Lea. Robin thought for a moment, and then
said: "Ah, then we must search your other coffer," and in spite of the
cellarer's indignant protests he was deprived of all the money that
second coffer contained. Then he was allowed to depart, vowing
bitterly that a dinner in Blythe or Doncaster would have cost him much
less dear.

Sir Richard Arrives

Late that afternoon Sir Richard of the Lea and his little company
arrived at the trysting tree, and full courteously the knight greeted
his deliverer and apologised for his delay. Robin asked of his
welfare, and the knight told of his protection of the poor wrestler,
for which Robin thanked him warmly. When he would fain have repaid the
loan the generous outlaw refused to accept the money, though he took
with hearty thanks the bows and arrows. In answer to the knight's
inquiries, Robin said that he had been paid the money twice over
before he came; and he told, to his debtor's great amusement, the
story of the high cellarer and his eight hundred pounds, and
concluded: "Our Lady owed me no more than four hundred pounds, and she
now gives you, by me, the other four hundred. Take them, with her
blessing, and if ever you need more come to Robin Hood."

So Sir Richard returned to Uterysdale, and long continued to use his

power to protect the bold outlaws, and Robin Hood dwelt securely in
the greenwood, doing good to the poor and worthy, but acting as a
thorn in the sides of all oppressors and tyrants.

CHAPTER XVI: HEREWARD THE WAKE

Introduction

In dealing with hero-legends and myths we are sometimes confronted

with the curious fact that a hero whose name and date can be
ascertained with exactitude has yet in his story mythological elements
which seem to belong to all the ages. This anomaly arises chiefly from
the fact that the imagination of a people is a myth-making thing, and
that the more truly popular the hero the more likely he is to become
the centre of a whole cycle of myths, which are in different ages
attached to the heroes of different periods. The folk-lore of
primitive races is a great storehouse whence a people can choose tales
and heroic deeds to glorify its own national hero, careless that the
same tales and deeds have done duty for other peoples and other
heroes. Hence it happens that Hereward the Saxon, a patriot hero as
real and actual as Wellington or Nelson, whose deeds were recorded in
prose and verse within forty years of his death, was even then
surrounded by a cloud of romance and mystery, which hid in vagueness
his family, his marriage, and even his death.

The Saxon Patriot

Hereward was, naturally, the darling hero of the Saxons, and for the
patriotism of his splendid defence of Ely they forgave his final
surrender to William the Norman; then they attributed to him all the
virtues supposed to be inherent in the free-born, and all the glorious
valour on which the English prided themselves; and, lastly, they
surrounded his death with a halo of desperate fighting, and made his
last conflict as wonderful as that of Roland at Roncesvalles. If
Roland is the ideal of Norman feudal chivalry, Hereward is equally
the ideal of Anglo-Saxon sturdy manliness and knighthood, and it seems
fitting that the Saxon ideal in the individual should go down before
the representatives, however unworthy, of a higher ideal.

Leofric of Mercia

When the weak but saintly King Edward the Confessor nominally ruled
all England the land was divided into four great earldoms, of which
Mercia and Kent were held by two powerful rivals. Leofric of Mercia
and Godwin of Kent were jealous not only for themselves, but for their
families, of each other's power and wealth, and the sons of Leofric
and of Godwin were ever at strife, though the two earls were now old
and prudent men, whose wars were fought with words and craft, not with
swords. The wives of the two great earls were as different as their
lords. The Lady Gytha, Godwin's wife, of the royal Danish race, was
fierce and haughty, a fit helpmeet for the ambitious earl who was to
undermine the strength of England by his efforts to win kingly power
for his children. But the Lady Godiva, Leofric's beloved wife, was a
gentle, pious, loving woman, who had already won an almost saintly
reputation for sympathy and pity by her sacrifice to save her
husband's oppressed citizens at Coventry, where her pleading won
relief for them from the harsh earl on the pitiless condition of her
never-forgotten ride. Happily her gentle self-suppression awoke a
nobler spirit in her husband, and enabled him to play a worthier part
in England's history. She was in entire sympathy with the religious
aspirations of Edward the Confessor, and would gladly have seen one of
her sons become a monk, perhaps to win spiritual power and a saintly
reputation like those of the great Dunstan.

[Illustration: "Her pleading won relief for them"]

Hereward's Youth

For this holy vocation she fixed on her second son, Hereward, a wild,
wayward lad, with long golden curls, eyes of different colours, one
grey, one blue, great breadth and strength of limb, and a wild and
ungovernable temper which made him difficult of control. This reckless
lad the Lady Godiva vainly tried to educate for the monkish life, but
he utterly refused to adopt her scheme, would not master any but the
barest rudiments of learning, and spent his time in wrestling, boxing,
fighting and all manly exercises. Despairing of making him an
ecclesiastic, his mother set herself to inspire him with a noble ideal
of knighthood, but his wildness and recklessness increased with his
years, and often his mother had to stand between the riotous lad and
his father's deserved anger.

His Strength and Leadership

When he reached the age of sixteen or seventeen he became the terror
of the Fen Country, for at his father's Hall of Bourne he gathered a
band of youths as wild and reckless as himself, who accepted him for
their leader, and obeyed him implicitly, however outrageous were his
commands. The wise Earl Leofric, who was much at court with the
saintly king, understood little of the nature of his second son, and
looked upon his wild deeds as evidence of a cruel and lawless mind, a
menace to the peace of England, while they were in reality but the
tokens of a restless energy for which the comparatively peaceable life
of England at that time was all too dull and tame.

Leofric and Hereward

Frequent were the disputes between father and son, and sadly did Lady
Godiva forebode an evil ending to the clash of warring natures
whenever Hereward and his father met; yet she could do nothing to
avert disaster, for though her entreaties would soften the lad into
penitence for some mad prank or reckless outrage, one hint of cold
blame from his father would suffice to make him hardened and
impenitent; and so things drifted from bad to worse. In all Hereward's
lawless deeds, however, there was no meanness or crafty malice. He
hated monks and played many a rough trick upon them, but took his
punishment, when it came, with equable cheerfulness; he robbed
merchants with a high hand, but made reparation liberally, counting
himself well satisfied with the fun of a fight or the skill of a
clever trick; his band of youths met and fought other bands, but they
bore no malice when the strife was over. In one point only was
Hereward less than true to his own nobility of character--he was
jealous of admitting that any man was his superior in strength or
comeliness, and his vanity was well supported by his extraordinary
might and beauty.

Hereward at Court

The deeds which brought Earl Leofric's wrath upon his son in a
terrible fashion were not matters of wanton wickedness, but of lawless
personal violence. Called to attend his father to the Confessor's
court, the youth, who had little respect for one so unwarlike as "the
miracle-monger," uttered his contempt for saintly king, Norman
prelate, and studious monks too loudly, and thereby shocked the weakly
devout Edward, who thought piety the whole duty of man. But his
wildness touched the king more nearly still; for in his sturdy
patriotism he hated the Norman favourites and courtiers who surrounded
the Confessor, and again and again his marvellous strength was shown
in the personal injuries he inflicted on the Normans in mere boyish
brawls, until at last his father could endure the disgrace no longer.

Hereward's Exile

Begging an audience of the king, Leofric formally asked for a writ of

outlawry against his own son. The Confessor, surprised, but not
displeased, felt some compunction as he saw the father's affection
overborne by the judge's severity. Earl Godwin, Leofric's greatest
rival, was present in the council, and his pleading for the noble lad,
whose faults were only those of youth, was sufficient to make Leofric
more urgent in his petition. The curse of family feud, which
afterwards laid England prostrate at the foot of the Conqueror, was
already felt, and felt so strongly that Hereward resented Godwin's
intercession more than his father's sternness.

Hereward's Farewell

"What!" he cried, "shall a son of Leofric, the noblest man in England,

accept intercession from Godwin or any of his family? No. I may be
unworthy of my wise father and my saintly mother, but I am not yet
sunk so low as to ask a favour from a Godwin. Father, I thank you. For
years I have fretted against the peace of the land, and thus have
incurred your displeasure; but in exile I may range abroad and win my
fortune at the sword's point." "Win thy fortune, foolish boy!" said
his father. "And whither wilt thou fare?" "Wherever fate and my
fortune lead me," he replied recklessly. "Perhaps to join Harald
Hardrada at Constantinople and become one of the Emperor's Varangian
Guard; perhaps to follow old Beowa out into the West, at the end of
some day of glorious battle; perhaps to fight giants and dragons and
all kinds of monsters. All these things I may do, but never shall
Mercia see me again till England calls me home. Farewell, father;
farewell, Earl Godwin; farewell, reverend king. I go. And pray ye that
ye may never need my arm, for it may hap that ye will call me and I
will not come." Then Hereward rode away, followed into exile by one
man only, Martin Lightfoot, who left the father's service for that of
his outlawed son. It was when attending the king's court on this
occasion that Hereward first saw and felt the charm of a lovely little
Saxon maiden named Alftruda, a ward of the pious king.

Hereward in Northumbria

Though the king's writ of outlawry might run in Mercia, it did not
carry more than nominal weight in Northumbria, where Earl Siward ruled
almost as an independent lord. Thither Hereward determined to go, for
there dwelt his own godfather, Gilbert of Ghent, and his castle was
known as a good training school for young aspirants for knighthood.
Sailing from Dover, Hereward landed at Whitby, and made his way to
Gilbert's castle, where he was well received, since the cunning
Fleming knew that an outlawry could be reversed at any time, and
Leofric's son might yet come to rule England. Accordingly Hereward was
enrolled in the number of young men, mainly Normans or Flemings, who
were seeking to perfect themselves in chivalry before taking
knighthood. He soon showed himself a brave warrior, an unequalled
wrestler, and a wary fighter, and soon no one cared to meddle with the
young Mercian, who outdid them all in manly sports. The envy of the
young Normans was held in check by Gilbert, and by a wholesome dread
of Hereward's strong arm; until, in Gilbert's absence, an incident
occurred which placed the young exile on a pinnacle so far above them
that only by his death could they hope to rid themselves of their
feeling of inferiority.

The Fairy Bear

Gilbert kept in his castle court an immense white Polar bear, dreaded
by all for its enormous strength, and called the Fairy Bear. It was
even believed that the huge beast had some kinship to old Earl Siward,
who bore a bear upon his crest, and was reputed to have had something
of bear-like ferocity in his youth. This white bear was so much
dreaded that he was kept chained up in a strong cage. One morning as
Hereward was returning with Martin from his morning ride he heard
shouts and shrieks from the castle yard, and, reaching the great gate,
entered lightly and closed it behind him rapidly, for there outside
the shattered cage, with broken chain dangling, stood the Fairy Bear,
glaring savagely round the courtyard. But one human figure was in
sight, that of a girl of about twelve years of age.

Hereward Slays the Bear

There were sounds of men's voices and women's shrieks from within the
castle, but the doors were fast barred, while the maid, in her terror,
beat on the portal with her palms, and begged them, for the love of
God, to let her in. The cowards, refused, and in the meantime the
great bear, irritated by the dangling chain, made a rush towards the
child. Hereward dashed forward, shouting to distract the bear, and
just managed to stop his charge at the girl. The savage animal turned
on the new-comer, who needed all his agility to escape the monster's
terrible onset. Seizing his battle-axe, the youth swung it around
his head and split the skull of the furious beast, which fell dead. It
was a blow so mighty that even Hereward himself was surprised at its
deadly effect, and approached cautiously to examine his victim. In the
meantime the little girl, who proved to be no other than the king's
ward, Alftruda, had watched with fascinated eyes first the approach of
the monster, and then, as she crouched in terror, its sudden
slaughter; and now she summoned up courage to run to Hereward, who had
always been kind to the pretty child, and to fling herself into his
arms. "Kind Hereward," she whispered, "you have saved me and killed
the bear. I love you for it, and I must give you a kiss, for my dame
says so do all ladies that choose good knights to be their champions.
Will you be mine?" As she spoke she kissed Hereward again and again.

[Illustration: Alftruda]

Hereward's Trick on the Knights

"Where have they all gone, little one?" asked the young noble; and
Alftruda replied: "We were all out here in the courtyard watching the
young men at their exercises, when we heard a crash and a roar, and
the cage burst open, and we saw the dreadful Fairy Bear. They all ran,
the ladies and knights, but I was the last, and they were so
frightened that they shut themselves in and left me outside; and when
I beat at the door and prayed them to let me in they would not, and I
thought the bear would eat me, till you came."

"The cowards!" cried Hereward. "And they think themselves worthy of

knighthood when they will save their own lives and leave a child in
danger! They must be taught a lesson. Martin, come hither and aid me."
When Martin came, the two, with infinite trouble, raised the carcase
of the monstrous beast, and placed it just where the bower door,
opening, would show it at once. Then Hereward bade Alftruda call to
the knights in the bower that all was safe and they could come out,
for the bear would not hurt them. He and Martin, listening, heard with
great glee the bitter debate within the bower as to who should risk
his life to open the door, the many excuses given for refusal, the
mischievous fun in Alftruda's voice as she begged some one to open to
her, and, best of all, the cry of horror with which the knight who had
ventured to draw the bolt shut the door again on seeing the Fairy Bear
waiting to enter. Hereward even carried his trick so far as to thrust
the bear heavily against the bower door, making all the people within
shriek and implore the protection of the saints. Finally, when he was
tired of the jest, he convinced the valiant knights that they might
emerge safely from their retirement, and showed how he, a stripling of
seventeen, had slain the monster at one blow. From that time Hereward
was the darling of the whole castle, petted, praised, beloved by all
its inmates, except his jealous rivals.

Hereward Leaves Northumbria

The foreign knights grew so jealous of the Saxon youth, and so restive
under his shafts of sarcastic ridicule, that they planned several
times to kill him, and once or twice nearly succeeded. This
insecurity, and a feeling that perhaps Earl Siward had some kinship
with the Fairy Bear, and would wish to avenge his death, made Hereward
decide to quit Gilbert's castle. The spirit of adventure was strong
upon him, the sea seemed to call him; now that he had been
acknowledged superior to the other noble youths in Gilbert's
household, the castle no longer afforded a field for his ambition.
Accordingly he took a sad leave of Alftruda, an affectionate one of
Sir Gilbert, who wished to knight him for his brave deed, and a
mocking one of his angry and unsuccessful foes.

Hereward in Cornwall

Entering into a merchant-ship, he sailed for Cornwall, and there was

taken to the court of King Alef, a petty British chief, who, on true
patriarchal lines, disposed of his children as he would, and had
betrothed his fair daughter to a terrible Pictish giant, breaking off,
in order to do it, her troth-plight with Prince Sigtryg of Waterford,
son of a Danish king in Ireland. Hereward was ever chivalrous, and
little Alftruda had made him feel pitiful to all maidens. Seeing
speedily how the princess loathed her new betrothed, a hideous,
misshapen wretch, nearly eight feet high, he determined to slay him.
With great deliberation he picked a quarrel with the giant, and killed
him the next day in fair fight; but King Alef was driven by the
threats of the vengeful Pictish tribe to throw Hereward and his man
Martin into prison, promising trial and punishment on the morrow.

Hereward Released from Prison

To the young Saxon's surprise, the released princess appeared to be as

grieved and as revengeful as any follower of the Pictish giant, and
she not only advocated prison and death the next day, but herself
superintended the tying of the thongs that bound the two strangers.
When they were left to their lonely confinement Hereward began to
blame the princess for hypocrisy, and to protest the impossibility of
a man's ever knowing what a woman wants. "Who would have thought," he
cried, "that that beautiful maiden loved a giant so hideous as this
Pict? Had I known, I would never have fought him, but her eyes said
to me, 'Kill him,' and I have done so; this is how she rewards me!"
"No," replied Martin, "this is how"; and he cut Hereward's bonds,
laughing silently to himself. "Master, you were so indignant with the
lady that you could not make allowances for her. I knew that she must
pretend to grieve, for her father's sake, and when she came to test
our bonds I was sure of it, for as she fingered a knot she slipped a
knife into my hands, and bade me use it. Now we are free from our
bonds, and must try to escape from our prison."

The Princess Visits the Captives

In vain, however, the master and man ranged round the room in which
they were confined; it was a tiny chapel, with walls and doors of
great thickness, and violently as Hereward exerted himself, he could
make no impression on either walls or door, and, sitting sullenly down
on the altar steps, he asked Martin what good was freedom from bonds
in a secure prison. "Much, every way," replied the servant; "at least
we die with free hands; and I, for my part, am content to trust that
the princess has some good plan, if we will only be ready." While he
was speaking they heard footsteps just outside the door, and the sound
of a key being inserted into the lock. Hereward beckoned silently to
Martin, and the two stood ready, one at each side of the door, to make
a dash for freedom, and Martin was prepared to slay any who should
hinder. To their great surprise, the princess entered, accompanied by
an old priest bearing a lantern, which he set down on the altar step,
and then the princess turned to Hereward, crying, "Pardon me, my
deliverer!" The Saxon was still aggrieved and bewildered, and replied:
"Do you now say 'deliverer'? This afternoon it was 'murderer,
villain, cut-throat.' How shall I know which is your real mind?" The
princess almost laughed as she said: "How stupid men are! What could I
do but pretend to hate you, since otherwise the Picts would have slain
you then and us all afterwards, but I claimed you as my victims, and
you have been given to me. How else could I have come here to-night?
Now tell me, if I set you free will you swear to carry a message for
me?"

[Illustration: Hereward and the Princess]

Sigtryg Ranaldsson of Waterford

"Whither shall I go, lady, and what shall I say?" asked Hereward.
"Take this ring, my ring of betrothal, and go to Prince Sigtryg, son
of King Ranald of Waterford. Say to him that I am beset on every side,
and beg him to come and claim me as his bride; otherwise I fear I may
be forced to marry some man of my father's choosing, as I was being
driven to wed the Pictish giant. From him you have rescued me, and I
thank you; but if my betrothed delays his coming it may be too late,
for there are other hateful suitors who would make my father bestow my
hand upon one of them. Beg him to come with all speed." "Lady, I will
go now," said Hereward, "if you will set me free from this vault."

Hereward Binds the Princess

"Go quickly, and safely," said the princess; "but ere you go you have
one duty to fulfil: you must bind me hand and foot, and fling me, with
this old priest, on the ground." "Never," said Hereward, "will I bind
a woman; it were foul disgrace to me for ever." But Martin only
laughed, and the maiden said again: "How stupid men are! I must
pretend to have been overpowered by you, or I shall be accused of
having freed you, but I will say that I came hither to question you,
and you and your man set on me and the priest, bound us, took the key,
and so escaped. So shall you be free, and I shall have no blame, and
my father no danger; and may Heaven forgive the lie."

Hereward reluctantly agreed, and, with Martin's help, bound the two
hand and foot and laid them before the altar; then, kissing the
maiden's hand, and swearing loyalty and truth, he turned to depart.
But the princess had one question to ask. "Who are you, noble
stranger, so gallant and strong? I would fain know for whom to pray."
"I am Hereward Leofricsson, and my father is the Earl of Mercia." "Are
you that Hereward who slew the Fairy Bear? Little wonder is it that
you have slain my monster and set me free." Then master and man left
the chapel, after carefully turning the key in the lock. Making their
way to the shore, they succeeded in getting a ship to carry them to
Ireland, and in course of time reached Waterford.

Prince Sigtryg

The Danish kingdom of Waterford was ruled by King Ranald, whose only
son, Sigtryg, was about Hereward's age, and was as noble-looking a
youth as the Saxon hero. The king was at a feast, and Hereward,
entering the hall with the captain of the vessel, sat down at one of
the lower tables; but he was not one of those who can pass unnoticed.
The prince saw him, distinguished at once his noble bearing, and asked
him to come to the king's own table. He gladly obeyed, and as he drank
to the prince and their goblets touched together he contrived to drop
the ring from the Cornish princess into Sigtryg's cup. The prince saw
and recognised it as he drained his cup, and, watching his
opportunity, left the hall, and was soon followed by his guest.

Hereward and Sigtryg

Outside in the darkness Sigtryg turned hurriedly to Hereward, saying,

"You bring me a message from my betrothed?" "Yes, if you are that
Prince Sigtryg to whom the Princess of Cornwall was affianced." "Was
affianced! What do you mean? She is still my lady and my love." "Yet
you leave her there unaided, while her father gives her in marriage to
a hideous giant of a Pict, breaking her betrothal, and driving the
hapless maiden to despair. What kind of love is yours?" Hereward said
nothing yet about his own slaying of the giant, because he wished to
test Prince Sigtryg's sincerity, and he was satisfied, for the prince
burst out: "Would to God that I had gone to her before! but my father
needed my help against foreign invaders and native rebels. I will go
immediately and save my lady or die with her!" "No need of that, for I
killed that giant," said Hereward coolly, and Sigtryg embraced him in
joy and they swore blood-brotherhood together. Then he asked: "What
message do you bring me, and what means her ring?" The other replied
by repeating the Cornish maiden's words, and urging him to start at
once if he would save his betrothed from some other hateful marriage.

Return to Cornwall

The prince went at once to his father, told him the whole story, and
obtained a ship and men to journey to Cornwall and rescue the
princess; then, with Hereward by his side, he set sail, and soon
landed in Cornwall, hoping to obtain his bride peaceably. To his grief
he learnt that the princess had just been betrothed to a wild Cornish
leader, Haco, and the wedding feast was to be held that very day.
Sigtryg was greatly enraged, and sent a troop of forty Danes to King
Alef demanding the fulfilment of the troth-plight between himself and
his daughter, and threatening vengeance if it were broken. To this
threat the king returned no answer, and no Dane came back to tell of
their reception.

[Illustration: Hereward and Sigtryg]

Hereward in the Enemy's Hall

Sigtryg would have waited till morning, trusting in the honour of the
king, but Hereward disguised himself as a minstrel and obtained
admission to the bridal feast, where he soon won applause by his
beautiful singing. The bridegroom, Haco, in a rapture offered him any
boon he liked to ask, but he demanded only a cup of wine from the
hands of the bride. When she brought it to him he flung into the empty
cup the betrothal ring, the token she had sent to Sigtryg, and said:
"I thank thee, lady, and would reward thee for thy gentleness to a
wandering minstrel; I give back the cup, richer than before by the
kind thoughts of which it bears the token." The princess looked at
him, gazed into the goblet, and saw her ring; then, looking again, she
recognised her deliverer and knew that rescue was at hand.

Haco's Plan

While men feasted Hereward listened and talked, and found out that the
forty Danes were prisoners, to be released on the morrow when Haco was
sure of his bride, but released useless and miserable, since they
would be turned adrift blinded. Haco was taking his lovely bride back
to his own land, and Hereward saw that any rescue, to be successful,
must be attempted on the march. Yet he knew not the way the bridal
company would go, and he lay down to sleep in the hall, hoping that
he might hear something more. When all men slept a dark shape came
gliding through the hall and touched Hereward on the shoulder; he
slept lightly, and awoke at once to recognise the old nurse of the
princess. "Come to her now," the old woman whispered, and Hereward
went, though he knew not that the princess was still true to her
lover. In her bower, which she was soon to leave, Haco's sorrowful
bride awaited the messenger.

Rescue for Haco's Bride

Sadly she smiled on the young Saxon as she said: "I knew your face
again in spite of the disguise, but you come too late. Bear my
farewell to Sigtryg, and say that my father's will, not mine, makes me
false to my troth-plight." "Have you not been told, lady, that he is
here?" asked Hereward. "Here?" the princess cried. "I have not heard.
He loves me still and has not forsaken me?" "No, lady, he is too true
a lover for falsehood. He sent forty Danes yesterday to demand you of
your father and threaten his wrath if he refused." "And I knew not of
it," said the princess softly; "yet I had heard that Haco had taken
some prisoners, whom he means to blind." "Those are our messengers,
and your future subjects," said Hereward. "Help me to save them and
you. Do you know Haco's plans?" "Only this, that he will march
to-morrow along the river, and where the ravine is darkest and forms
the boundary between his kingdom and my father's the prisoners are to
be blinded and released." "Is it far hence?" "Three miles to the
eastward of this hall," she replied. "We will be there. Have no fear,
lady, whatever you may see, but be bold and look for your lover in the
fight." So saying, Hereward kissed the hand of the princess, and
passed out of the hall unperceived by any one.

The Ambush

Returning to Sigtryg, the young Saxon told all that he had learnt, and
the Danes planned an ambush in the ravine where Haco had decided to
blind and set free his captives. All was in readiness, and side by
side Hereward and Sigtryg were watching the pathway from their covert,
when the sound of horses' hoofs heard on the rocks reduced them to
silence. The bridal procession came in strange array: first the Danish
prisoners bound each between two Cornishmen, then Haco and his unhappy
bride, and last a great throng of Cornishmen. Hereward had taken
command, that Sigtryg might look to the safety of his lady, and his
plan was simplicity itself. The Danes were to wait till their
comrades, with their guards, had passed through the ravine; then while
the leader engaged Haco, and Sigtryg looked to the safety of the
princess, the Danes would release the prisoners and slay every
Cornishman, and the two parties of Danes, uniting their forces, would
restore order to the land and destroy the followers of Haco.

Success

The whole was carried out exactly as Hereward had planned. The
Cornishmen, with Danish captives, passed first without attack; next
came Haco, riding grim and ferocious beside his silent bride, he
exulting in his success, she looking eagerly for any signs of rescue.
As they passed Hereward sprang from his shelter, crying, "Upon them,
Danes, and set your brethren free!" and himself struck down Haco and
smote off his head. There was a short struggle, but soon the rescued
Danes were able to aid their deliverers, and the Cornish guards were
all slain; the men of King Alef, never very zealous for the cause of
Haco, fled, and the Danes were left masters of the field. Sigtryg had
in the meantime seen to the safety of the princess, and now placing
her between himself and Hereward, he escorted her to the ship, which
soon brought them to Waterford and a happy bridal. The Prince and
Princess of Waterford always recognised in Hereward their deliverer
and best friend, and in their gratitude wished him to dwell with them
always; but he knew "how hard a thing it is to look into happiness
through another man's eyes," and would not stay. His roving and daring
temper drove him to deeds of arms in other lands, where he won a
renown second to none, but he always felt glad in his own heart, even
in later days, when unfaithfulness to a woman was the one great sin of
his life, that his first feats of arms had been wrought to rescue two
maidens from their hapless fate, and that he was rightly known as
Hereward the Saxon, the Champion of Women.
GLOSSARY AND INDEX

In the following Index no attempt is made to indicate the exact

pronunciation of foreign names; but in the case of those from the
Anglo-Saxon a rough approximation is given, as being often essential
to the reading of the metrical versions. In these indications the
letters have their ordinary English values; e indicates the very
light, obscure sound heard in the indefinite article in such a phrase
as "with a rush."

ABLOEC. See Anlaf

ACHILLES. His sulks, 184;

Cuchulain, "the Irish," 184

ADEON. Son of Eudav; grandson of Caradoc, 49

AGE. See Golden Age

AILILL. King of Connaught, husband of Queen Meave; to decide claims

to title of Chief Champion, 189;
seeks aid of Fairy People of the Hills, 193

AILMAR. King of Westernesse, 290;

welcomes and adopts Childe Horn, 291;
Princess Rymenhild, daughter of, 292;
dubs Horn knight, 297;
hears of Horn's first exploit, 299;
Fikenhild betrays Horn and Rymenhild to, 300;
Horn returns to, 304;
reluctantly gives his daughter to Horn, 308;
Horn leaves Rymenhild to his care, 308, 309

AIX-LA-CHAPELLE. Wondrous springs of, 125;

Charlemagne at, 155

ALEF. King of Cornwall; Hereward at court of, 343;

casts Hereward into prison, 343;
his daughter releases Hereward, 344, 345;
Sigtryg sends forty Danes to, 348

ALFTRUDA. Ward of Edward the Confessor, 339;

Hereward's first meeting with, 339;
rescues from Fairy Bear, 340, 341;
Hereward takes farewell of, 342

ALICE OF CLOUDESLEE. Wife of William of Cloudeslee, 227;

outlaw husband visits, 227, 228;
rescued from burning house, 232;
thanks Adam Bell and Clym for delivering her husband, 240;
appointed chief woman of bedchamber to the royal children, 246

ALL-FATHER. Praised for Beowulf's victory over Grendel, 18

ALTO-BIS-CA�R. Song of (a forgery), 120

ANGLESEY. Same as Mona, 47

ANGLO-SAXON NOBILITY. Hereward the ideal of, 334, 335

ANGLO-SAXON TIMES. Legends regarding Constantine during, 42

�NGUS THE EVER-YOUNG. Irish people and wrath of, 158

ANLAF. Same as Olaf, or Sihtricson; known to Welsh as Abloec or

Habloc; romantic stories concerning, 73

ANSEIS, DUKE OF. Mortally wounded, 143

ARABIA. Physicians from, with remedies for Constantine's leprosy, 65

ARMAGH. Capital of Ulster; Cuchulain and Emer dwell at, 186;

King Conor and heroes return to, 190;
heroes return to, 195

ARNOLDIN, SIR. Cousin of Athulf; helps to save Rymenhild, 312;

King Ailmar nominates as his heir, 313

ARTHUR, KING. Uncle of Sir Gawayne, 265;

Christmas kept at Carlisle by, 266;
Guenever, queen of, 266;
uncle of Sir Gareth and Sir Mordred, 266;
damsel requests a boon of, 267;
his journey to Tarn Wathelan, and fight with giant, 269;
humiliated by the giant and released on certain conditions, 270;
his search for the answer to the giant's question, 270-272;
learns it from the loathly lady, 272;
the ransom paid to giant, 273;
the loathly lady demands a young and handsome knight for husband
for helping, 274;
Sir Gawayne offers to pay ransom for, 275;
summons court to hunt in greenwood near Tarn Wathelan, 276;
rebukes Sir Kay, 277;
his joy over his nephew's wedding with the supposed loathly lady,
284, 285

ARTHURIAN LEGEND. Preserved by medi�val Wales, 265

ARVON. Fertile land of, searched by ambassadors of Maxen Wledig,

47-49

ASBRAND. Brother of Biargey, 113;

helps Howard against Thorbiorn, 115

ASCHERE (ask-here). One of King Hrothgar's thanes, carried off by

Grendel's mother, 21

ATHELBRUS. King Ailmar's steward, to train Childe Horn to be a

knight, 291, 292;
induces Athulf to personate Horn, 293;
sends Horn to Princess Rymenhild, 294;
land of King Modi committed to care of, 313

ATHELSTAN. King of England; kinship of Anlaf with, 73

 ATHELWOLD. King of England, father of Goldborough, 80;
his death and burial, 81

ATHULF. Horn's favourite companion, 287;

personates Horn before Rymenhild, 293;
writes to Horn on behalf of Rymenhild, 303;
plans with Horn the rescue of Rymenhild, 308;
his father found at Suddene, 309, 310;
weds Reynild, 313

AUDE THE FAIR. Sister of Oliver, betrothed bride of Roland, 155;

Charlemagne promises his son Louis to, 155;
dies of grief for Roland's loss, 155

AUGUSTUS. Constantine's elevation to rank of, 64

AWE, LOCH. Black Colin, Knight of, 249, 250;

Black Colin dwells at, with wife, 250;
Lady of, 251;
Black Colin far away from, 254;
Black Colin's return to, 258

BABYLON, EMIR OF. Marsile's vassal; defeated by Charlemagne, 154

BALTIC SEA. Forefathers who dwelt on shores of, 1

BANIER, SIR. A Knight of the Round Table, 266

BARNESDALE. Forest in South Yorkshire, once dwelling-place of Robin

Hood, 314, 315;
Sir Richard of the Lea sets out for, to repay loan, 328

BARTON, SIR ANDREW. Scottish hero, 248

BASQUES. Attack Charlemagne, 119

BATHSTEAD. Place on shores of Icefirth near where Thorbiorn lived,

97-118

BEAN-STAN. Father of Breca, 12

BEDIVERE, SIR. A Knight of the Round Table, 266

BELI. Son of Manogan; Britain conquered by Maxen Wledig from, 48

BELL, ADAM. Outlaw leader in forest of Englewood, 226;

declared powerless to deliver William of Cloudeslee, 233;
rescues William from death, 237, 238;
visit to London to see the king, 241;
the king pardons, 243

BEO�WA. Stories of, crystallised in stories of Beowulf, 1

BEO�WULF.
1. The poem of, 1.
 2. Thane of Hygelac, King of Geats, 1;
son of Ecgtheow, 6;
nephew of King Hygelac, 6;
grandson of Hrethel, 6;
brought up at Geatish court, 6;
famous swimming match with Breca, 6;
his mighty hand-grip, 6;
sails for Denmark to attack Grendel, 6;
challenged by Warden of Denmark, 6;
declares his mission to Hrothgar, 10;
disparaged by Hunferth, 12;
honoured by Queen Wealhtheow, 14, 20;
struggles with Grendel, 16;
mortally wounds Grendel, 17;
vows to slay mother of Grendel, 23;
does so, 26;
carries off sword-hilt and Grendel's head, 26;
sails to Geatland, 29;
welcomed by King Hygelac and Queen Hygd, 29, 30;
chief champion of Hygelac, 30;
refuses the throne in favour of Heardred, and becomes guardian
of, 31;
again chosen King of Geatland, 31;
encounters with fire-dragon, 31-39;
recites slaying of Frankish warrior, Daghrefn, 35;
forsaken by Geats in his encounter with the fire-dragon, 36;
slays the dragon, 37;
his death and funeral, 39-41

BERILD. Son of King Thurston, 301;

slain by the Saracens, 302

BERNARD BROWN. Danish magistrate; protects Havelok and Goldborough,

88-89

BER-NA�R-DO DEL CA�R-PIO. Hero in Spanish legend who defeats Roland,

121

BERTRAM. Earl's cook who befriended Havelok, 82-83;

marries one of Grim's daughters and becomes Earl of Cornwall, 94

BIARGEY. Wife of Howard the Halt, 97;

urges Howard to claim wergild for Olaf, 106, 107, 108;
Howard returns to, 111;
visits her brothers, Valbrand, Thorbrand, and Asbrand, 112, 113;
hails Thorbiorn while out fishing, 112;
urges Howard to seek vengeance, 113, 114

BIRKABEYN. Rule of, as king over Denmark, 74;

Swanborow and Elfleda, daughters of, and Havelok, son of, 74;
commits Havelok to care of Jarl Godard, 75;
death and funeral of, 75;
Jarl Ubbe, an old friend of, 87

BLACK COLIN OF LOCH AWE, 249;

son of Sir Nigel Campbell, 249;
Patterson, name of foster-parents, 250;
messenger tells of new crusade, 250;
decides to go on crusade, 251;
 his wife's grief, 251;
touches at Edinburgh and ships at Leith, _en route_ to Holy Land,
253;
his desire to see Holy Land and Holy Sepulchre, 253;
reaches Rome, 253;
sees Pope, 253;
regards Pope as Vicar of Christ, 253;
journeys to Rhodes, 253;
takes service with Knights of St. John, 253;
a pilgrim at Jerusalem, 253;
letter in name of, forged by Baron MacCorquodale, 255;
falsely reported wounded by Saracens, 255;
hears news of wife's impending second marriage, 257;
returns home, 258;
welcomed by foster-mother, 259;
disguised as a beggar, hands token to his wife, 262;
recognised and welcomed by his wife, 262

BLACK DOUGLAS. Scottish hero, 248

BLACK MONK, THE. Captured by Robin Hood's followers, 330;

high cellarer in Abbey of St. Mary, 331;
Robin Hood confiscates his gold as repayment of loan to Sir
Richard of the Lea, 331, 332;
departs from greenwood, 332

BLACK SAINGLAIN. One of Cuchulain's magic steeds, 191

BLANCANDRIN. Vassal of King Marsile, 123;

overtaken by Ganelon, 130;
Ganelon and, plot Roland's destruction, 131

BLAYE. Bodies of Roland, Oliver, and Turpin buried in cathedral of,

155

BLUEMIRE. Dwelling-place of Howard the Halt, 97

BOG OF ALLEN. Cathleen's messenger declared to be sick in, 177

BORS, SIR. A Knight of the Round Table, 266

BOURNE, HALL OF. Home of Leofric, Earl of Mercia, 336

BRAND. Trusted serving-man of Thorbiorn, 97, 102

BRECA. Famous swimming champion, beaten by Beowulf, 6;

son of Beanstan, 12

BRICRIU OF THE BITTER TONGUE. Compared with Thersites, 186;

invites King Conor and Red Branch heroes to a feast, 186;
stirs up strife among heroes of Ulster, 187, 188;
flatters the wives of the heroes, 189, 190

BRIGIT.
1. Of the Holy Fire; wrath of, and Irish people, 158.
2. Cathleen's old servant, 173

BRISEIS. Achilles and his sulks concerning, 184

 BRITAIN. Legend of "The Dream of Maxen Wledig" shows importance of
Constantine to, 42;
ambassadors of Maxen Wledig carried to, 47;
conquered by Maxen Wledig from Beli, son of Manogan, 48;
given by Maxen Wledig to Eudav, 49;
Elene summoned from, is baptized, and seeks the sacred Cross,
54-62;
Constantine sent to, 63;
Constantine proclaimed emperor of, 63

BRITONS, EARLY, Greeks of Homer, and Irish Celts, racial affinity

between, 184

BRITTANY. Roland, prefect of marches of, 120

BRUCE, ROBERT. Scottish hero, 248;

Sir Nigel Campbell, adherent of, 249

CAERLLEON. See Caernarvon, 49

CAERMARTHEN. See Caernarvon, 49

CAERNARVON. Castle in land of Arvon in which Princess Helena dwelt,

48;
given with castles Caerlleon and Caermarthen to Princess Helena as
dowry, 49

CAIN. Grendel, offspring of, 4

CALEDONIANS. Defeated by Constantius, 63

CALIDORE, SIR. Medi�val Wales had a knight of courtesy equal to, 265

CALVARY. The hill of, 58, 59, 61

CAMPBELL, SIR NIGEL. Leader in Scottish Independence, 249;

father of Black Colin, 249;
his death, 250;
clansmen of, accompany Black Colin to Holy Land, 252

CARADOC. Father of Eudav; grandfather of Princess Helena, and of

Princes Kynon and Adeon, 49

CARLISLE. Outlaw band near town of, in Englewood Forest, 226;

reference to sheriff of, 227;
William of Cloudeslee goes to, 227;
sheriff informed of William's presence at, 229;
outlaws Adam Bell and Clym go to, 234;
the outlaws escape from, 239;
King Arthur keeps Christmas at, 266;
Sir Gawayne and loathly lady wedded at, 280

CATHBAD. Druid; Cuchulain's tutor, 185

CATHLEEN. Irish countess; legend concerning, 156;

antiquity of the legend, 156;
 the story, 156-183;
her grief because of her people's famine, 161;
prays to Virgin Mary, 163;
Fergus, steward of, 163;
value of her wealth, 164;
commands Fergus to provide food for sufferers from famine, 165;
her goodness extolled by the demons, 169;
hears of demon traders, 172;
tries to check traffic in souls, 174;
visits demons, 176;
Oona, foster-mother to, 178;
revisits demons, 179;
sells her soul, 179, 180;
her death, 182

CATHOLIC CHURCH. Pope, head of, 119

CELION. Constantine to send to, for Bishop Sylvester, 71

CELTIC LITERATURE. Spirit of mysticism in all, 156

CELTS. Gospel preached to, by St. Patrick, 157;

Irish, early Britons, and Greeks of Homer, racial affinity between,
184

CHAMPION.
1. Of Erin: compared with Achilles, 184;
Cuchulain the, his fame at age of seventeen, 185;
Bricriu urges Laegaire to claim title of, 187;
title to go to warrior who obtains Champion's Bit, 187;
tests to decide claims to title of, 193, 194, 196-203;
Uath the Stranger challenges the heroes to a test to decide
claims to title, 199-203.
2. Of Women: Hereward known as, 351

CHAMPION OF IRELAND. See Champion of Erin.

CHAMPION'S BIT, THE, 187, 188;

claimed by chariot-drivers of Laegaire, Conall, and Cuchulain,
188, 189;
awarded by Queen Meave to Laegaire, 195;
heroes severally claim, 195, 196;
tests to decide claims to, 196-203

CHANSON DE ROLAND. Roland and, 121;

late version of Anglo-Norman poem, 122;
Thorold, author of, 122

CHARLEMAGNE. World-famed equivalent, 119;

head of Roman Empire, 119;
Roland, nephew of, 119;
expedition into Spain, 119;
receives an embassage from Marsile, 124;
calls his Twelve Peers to council, 125;
sends Ganelon to Saragossa, 128-130;
receives through Ganelon the keys of Saragossa, 134;
his evil dream, 134, 137;
hears Roland's horn, 145, 146;
hastens to the rescue, 146;
 avenges death of Roland and the Peers, 153, 154;
his return to Aix, 155;
his son, Louis, promised to Aude the Fair, 155

CHARLES THE GREAT. King of the Franks, world-famed as Charlemagne,

119.
See Charlemagne

CHILDE HORN. See Horn

CHOSEN PEOPLE. The Jews the, 56

CHRIST. The Cross the sign of, 53;

the Resurrection of, preached to Constantine, 53;
Constantine's desire to find the sacred Cross, 54;
inhabitants of Suddene who believe on, threatened with death, 287

CHRISTENDOM. Enriched by treasures of the True Cross and Holy Nails,

62

CHRISTIAN-S. Preach the way of life to Constantine, 53;

the Lord of, 57;
faith, in Iceland, 96, 97;
law, to be driven out of Suddene by law of Mahomet, 287

CHURCH OF ROME. Constantine's generosity to, 42

CHURCHMEN. Beaten and battered by Gamelyn, 217

CINDERELLA. Root idea of, similar to "Gamelyn," 204

CLYM OF THE CLEUGH. Outlaw leader in forest of Englewood, 226;

declared powerless to deliver William of Cloudeslee, 233;
his stratagem to save William of Cloudeslee, 234;
rescues William from death, 238;
visits London to see the king, 241;
the king pardons, 243

COLIN, BLACK. See Black Colin, 249

COMALA. Hero in Gaelic Highland poems, 248

CONALL CEARNACH. Cuchulain's cousin, a Red Branch chief, 187;

urged to claim title of Chief Champion, 187;
awarded Champion's Portion, 195;
claim tested by Curoi, 196-203;
disgraced by Uath, 201

CONFESSIO AMANTIS. Early English poem, by "the moral Gower," 42;

story told in, of Constantine's true charity, 64

CONNAUGHT. Ailill, King of, 189;

heroes sent to Cruachan in, 190

CONOR. King of Ulster, 185;

Cuchulain, nephew of, 185;
Dechtire, sister of, 185;
invited with the heroes of Red Branch to a feast by Bricriu, 186;
received with court at Dundrum by Bricriu, 188
CONQUEROR, WILLIAM THE. Cause of England being laid at feet of, 338

CONSTANTINE III. King of Scotland; marriage of Anlaf with daughter

of, 73

CONSTANTINE THE GREAT. Emperor of Rome; renown in medi�val England,

42;
Cynewulf's poem, "Elene," written on the subject of his conversion,
42;
his vision of the Holy Cross, 42, 50, 51;
generosity to Church of Rome and Bishop Sylvester, 42;
legends concerning, 42;
the only British-born Roman emperor, 49;
his greatness provokes a confederation to overthrow him by Huns,
Goths, Franks, and Hugas, 50;
conquers Huns by Cross standard, 52;
Christians preach the way of life to, 53;
is baptized into the Christian faith, 53;
his desire to find the sacred Cross, 54;
sends for Elene, 54;
ordains "Holy Cross Day," 62;
eldest son of Constantius, 63;
sent to Britain, 63;
proclaimed emperor, 63;
granted title of "C�sar," 64;
marriage with Fausta, 64;
elevation to rank of Augustus, 64;
Emperor of Rome, 64;
attacked by leprosy, 64;
the remedies suggested, 65-72;
his noble resolve, 68;
his vision, 69-70;
his healing, 71-72

CONSTANTIUS. Emperor Maxentius hero of the Welsh saga instead of, 42;
father of Constantine the Great, 63;
proclaimed Emperor of Britain, 63

CORNISH PRINCESS, THE. Daughter of King Alef, affianced to Prince

Sigtryg, 343, 344, 345, 346;
Haco betrothed to, 347, 348;
receives token from Hereward, 348;
reveals Haco's plans to Hereward, 349;
rescued from Haco, 350;
guards, all slain, 351;
wedded by Sigtryg, 351

CORNWALL. Godrich, Earl of, 80;

Bertram made Earl of, 94;
Hereward sails for, 343;
Alef, King of, 343;
Sigtryg and Hereward sail for, 347

COVENTRY. Lady Godiva's ride through, 335

CRESCENT. Cross exalted above the, 253

CROSS. The Holy, Constantine's vision of, 42, 50, 51;

 Romans conquer Huns by, 52;
the people awed by the standard of the, 53;
Constantine's desire to find the sacred, 54;
Elene's quest after, 54-62;
secret place of, revealed by Judas, 61;
"Holy Cross Day" ordained, 62

CRUACHAN. Conor sends heroes to Ailill at, 190;

Good People's Hill at, 193;
heroes bid farewell to court at, 195

CRUSADE-S. Reference to, 249;

Black Colin receives tidings of one about to be set on foot, 250;
Black Colin decides to go on, 251;
story of Horn typical of romance of the, 286

CUCHULAIN. Reference to Connla and, 95;

Irish hero, 156;
often called "the Irish Achilles," 184;
nephew of King Conor and son of Dechtire, 185;
god Lugh, reputed father of, 185;
champion in Ulster and all Ireland, 185;
bride sought for, 186;
wooes and weds Emer, daughter of Forgall the Wily, 186;
Conall Cearnach, cousin of, 187;
urged to claim title of Chief Champion, 188;
Grey of Macha and Black Sainglain, magic steeds of, 191;
awarded golden cup and Champion's Portion, 195;
claim tested by Curoi, 196-203;
answers Uath's tests, 202;
acclaimed Champion of Heroes of all Ireland, 203

CUROI OF MUNSTER. Failing a judgment from Ailill, to be asked to

decide claims to title of Chief Champion, 190;
heroes go to, to hear his judgment, 196;
puts heroes to certain tests in order to decide claims, 196-203;
assumes form of giant under name of Uath, the Stranger, 199-203

CURTIUS. Reference to, 156

CUTHBERT. Name under which Childe Horn serves King Thurston in

Ireland, 301, 302

CYNEWULF (ki�ne-wulf). Early English religious poet; "Elene," his

poem on the subject of conversion of Constantine the Great,
42

CYRIACUS. Baptismal name of Judas, 61;

Bishop of Jerusalem, 61

DAGDA. Irish people and wrath of, 158

DA�G-HREFN. Frankish warrior who slays Hygelac; killed by Beowulf's

deadly hand-grip, 35

DANES. Corpse of Scyld sorrowfully placed in vessel by, 2;

 feasting of, in Heorot, 4;
slain in Heorot by Grendel, 4;
desert Heorot, 5;
welcome Geats and Beowulf, 10;
rejoice over Beowulf's victory, 18-29;
friendship with Geats, 30;
Gospel preached to, 157;
Prince Sigtryg sends forty to King Alef, 348;
plan ambush for Haco, 350;
rescue Cornish princess, 350, 351

DANISH.
1. Occupation of England and its influence on language, &c., 73.
2. Invasions, hero-legends which have come down from times of, 286

DANUBE. Huns overwhelmed in, 52

DECHTIRE. Sister of King Conor, 185

DECIUS. Reference to, 156

DEMONS. Appear in Erin to buy souls, 168;

visited by Cathleen, 176;
revisited by her, 179;
Cathleen sells her soul to, to ransom her people, 179;
cheated of Cathleen's soul, 182

DENMARK. Under sway of Scyld Scefing, 2;

Scyld Scefing mysteriously comes to, as babe, 2;
Beowulf sails to deliver King of, from Grendel, 6;
Warden of, challenges Beowulf, 6;
King Birkabeyn's rule over, 74;
Godard made regent of, on behalf of Havelok, 75;
Havelok sails from, with Grim, 80;
Havelok's dream concerning, 86;
Havelok's return to, and recognition as King of, 87-92

DIARMUIT. Irish hero, 156

DIOCLETIAN. Emperor; Constantine evades jealousy of, 63

DODDERER. Horse offered as wergild by Thorbiorn to Howard, 107

DOVER. Princess Goldborough imprisoned in castle of, 81;

Hereward sails from, to Whitby, 339

DUBLIN. Demons arrive at village near, 168

DUNDRUM. Bricriu receives King Conor and court at, 188

DUNSTAN. Monk; his saintly reputation, 335

DURENDALA. Roland's famous sword, 136;

Roland tries in vain to break, 152

ECGTHEOW (eg�theow). Father of Beowulf, 10;

 shielded by Hrothgar against Wilfings, 11

EDINBURGH. Black Colin at, _en route_ to Holy Land, 253

EDWARD.
1. The First: reference to war between England and Scotland during
reign of, 249;
2. The Second: reference, _ibid._, 249.
3. The Confessor: division of England under, 335;
Hereward at court of, 337, 338;
banishes Hereward, 338, 339;
Alftruda, ward of, 339

EGYPT. Constantine's valour in wars in, 64;

philosophers from, with remedies for Constantine's leprosy, 65

ELECTRA. Reference to Orestes and, 95

ELENA. Same as Elene and Helena, 63

"ELENE" (ela�ne). Cynewulf's poem of, on the subject of

Constantine's conversion, 42;
summoned from Britain by Constantine, is baptized, and seeks the
sacred Cross, 54-62.
Same as Helena (Elena), 63

ELFLEDA THE FAIR. Daughter of King Birkabeyn, 74;

slain by Godard, 76

ELY. Hereward's defence of, 334

EMER. Daughter of Forgall the Wily; wooed and wedded by Cuchulain,

186;
flattered by Bricriu, 189;
flattered by Queen Meave, 195;
adjudged by Uath to have first place among all the women of Ulster,
203

ENGELIER THE GASCON. Mortally wounded, 143

ENGLAND. Medi�val, and Constantine the Great, 42;

influence on language by Danish occupation, 73;
Athelstan, King of, 73;
Athelwold, King of, 80;
Grim sails from Denmark to, 80;
arrives at, in Humber (Grimsby), 81;
Havelok's dream concerning, 86;
Fergus journeys to, 165;
the outlaw of medi�val, 225;
King of, pardons outlaws, William of Cloudeslee, &c., 243;
war between Scotland and, 249;
government of, during twelfth, thirteenth, and fourteenth
centuries, 314;
division of, under Edward the Confessor, 335;
cause of being laid at Conqueror's feet, 338

ENGLEWOOD. Outlaws in forest of, under Adam Bell, William of

Cloudeslee, and Clym of the Cleugh, 226;
outlaw band broken up, 247
 ERCOL. Ailill's foster-father; heroes sent to, 194

ERIN. See Ireland, 157;

demons appear in, 168;
Champion of, compared with Achilles, 184;
land of, searched for bride for Cuchulain, 186

EUDAV. Son of Caradoc, father of Princess Helena, 49;

Kynon and Adeon, sons of, 49

EUROPE. Ruled from City of Seven Hills (Rome) by Emperor Maxen

Wledig, 43;
Constantine granted rule over Western, 64;
relation between Greek and Irish literature among literatures of,
184

EVIL ONE. Tales relating dealings with, reference to, 157;

demons buy souls for, 168-182

EXCALIBUR. King Arthur's sword, 269

FAIRY BEAR, THE. A white Polar bear owned by Gilbert of Ghent, 340;
reputed kinship of, to Earl Siward, 340, 342;
slain by Hereward, 341;
Hereward's trick on Norman knights with, 341, 342

FAIRY PEOPLE OF THE HILLS. King Ailill seeks aid of, 193

FAITH. Bishop Sylvester preaches the Christian, to Constantine, 71;

Charlemagne fights for, 119;
Marsile to embrace the Christian, 131;
the true, English knowledge of, 165;
Irish sufferers tempted to revolt from, 167

FALL, THE, OF MAN, 71

FAUST. Legends, trend of, 157

FAUSTA. Daughter of Emperor Maximian and wife of Constantine, 64

FEDELM. Wife of Laegaire, 189

FEN COUNTRY. Hereward, the terror of the, 336

FENIANS. Champions of the, identical with Highland Gaelic heroes, 248

FERGUS THE WHITE. Cathleen's steward, 163;

foster-brother to Cathleen's grandfather, 164;
declares value of Cathleen's wealth, 164;
sends servant to buy food at Ulster, 165;
journeys to England, 165;
returns with help, 182

FIKENHILD. Horn's companion next in favour to Athulf, 287;

spies on Horn and Rymenhild, 299, 300;
 demands Rymenhild in marriage, 311;
slain by Horn, 313

FINGAL. Hero in Gaelic Highland poems, 248;

Scotch embodiment of Finn, 248

FINN. Fingal Scotch embodiment, 248

FINN OF THE FRISIANS. Victory of Danes over, chanted in Heorot, 19

FINNSBURG. Fight in, sung of in Heorot, 19

FITELA. Son of Sigmund; glory of, chanted by Danish bard, 18

FLEMINGS. Or Normans; Hereward enrolled among, to qualify for

knighthood, 339;
Hereward's trick on, with Fairy Bear, 341, 342

FOREFATHERS. Feelings of our, embodied in "Beowulf," 1

FORGALL THE WILY. Cuchulain wooes Emer, daughter of, 186

FRANCE. Victories of Charlemagne for, 119;

Charlemagne sets out for, 134

FRANKISH.
1. Warrior, Daghrefn, slays Hygelac, and is slain by Beowulf, 35.
2. Army marches towards Pyrenees, 134;
arrives too late to rescue Roland, 146

FRANKS. Charles the Great (Charlemagne), King of, 119;

Saracen host encamps near, 134;
and Moors meet in battle, 140;
defeat the Saracens, 141;
attacked by second Saracen army, 142;
defeat the heathens once more, 143;
attacked by third Saracen army, 144

FRENCH LITERATURE, developing "Roland Saga," 121

FRIAR TUCK. See Tuck

GALERIUS. Constantine evades hatred of, 63;

grants Constantine title of "C�sar," 63

GAMELYN. Tale of, a variant of fairy-tale "Wicked Elder Brothers,"

204;
ultimate source, through Lodge's "Euphues' Golden Legacy," of
_As You Like It_, 204;
literary ancestor of "Robin Hood," 204;
Sir John of the Marshes, father of, 205;
left in charge of eldest brother, John, 206;
resists him, 207, 208;
victorious at wrestling match, 210, 211;
overcomes his brother's servants, 212;
allows himself to be chained, 213;
 released by Adam Spencer, 214, 215;
batters the Churchmen, 217;
puts his brother John in chains, 217;
puts sheriff's men to flight, 218;
goes to the greenwood, 219;
joins the outlaws, 220;
proclaimed a wolf's-head, 220;
arrested, 221;
Otho offers himself as surety, 221;
fails to appear at court, 222, 223;
releases Otho, 223;
sits on judge's seat and condemns Sir John, 224;
made chief forester by King Edward, 224;
made Otho's heir, 224

GANELON. Romance version of Danilo or Nanilo, 121;

compared with Judas, 121;
one of Charlemagne's Twelve Peers, 125;
his hostility to Roland, 126;
plots with Blancandrin the destruction of Roland, 131;
delivers to Marsile the message of Charlemagne, 131, 132;
swears on sacred relics the treacherous death of Roland, 134;
delivers keys of Saragossa to Charlemagne, 134;
deceives Charlemagne concerning sound of Roland's horn, 145, 146;
arrested for treason, 146;
his death as a traitor, 155;
his name a byword in France for treachery, 155

GARETH, SIR. One of King Arthur's nephews, 266

GASCONS. Attack Charlemagne, 119

GAUTIER, COUNT. Roland's vassal, 136

GAWAYNE, SIR. King Arthur's nephew, the true Knight of Courtesy, 265;
learns of King Arthur's adventure with the giant, 274;
learns the price to be paid for the loathly lady's secret, 275;
offers to pay it by marrying the loathly lady, 275;
betroths the loathly lady, 279, 280;
weds the loathly lady, 280;
his choice frees the loathly lady from magic spells, 281, 283;
the beauty of his bride, 281-285

GEATISH COURT. Beowulf brought up at, 6

GEATLAND. Same as G�taland; news of Grendel's ravages reaches, 6;

Beowulf sails to, 29;
welcomed to shores of, 29, 30

GEATS. Hygelac, King of, 1;

G�taland, realm of, 5;
arrival with Beowulf at Danish shores, 7;
friendship with Danes, 30;
forsake Beowulf in his encounter with the fire-dragon, 36;
their sorrow over Beowulf's death, 40-41

GERIER. Peer of Charlemagne; mortally wounded, 143

GERIN. Peer of Charlemagne; mortally wounded, 143

GERMANY. Forefathers who dwelt in North, 1;
Hygelac seeks conquest of his neighbours on mainland of, 5

GHENT. See Gilbert

GILBERT OF GHENT. Hereward's godfather, 339;

Hereward received by, 339;
his Fairy Bear, slain by Hereward, 340, 341;
Hereward quits his castle, 342;
Hereward takes farewell of, 343

GLENURCHY. Glen belonging to MacGregors, given to Sir Nigel Campbell,

249;
Black Colin inherits, 250;
Lady of, grieves over her husband's departure on crusade, 251;
Baron MacCorquodale's land borders, 256;
Black Colin's return to, 258;
new castle built with rents of, 264

GOD. The Unknown, reverenced by Constantine, 51;

the people awed by the token of the Unknown, 53;
worship of the True, 157;
famine cools love for, 167

GODARD, JARL. Counsellor and friend of King Birkabeyn, 75;

Havelok committed to care of, 75;
regency over Denmark, 75;
his cruelty, 76-78;
his treachery disclosed and punished by death, 91-92

GODHILD. Queen of Suddene, King Murry's consort, the mother of Horn,

286;
hears of husband's death and flees, 288

GODIVA, LADY. Wife of Leofric, Earl of Mercia, 335;

her famous ride through Coventry, 335;
Hereward, second son of, 336

GODRICH. Earl of Cornwall, regent for Princess Goldborough, 80;

his rule, 81;
imprisons Princess Goldborough out of jealousy, 81;
attends sports at Lincoln, 83;
hears of Havelok's skill and strength, 83;
enforces a marriage between Havelok and Goldborough, 84;
captured, tried as a traitor, and burnt at the stake, 93-94

GODWIN. Earl of Kent, 335;

Lady Gytha, wife of, 335;
intercedes on behalf of Hereward, 338;
Hereward bids farewell to, 339

GOLDBOROUGH. English princess, daughter of King Athelwold; orphaned,

80;
Earl Godrich regent for, 80;
imprisoned in Dover Castle, 81;
forced to wed Havelok, 84;
learns in a dream of Havelok's royal birth, 86;
crowned Queen of England, 94
GOLDEN AGE. Forefathers cherished lifetime of ancestors as, 1

G�TALAND. Realm of Geats, in south of Sweden, 5.

See Geatland, 7

GOTHS. Form a confederation with the Huns, Franks, and Hugas to

overthrow Constantine, 50

GOWER, "THE MORAL." Early English poet; his poem "Confessio Amantis"
and Constantine's conversion, 42;
story told in "Confessio Amantis" of Constantine's true charity, 64

GREECE. Philosophers from, with remedies for Constantine's leprosy,

65

GREEK-S. Elene touches at land of, 56;

literature, relation of, to Irish literature, 184;
of Homer, early Britons, and Irish Celts, racial affinity between,
184

GRENDEL. A loathsome fen-monster, 3;

enmity aroused by the feasting at Heorot, 4;
slays and devours Danes in Heorot, 4;
master of Heorot, 5;
Beowulf determines to attack, 6;
struggles with Beowulf in Heorot, 16;
worsted by Beowulf, 17;
mother of, avenges his death, 21

GREY OF MACHA. Cuchulain's best-beloved horse, 191

GRIM. Legendary hero whose loyalty secured privileges to Grimsby,

74;
Godard's thrall, 77;
ordered to drown Havelok, 77;
saves and maintains Havelok, 79-82;
sails from Denmark to England, 80;
sends Havelok to Lincoln, 82;
his death, 85;
his three sons, Robert the Red, William Wendut, and Hugh the
Raven, 87

GRIMSBY. The town of Grim, 74;

Havelok at fish-market of, 82;
battle near, between Havelok and Godrich, 93

GUDRUN. Reference to Siegfried and, 95

GUENEVER, QUEEN. Wife of King Arthur, 266;

dreads magic arts during husband's absence, 274;
learns of King Arthur's adventure with the giant, 274;
welcomes the loathly lady at court, 280

GUEST, THE WISE. Sister of, marries Thorbiorn, 103;

Howard seeks at the Thing, 108, 109, 110;
his judgment against Thorbiorn, 110, 111;
removes his sister from Thorbiorn, 111;
gives judgment at Thing against Howard, 118
 GYTHA, LADY. Wife of Godwin, Earl of Kent, 335

HABLOC. Welsh name for Havelok, 73

HACO. Cornish leader; betrothed to the Cornish princess, 347;

Cornish princess reveals plans of, to Hereward, 349;
ambush planned for, 350;
slain by Hereward, 350

HAROLD. Son of King Thurston, 301;

slain by the Saracens, 302

HART, THE. See Heorot, 3

HASTINGS. Battle of, and "Song of Roland," 122

HATHCYN. Son of King Hrethel, brought up with Beowulf; slays his

brother, Herebeald, 34;
slain himself by Swedes, 35

HAUTECLAIRE. Oliver's sword, 141

HAVELOK THE DANE. Legend of, 73;

Anlaf, equivalent, 73;
hero of the strong arm, in medi�val England, 74;
son of King Birkabeyn of Denmark, 74;
committed to care of Jarl Godard, 75;
imprisoned by Godard, 76-77;
saved and maintained by Grim, 78-82;
brought by Grim to England, 80;
his feats of strength, 82-84;
Goldborough forced to wed, 84-85;
Grim's three sons accompany to Denmark, 87;
aided by Jarl Ubbe, 88-93;
Ubbe recognises as heir to throne of Denmark, and renders homage
to, 90-91;
acknowledged King of Denmark, 92;
and of England, 94

HEALFDENE (ha�lf-dane). Father of King Hrothgar, 9

HEARDRED (ha�rd-red). Son of Hygelac and Hygd; succeeds his father,

31;
his death, 31

HECTOR. Reference to death of, 95

HELENA. British princess; marriage with Constantine glorified in

"Mabinogion," 42;
hailed as Empress of Rome, 48, 49;
receives three castles as dowry, Caernarvon, Caerlleon, and
Caermarthen, 49;
mother of Constantine the Great, 63

HELL. The purchase of souls for, 170-183;

 Cathleen sells her soul to, 179

HENGEST. Deeds of, chanted in Heorot, 19

HEOROT (hyo�r-ot). Hall built by Hrothgar, 3;

same as "The Hart," 3;
enmity of Grendel to, 4;
feasting of Danes in, 4;
Danes slaughtered in, by Grendel, 4;
deserted by Danes, 5;
Grendel master of, 5;
Geats proceed to, 9;
feast in, to welcome Beowulf, 12;
Grendel and Beowulf struggle in, 16;
Grendel's mother enters and carries off Aschere, 21

HEREBEALD (he�re-bald). Son of King Hrethel, brought up with

Beowulf, 34

HEREWARD. One of the famous outlaws, 225;

the Saxon, personality real, yet surrounded by cloud of romance,
334;
the ideal of Anglo-Saxon chivalry, as Roland of Norman, 334;
second son of Leofric and Godiva, 336;
terror of Fen Country, 336;
at court, and his conduct there, 337;
banished as an outlaw, 338, 339;
his farewell, 338, 339;
his first meeting with Alftruda, 339;
goes to his godfather, Gilbert of Ghent, 339;
enrolled among Flemings to qualify for knighthood, 339;
his encounter with the Fairy Bear, 340, 341;
rescues Alftruda, 341;
his trick on the Norman knights, 341, 342;
leaves Northumbria, 342;
takes farewell of Alftruda, 342;
takes farewell of Gilbert of Ghent, 343;
sails for Cornwall, 343;
at court of King Alef, 343;
kills the Pictish giant, 343;
imprisoned by King Alef, 343;
released by King Alef's daughter, 344, 345;
sails for Ireland, 346;
sails for Cornwall with Prince Sigtryg, 347;
obtains admission to Haco's bridal feast, 348;
learns Haco's plans, 349;
slays Haco and helps to rescue Cornish princess, 350, 351;
known as Hereward the Saxon, the Champion of Women, 351

HEROD. Constantine declared more cruel than, 67

HET-WARE, THE. Expedition against, 31, 34

HIGHLANDS. Gaelic, old ballads, heroes in, 248;

ballads, merely versions of Irish Gaelic hero-legends, 248;
Irish Gaelic hero-legends carried from Erin to, 248

HILDEBURH, QUEEN. Deeds of, chanted in Heorot, 19

HN�F (naf). Deeds of, chanted in Heorot, 19

HOLY CROSS. Constantine's vision of, 42, 50, 51;

his desire to find, 54;
Elene's quest after, 54-62;
Judas confesses to knowledge of sacred truth of, 57;
Judas refuses to reveal place of, at first, but is prevailed upon
by starvation, 58, 59;
the "Day" of, ordained, 62

HOLY INNOCENTS. Constantine declared more cruel than Herod, who

killed the, 67

HOLY LAND. Black Colin receives tidings of fresh crusade in, 250;
sets out for, 252;
Black Colin's desire to see, 253

HOLY NAILS. Obtained by Elene, 61;

given to Constantine, 62

HOLY ROOD. King Arthur vows by, 268;

giant forces him to swear by, 270

HOLY SEPULCHRE. Black Colin's desire to see, 253

HOLY TREE. See Holy Cross

HOMER. Greeks of, early Britons, and Irish Celts, racial affinity
between, 184

HOOD, ROBIN. See Robin Hood

HORN. His story originally a story of Viking raids, 286;

son of King Murry and Queen Godhild, 286, 308;
Athulf, and next Fikenhild, his favourite companions, 287;
captured by Saracens, 288;
cast adrift upon the sea, 288, 289;
lands on shore of Westernesse, 289;
questioned by King of Westernesse, 290;
adopted by King Ailmar, 291;
Athelbrus trains as a knight, 291, 292;
loved by Princess Rymenhild, 292;
Athulf personates before Princess Rymenhild, 293;
welcomed to Rymenhild's bower, and hears her declaration of love,
294, 295;
dubbed knight, 297;
his first exploit, 298;
spied on by Fikenhild, 299, 300;
banished by King Ailmar, 300;
sails for Ireland, 301;
serves King Thurston under name of Cuthbert, 301;
slays the giant emir, 301, 302;
King Thurston offers his kingdom and daughter to, 302;
receives letter from Rymenhild, 304;
reveals his identity to King Thurston and implores his help, 304;
returns to Westernesse, accompanied by Irish knights, 304;
in disguise, visits Rymenhild's wedding feast, 305;
his stratagem to test Rymenhild's love, 306, 307;
the fictitious death of, 307;
 reveals his identity to Rymenhild, 307;
arranges with Athulf to deliver Rymenhild, 308;
weds Rymenhild, 308;
reconquers Suddene, 310;
finds his mother, 310, 311;
crowned King of Suddene, 311;
warned in dream of Rymenhild's danger, 311;
his return to Westernesse, 311, 312;
slays Fikenhild, 313;
dwells at Suddene with Rymenhild, 313

HOWARD THE HALT. Popular Icelandic saga, 96;

famous Viking, 97;
Biargey, wife of, 97;
Olaf, son of, 97;
upbraids Olaf, 100;
removes from Bathstead, 103;
mourns Olaf's death, 106;
claims wergild for Olaf, 106-111;
sheltered by Steinthor, 108, 109;
urged by Biargey to seek vengeance, 106, 107, 113;
seeks help of Valbrand, 114;
slays Thorbiorn, 116;
sheltered by Steinthor, 117;
judgment of Thing against, 118;
his nephews exiled, 118

HRETHEL (rethel). Father of Hygelac and grandfather of Beowulf, 6;

Beowulf and the king's sons, Herebeald, Hathcyn, and Hygelac, 34;
Beowulf recites his death, 35

HRETHRIC (re�th-ric). Son of Hrothgar; succeeds his father, 31

HROTHGAR (roth�gar). Great-grandson of Scyld, 2;

builds the hall Heorot, or "The Hart," 3;
grief of, over Grendel's fierce ravages, 4;
champions offer aid to, 5;
Geats conducted to, 8;
son of Healfdene, 9;
Wealhtheow, wife of, 14;
rejoices over Beowulf's victory, 18-29;
Aschere, thane of, carried off by Grendel's mother, 21;
grief of, over loss of Aschere, 22;
succeeded by his son Hrethric, 31

HRUNTING (runting). Hunferth's sword, lent Beowulf for the purpose

of attacking Grendel's mother, 23-25

HUGAS. See Huns, 50

HUGH THE RAVEN. Youngest son of Grim; accompanies Havelok to

Denmark, 87

HUMBER. Grim arrives in, 81

HUNFERTH. Hrothgar's orator, jealous of Beowulf, 12;

lends Beowulf his sword, Hrunting, 23, 24

HUNS. Form a confederation with the Goths, Franks, and Hugas to

 overthrow Constantine, 50;
Romans conquer by Cross standard, 52

HYGD. Wife of King Hygelac; hails Beowulf's return to Geatland,

29, 30;
offers crown to Beowulf, 31

HYGELAC (he�ge-lac). King of Geats, 1;

son of King Hrethel, 5, 34;
brother-in-law of Ecgtheow, 6;
uncle of Beowulf, 6;
hails Beowulf's return to Geatland, 29, 30;
Beowulf chief champion of, 30;
slain in expedition against the Hetware, 31;
succeeded by his son, Heardred, 31;
brought up with brothers, Herebeald and Hathcyn, and Beowulf, 34

ICEFIRTH. Thorbiorn in, 97

ICELAND. Christian faith in, 96, 97

ICELANDIC.
1. Saga, "Howard the Halt," 96.
2. Ghosts, reference to, 96

INNIS EOALAN. The Lady of Loch Awe builds a castle on ruins of White
House on, 257

INNOCENTS, HOLY. Constantine declared more cruel than Herod, who

killed the, 67

IRELAND. Characteristics common to people of, 156;

known in olden Europe as "Isle of Saints," 157;
Gospel preached to people of, 157;
High King of, convinced of truth of Trinity, 157;
strife in, 158;
famine in, 159-183;
famine tempts people to revolt from the True Faith, 167;
demons arrive in, 168;
Cuchulain without fear among the champions of, 185;
Horn at, 301-304;
Horn touches at, on way to Suddene, 313;
Sigtryg, son of a Danish king, in, 343;
Hereward sails for, 346

IRISH. Relation of literature, to Greek literature, 184;

Celts, early Britons, and Greeks of Homer, one stock, 184;
heroes, and legends concerning, 248

ISLE OF SAINTS. See Ireland, 157

ITALY. Claims Roland in guise of Orlando, Orlando Furioso, Orlando

Innamorato, 121

J
 JERUSALEM. The place where Christ suffered, 54;
Elene's quest in, to find the sacred Cross, 54-62;
Constantine and Elene build a glorious church in, 61;
Cyriacus (Judas) Bishop of, 61;
messenger to Black Colin familiar with all holy places in, 250;
Black Colin as a pilgrim at, 253

JESUS CHRIST. The Cross the sign of, 53;

the Resurrection and Ascension of, preached to Constantine, 53

JEWS. Elene's quest to land of, to find sacred Cross, 55-58;

the Chosen People, 56;
summoned, but dismissed in peace, by Elene, 58

JOHN.
1. Son of Sir John of the Marshes, 205;
Gamelyn left in charge of, 206;
Gamelyn resists, 207, 208;
his great feast, 216;
put in chains by Gamelyn, 217;
proclaims Gamelyn a wolf's-head, 220;
his death by hanging, 224.
2. Little. See Little John

JOSEPH and his brethren, "Gamelyn," a version of story of, 204

JUD�A. See Jerusalem

JUDAS. Grandson of Zacch�us; confesses to knowledge of secret truth

of Holy Tree, 57;
refuses at first to disclose the secret place of the Holy Cross,
but is prevailed upon by starvation, 58, 59;
baptismal name Cyriacus, 61;
Ganelon compared with, 121

JUDGMENT, DAY OF, 71

JULIUS C�SAR and early Britons, 184

KAY, SIR. Steward of King Arthur's household, 266;

jeers at loathly lady, 277

KENT. Earldom of, held by Godwin, 335

KERRY. Champions drive to, 196

KILCHURN CASTLE. New castle built with rents of Glenurchy, 264

KNIGHT OF COURTESY. The true, is Sir Gawayne, King Arthur's nephew,

265

KNIGHT OF LOCH AWE. Equivalent, Black Colin Campbell, 249

KYNON. Son of Eudav, grandson of Caradoc, 49

L

LADY OF GLENURCHY. Grief of, 251;

the gold ring token, 252;
wooed by Baron MacCorquodale, 254-257;
receives forged letter, 255;
her stratagem to delay her marriage, 256;
builds a castle on ruins of White House on Innis Eoalan, 256, 257;
recognises and welcomes her husband, 262

LADY OF LOCH AWE. Same as Lady of Glenurchy, 251

LAE-GAI�RE. Bricriu urged to claim title of, 187;

Fedelm, wife of, 189;
awarded Champion's Portion by Queen Meave, 195;
claim tested by Curoi, 196-203;
disgraced by Uath, 201

LANCELOT, SIR. A Knight of the Round Table, 266

LEA, SIR RICHARD OF THE. Stranger guest of Robin Hood's, 323

LEITH. Black Colin takes ship at, for Holy Land, 253

LENDABAIR. Conall's wife, 189

LEOFRIC. Earl of Mercia, 335;

Lady Godiva, wife of, 335;
Hereward, second son of, 336;
Hall of Bourne, home of, 336;
his wrath kindled against Hereward, 337;
asks for writ of outlawry against Hereward, 338;
Hereward bids farewell to, 339

LEOFRICSSON, HEREWARD. See Hereward

LEVE (lave). Wife of Grim the fisherman, 78

LIGHTFOOT, MARTIN. Hereward's follower who accompanied him into

exile, 339;
assists Hereward in his trick on Norman knights, 341, 342;
cast into prison by King Alef, 343;
released by King Alef's daughter, 344, 345

LINCOLN. Grim carries fish to, 81;

Havelok goes to, 82;
Havelok becomes porter, 82;
Havelok's fame in, 83;
Godrich summons his army to, against Havelok, 93;
Godrich's trial and death at, 94

LITTLE JOHN. One of Robin Hood's followers, 315;

searches the stranger knight's coffer, 319;
counts out four hundred pounds to stranger guest, 322, 323;
acts as squire to Sir Richard of the Lea, 323-327

LOATHLY LADY, THE, and King Arthur, 271-274;

demands of King Arthur a young and handsome knight for husband,
 as price of her help, 274;
Sir Gawayne offers to wed, 275;
Sir Kay jeers at, 277;
her betrothal to Sir Gawayne, 279;
her marriage with Sir Gawayne, 280;
set free from magic spells, 281-285

LOCH AWE. See Awe, Loch

LONDON. Visit to, of William of Cloudeslee and fellow outlaws, 241

LOUIS. Charlemagne's son, Count of the Marshes, promised to Aude the

Fair, 155

LUGH OF THE LONG HAND. Great god, reputed father of Cuchulain, 185

MABINOGION. A series of Welsh legends; glorifies marriage of British

princess Helena and Constantine, 42

MACCORQUODALE, BARON. Wooes the Lady of Loch Awe, 254-257;

his stratagem of a forged letter, 255;
hears of Black Colin's return, 263

MACGREGORS. Expelled from Glenurchy, 249

MAHOMET. Saracens declare determination to win land of Suddene

according to law of, 287;
faith of, thrown off by Saracens for the true faith, 310

MAIRI. Old widow in whose house the demon traders lived, 173

MARSILE. King of Moors; defies Charlemagne, 122;

idols of, 122;
Blancandrin's advice to, 123;
sends an embassage to Charlemagne, 124;
offers to become a Christian, 124-126;
Ganelon sent to, with Charlemagne's terms, 130;
Ganelon's reception by, 131, 132;
takes counsel with leaders, 132;
swears on the book of Law of Mahomet the treacherous death of
Roland, 134;
pursues the Frankish army, 137;
Roland slays only son of, 147;
mortally wounded, he returns to Saragossa, 147;
his death, 154

MARTIN. See Lightfoot

MASSES. Of the Father, of the Holy Spirit, of Our Lady, heard daily
by Robin Hood, 315

MAXEN WLEDIG. "The Dream of," preserved in the "Mabinogion," 42-49;

Emperor of Rome, 43;
expedition down the Tiber, 43;
his vision near Rome, 43;
his vision declared, 44-47;
 ambassadors sent out to find the maiden of his dream, 47, 48;
journeys himself to land of Arvon, 48, 49;
conquers Britain from Beli, son of Manogan, 48;
weds Helena, daughter of Eudav, 49;
Constantine, son of, the only British-born Emperor of Rome, 49

MAXENTIUS. Emperor; hero of Welsh saga "Mabinogion," 42

MAXIMIAN. The Emperor; father of Fausta, who became Constantine's

wife, 64

MEAD. Dwelling-place of Guest the Wise, 103

MEAVE. Queen of Connaught, wife of King Ailill; to decide claims to

title of Chief Champion, 189;
pronounces judgment, 195

MERCIA. Earldom of, held by Leofric, 335

MODI. King of Reynes; wooes Rymenhild, 303;

slain by Horn, 308;
land of, committed to care of Sir Athelbrus, 313

MONA. Sacred isle of; same as Anglesey; ambassadors of Maxen Wledig

view, 47

"MONTJOIE! MONTJOIE!" Battle cry of Franks, under Roland, 140, 142,

148

MOORS. Rulers of, and Charlemagne, 119;

and Franks meet in battle, 140

MORDRED, SIR. One of King Arthur's nephews, 266

MOST HIGH. Grendel outcast from mercy of, 4

MUCH. One of Robin Hood's followers, 315;

assists to count out gold for stranger guest, 323

MURRY. King of Suddene, 286;

Queen Godhild consort of, 286;
Horn, son of, 286;
attacked and slain by Saracens, 287, 288

NAESI. Irish hero, 156

NAILS, THE HOLY. Obtained by Elene, 61;

given to Constantine, 62

NAIMES, DUKE. One of Charlemagne's Twelve Peers, 126, 136, 137;

urges Charlemagne to hasten to rescue of Roland, 146

NORMAN ENGLAND. Royal authority in, how asserted, 314

NORMANS. Or Flemings; Hereward enrolled among, to qualify for

knighthood, 339;
 Hereward's trick on, with Fairy Bear, 341, 342

NORSE influence in connection with story of "King Horn," 286

NORSEMEN. Firm hold of blood-feud on imagination of, 96

NORTH COUNTRY. Equivalent, Ulster, 165

NORTH SEA. Forefathers who dwelt on shores of, 1;

ambassadors of Maxen Wledig reach, 47

NORTHUMBRIA. Inheritance of Anlaf, 73;

writ of outlawry against Hereward only of nominal weight in, 339;
Earl Siward ruler in, 339;
Hereward leaves, 342

NOTTINGHAMSHIRE. The Sheriff of, and Robin Hood, 315

ODIN. The raven, the bird of, 115

OISIN. Scotch embodiment of Ossian, 248

OLAF.
1. Same as Anlaf, &c., 73.
2. Son of famous Viking, Howard the Halt, 97;
finds Thorbiorn's lost sheep, 98-100;
kills a wizard, 101;
second fight with the wizard's ghost, 102;
wooes Sigrid, 99, 103;
meets Thorbiorn, 103-106;
his death, 106;
Howard claims wergild for, 106-111;
wergild awarded for, 118

OLIFANT. Roland's horn, 138;

blown by Roland, 145, 146;
Roland's dying blast on, 149

OLIVER. One of Charlemagne's Twelve Peers, 125, 136;

descries the Saracens and proclaims Ganelon's treason, 138;
appeals to Roland to blow his horn, 138;
Hauteclaire, sword of, 141;
objects to Roland blowing his horn, 144;
mortally wounded by Marsile's uncle, 148;
under misapprehension, strikes Roland with Hauteclaire, 148;
his death, 148, 149;
avenged by Charlemagne, 153, 154

OONA. Cathleen's foster-mother, 178;

her vision, 182

ORCHY. River, running through Glenurchy, 249

ORESTES. Reference to Electra and, 95

ORLANDO, ETC. Italy claims Roland in guise of, 121

 OSSIAN. Hero in Gaelic Highland poems, 248;
Scotch embodiment of Oisin, 248

OTHO. Son of Sir John of the Marshes, 205;

becomes surety for Gamelyn, 221;
arrested owing to failure of Gamelyn to appear at court, 223;
released by Gamelyn, 223;
sits on judge's seat with Gamelyn and condemns Sir John, 224;
appointed sheriff by King Edward I., 224;
makes Gamelyn his heir, 224

OUR LADY. Robin Hood accepts her surety for four hundred pounds lent
to stranger guest, 322;
the Black Monk and the suretyship, 331-333

OUTLAWS. Famous: Hereward, Robin Hood, William of Cloudeslee, 226;

pardoned by king, 243;
rules of, in case of Robin Hood, 316;
their feast, 317, 318, 330

PAMPELUNA. Taken by Charlemagne, 119

PARADISE. Cathleen's soul in, 182

PATTERSON. Name of foster-parents of Black Colin, 250

PEERS. Of France, 125, 136;

the champions of the Moors challenge the Twelve, of France, 137;
of Charlemagne, triumph over Marsile's twelve champions, 141;
their death, 143-153;
avenged by Charlemagne, 153, 154

PENELOPE. Lady of Loch Awe turns to guile, as did, 256

PEOPLE OF THE HILLS. Cuchulain's friends among, 198, 199

PERSIA. Constantine's valour in wars in, 64;

physicians from, with remedies for Constantine's leprosy, 65

PETER AND PAUL. The Apostles; appear in a vision to Constantine,

70, 71

PICTISH GIANT. King Alef's daughter betrothed to, 343;

slain by Hereward, 343

PLANTAGENETS. England under, 314

POPE. Head of Holy Catholic Church, 119;

proclaims Holy War at Rome, 251;
sees Black Colin, 253;
regarded by Black Colin as Vicar of Christ on earth, 253

PRIAM. Reference to lament of, 95

PYRENEES. Charlemagne's march through passes of, 119;

 Frankish army marches toward, 134

RANALD. King of Waterford, 345, 346;

Prince Sigtryg, son of, 345;
Hereward at feast of, 346, 347

RANALDSSON, SIGTRYG. See Sigtryg

RED BRANCH. Heroes of, invited to feast by Bricriu, 186;

heroes return to, 199;
Uath, the Stranger, comes to, 199;
heroes of, and Uath, the Stranger, 199-203;
champions of, identical with Highland Gaelic heroes, 248

REYNES. Modi, King of, 303;

wooes Rymenhild, 303, 304

REYNILD. Daughter of King Thurston; offered to Horn, 302;

weds Sir Athulf, 313

RHINE. Black Colin's journey up, 253

RHODES. Black Colin journeys to, 253;

supposed news from, by man of Black Colin's band, 255

RICHARD, SIR, OF THE LEA, Robin Hood's stranger-guest, 317-324;

Robin Hood's loan to, 322-324;
his land in Uterysdale, 323;
redeems his land from Abbot of St. Mary's, 324-327;
sets out to repay loan, 328;
defends the right at a wrestling contest, 328;
arrives before Robin Hood to repay loan, but is exempt, 333;
returns to Uterysdale, 333;
his power used to protect the outlaws, 333

ROBERT THE RED. Eldest son of Grim; accompanies Havelok to Denmark,

87

ROBIN HOOD. Romantic sympathy with, 225;

one of the famous outlaws, 226;
the original, 314;
forest of Barnesdale at one time his dwelling-place, 314, 315;
Sherwood Forest, headquarters of, 315;
Little John, Will Scarlet, and Much, his three most loyal
followers, 315;
three Masses heard by, 315;
sends his followers to Watling Street, 316;
his outlaw rules, 316;
stranger guest brought to, 317;
lends stranger guest four hundred pounds, 322;
sends his followers again to Watling Street, 329;
his followers capture and bring to greenwood, as guest, the Black
Monk, 330;
appropriates gold of the Black Monk as payment of loan to Sir
Richard of the Lea, 331, 332;
exempts Sir Richard from repayment of four hundred pounds, 333;
 dwells securely in the greenwood under Sir Richard's protection,
333

ROLAND. Charlemagne's nephew; fame of, in romance, 119;

historical basis of legend of, 120;
in Spanish legend, 121;
"Saga" in French literature, 121;
"Chanson de Roland" and, 121;
one of the Twelve Peers, 125;
destruction plotted by Blancandrin and Ganelon, 131, 134;
plants his banner on topmost summit of Pyrenees, 134;
appointed to command rearguard, 135;
appealed to by Oliver to blow his horn, 138;
his army defeats Saracens, 141;
defeats second Saracen army, 143;
attacked by third Saracen army, 144;
willing to blow horn, but Oliver objects, 144;
blows Olifant, 145, 146;
Charlemagne hastens to rescue of, but arrives too late, 146;
slays only son of Marsile, 147;
smitten by Oliver in mistake, 148;
set upon by four hundred Saracens, 150;
realising death near, he tries to destroy sword Durendala, 152;
his death, 153;
avenged by Charlemagne, 153, 154

ROMAN EMPIRE. Charlemagne head of, 119

ROMANS. Conquer Huns by the Cross standard, 52

ROME. Church of, Constantine's generosity to, 42;

Maxen Wledig seeks rest near, 43, 46;
Princess Helena hailed Empress of, 48, 49;
Constantine calls a council of all wisest men in, 53;
Black Colin's messenger just home from, 251;
Holy War proclaimed by Pope at, 251;
Black Colin reaches, 253;
Black Colin's supposed letter from, 255

RONCESVALLES. Roland's glory from, 119;

celebrated in "Song of Altobiscar," 120;
Spain claims part of honour of, 120;
the battle of, 140-153

RONCEVAUX. Same as Roncesvalles, 122

ROUND TABLE. Knights of, 266

RYMENHILD. Princess, daughter of King Ailmar;

loves Horn, 292;
Athulf personates Horn before, 293;
welcomes Horn in her bower and declares her love, 294;
wishes Horn good success as knight, 298;
gives token to Horn, 298;
spied on by Fikenhild, 299, 300;
wooed by King Modi, 303;
writes to Horn through Athulf, 303;
Horn at wedding-feast of, 305;
Horn's stratagem to test her love, 306, 307;
 her knight and lover, Horn, restored, 307;
wedded to Horn, 308;
left to her father's care, 309;
demanded in marriage by traitor, Fikenhild, 311;
delivered by Horn, 313;
dwells at Suddene as queen, 313

SAMSON. Peer of Charlemagne; mortally wounded, 143

SARACEN-S. Host, encamps near Franks, 134;

pursue the Frankish army, 137;
chiefs vow to slay Roland, 137;
defeat of, by Roland's army, 141;
second army attacks Roland, 142;
defeated once more, 143;
third army attacks Roland, 144;
their rule in the Holy Land, 251;
Horn's hatred of, typical of romance of Crusades, 286;
attack and slay King Murry, 287, 288;
Horn's victory over, 298;
Suddene purged of, by Horn, 310

SARAGOSSA. Charlemagne repulsed at, 119;

decided to send Ganelon to, as ambassador, 128;
Charlemagne's threat to take, 132;
Charlemagne receives through Ganelon the keys of, 134;
captured by Charlemagne, 154

"SARN HELEN." Roman roads in Wales connecting Helena's three castles

known as, 49

SAXON ENGLAND. The maintenance of justice in, 314

SAXON-S. Hereward the, 334;

the darling hero of the, 334;
Anglo-, chivalry, Hereward the ideal of, 334, 335;
Hereward the, known as the Champion of Women, 351

SCARLET, WILL. Cousin to and one of Robin Hood's followers, 315

SCOTLAND. Hero-myths of, 248;

national heroes of Lowland, actual, not mythical, 248;
war between England and, 249

SCOTTISH INDEPENDENCE. Sir Nigel Campbell one of leaders in cause

of, 249

SCYLD SCEFING (skild ske�f-ing). Founder of Scyldings dynasty, 2;

coming to and passing from Denmark, 2;
Hrothgar, great-grandson of, 2

SEVEN HILLS. Rome, the City of, 43;

Maxen Wledig, emperor, rules Europe from, 43

SHERWOOD, FOREST OF. Headquarters of Robin Hood, 315

SIEGFRIED. Gudrun and, in "Nibelungenlied," 95

SIGMUND. Father of Fitela; glory of, chanted by Danish bard, 18

SIGRID. Thorbiorn's housekeeper, 97;

loved by Olaf, 99;
quits Thorbiorn's service, 103;
disappearance of, 106

SIGT-RYG RANALDSSON. Prince of Waterford; his troth-plight with King

Alef's daughter, 343;
son of King Ranald, 345;
Hereward's mission to, 345-347;
sails for Cornwall to rescue his love, 347;
sends forty Danes to demand fulfilment of troth-plight, 348;
Sigtryg and Danes plan ambush for Haco, 350;
rescues, and marries, Cornish princess, 350, 351

SI�HT-RIC-SON. Same as Anlaf, Abloec, &c., 73

SIR JOHN OF THE MARSHES. Noble gentleman who lived in Lincolnshire,

in reign of Edward I., 204, 205;
father of John, Otho, and Gamelyn, 205;
his death, 206

SI-WARD, EARL. Ruler in Northumbria, 339;

reputed kinship to Fairy Bear, 340, 342

SNOWDON. Mountainous land of, reached by ambassadors of Maxen

Wledig, 47

SOCACH. Black Colin's foster-parents' dwelling-place, 250

SOULS. The traffic in, during Irish famine, 170-183;

Cathleen tries to check traffic in, 174

SPAIN. Charlemagne's expedition into, 119;

begins to quit, 134;
returns to, to rescue Roland, 146

SPANISH LEGEND. Bernardo del Carpio and Roland in, 121

SPENCER.
1. Adam, steward in household of Sir John, releases Gamelyn,
214, 215.
2. Edmund, reference to his Red Cross Knight, 265

STEINTHOR OF ERE. Great chieftain who shelters Howard, 108, 109,

117;
speaks on Howard's behalf at the Thing, 118

ST. JOHN, KNIGHTS OF. Black Colin takes service with, 253;
Grand Master of, 253

ST. MARY. Abbey of, in York, lands of stranger knight in pledge to

Abbot of, 321;
land redeemed by Sir Richard of the Lea, 324-327;
the Black Monk high cellarer in Abbey of, 331
 ST. PATRICK. Preached Gospel to people of Ireland, 157

SUDDENE. King Murry and Queen Godhild, and son Horn, the royal
family of, 286;
Horn sails for, to wrest from Saracens, 309;
Athulf's father found at, 309, 310;
Horn reconquers, 310;
a Christian realm once more, 311;
Horn crowned king of, 311

SWANBOROW. Daughter of King Birkabeyn, 74;

slain by Godard, 76

SWEDEN. G�taland, realm of Geats in south of, 5

SWEDES. Slay Hathcyn, son of King Hrethel, 35

SWITZERLAND. Black Colin and Highland clansmen pass through, 253

SYLVESTER. Bishop of Rome; and Constantine, 42;

Constantine told in a vision to send for, 70;
preaches the Christian faith to Constantine, 71

TAILLEFER. "Song of Roland" and, 122

TARA. Black stone of, 157

TARN WATHELAN. Giant in castle near, ill-treats maiden, 267;

King Arthur's journey to, and fight with giant who lived in Castle
of, 269, 270;
King Arthur summons court to hunt near, 276;
the churlish knight of, set free from magic spells, 284

TEUTONIC NORTH. Beowulf famous throughout, 5

THERSITES. Compared with Bricriu of the Bitter Tongue, 186

THING. Howard at the, 107, 108, 117, 118

THOR-BIORN. Mighty chief on shores of Icefirth, 97;

Vakr, nephew of, 97;
Olaf and sheep of, 98-100;
whale unjustly adjudged to, 102;
marries sister of Guest, 103;
Sigrid leaves, 103;
meets Olaf, 103-106;
Warflame, magic sword of, 104-106;
thrusts Olaf with Warflame, 106;
Howard claims wergild from, 106-111;
Guest's judgment against, 110, 111;
hailed by Biargey while out fishing, 112;
slain by Howard, 116

THOR-BRAND. Brother of Biargey, 113;

helps Howard against Thorbiorn, 115
 THOR-DIS. Mother of Vakr; sends second son to assist in fight
against Olaf, 105

THOR-KEL. Lawman and arbitrator of Icefirth, 97;

his false decree concerning a whale, 102

THOR-OLD. Same as Turoldus; author of "Song of Roland," 122

THURSTON. King of Ireland; served by Horn, 301;

Harold and Berild, sons of, 302;
offers kingdom and his daughter Reynild to Horn, 302;
Horn discloses his identity to, 304

TIBER. Hunting expedition down, by Maxen Wledig, 43

TIR-NAN-OG. The land of never-dying youth, 163

TREE, THE HOLY. See Holy Cross

TRINITY. Truth of, demonstrated by shamrock-leaf, 157

TROJAN WAR. An ancient story, yet well known, 58

TUCK, FRIAR. Masses sung by, for Robin Hood, 318

TURPIN. Archbishop of Charlemagne, one of Twelve Peers, 125, 136;

blesses the knights, 139, 140;
mediates between Roland and Oliver, 145;
mortally wounded, 149;
his death, 150, 151

UATH, THE STRANGER. Giant who tests champions, 199-203;

adjudges Cuchulain Champion of Heroes of all Ireland, 203

UBBE (ub-be). Danish jarl, friend of King Birkabeyn; befriends

Havelok and Goldborough, 87-93;
appointed Regent of Denmark for Havelok, 94

ULSTER. Fergus commanded to buy food at, 165;

Conor, King of, 185;
Cuchulain peer among champions of, 185;
Armagh, capital of, 186;
Red Branch heroes, royal bodyguard of, 186;
Bricriu stirs up strife among champions of, 187, 188

UNKNOWN GOD. Constantine's acceptance and reverence of the, 51;

the people awed by token of, 53

UTERYSDALE. Land of Sir Richard of the Lea in, 323;

Sir Richard redeems the land, 324-327;
Sir Richard returns to, 333

VAKR. Thorbiorn's nephew, 97;

 mocks Olaf, 100;
jeers at Brand the Strong, 102, 103;
accompanies Thorbiorn to meet Olaf, 103-106;
Thordis, mother of, 105;
his miserable end, 116

VALBRAND. Brother of Biargey, 112, 113;

visited by Howard, 114

VALTIERRA. Charlemagne retires to, on way to France, 134

VEILLANTIF. Roland's steed, 136;

slain by Saracens, 150

VICAR OF CHRIST on earth, Black Colin regards Pope as, 253

VIKINGS. Gospel preached to, 157

VIRGIN MARY. Cult of, 121;

Cathleen invokes, 163;
Cathleen's people invoke, 181

WALES. Old Roman roads in, that connected Helena's three castles
still known as "Sarn Helen," 49;
legend of Havelok the Dane thought to have originated in, 73;
medi�val, Arthurian legend preserved by, 265

WALLACE, SIR WILLIAM. Scottish hero, 248;

schoolfellow and comrade of Sir Nigel Campbell, 249

WARDEN. Of the coast of Denmark, welcomes Beowulf, 6;

conducts Geats to Heorot, 8;
Wulfgar, one of Hrothgar's nobles, greets Beowulf, 9;
of Geatland, welcomes Beowulf's return, 29

WARFLAME. Magic sword, owned by Thorbiorn, and by which he himself

is slain by Howard, 115, 116

WASHERS OF THE FORD. Wrath of, and Irish people, 158

WATERFORD. Prince Sigtryg of, his troth-plight with daughter of King

Alef, 343;
Ranald, King of, 345;
Hereward reaches, 346;
Prince and Princess of, Hereward the best friend of, 351

WATLING STREET. Robin Hood sends his followers to, 316;

a year later sends followers once more to, 329

WEALHTHEOW (wal-thyow), QUEEN. Wife of Hrothgar; honours Beowulf,

14, 20

WELSH.
1. Legends, "Mabinogion" and "The Dream of Maxen Wledig," 42;
Celtic features in, 185.
2. Saga, hero of, Emperor Maxentius, 42
 WEOHSTAN (wyo-stan). Father of Wiglaf, who supported Beowulf in his
fight with the fire-dragon, 36

WEST. Constantine a favourite of Roman soldiery of the, 63;

Roman soldiery of the, proclaim Constantine emperor, 63;
the fictitious wanderings of Horn in realms of, 307

WESTERN ISLES. Irish Gaelic hero-legends carried to, from Erin, 248

WESTERNESSE. Childe Horn lands on shore of, 289;

Ailmar, King of, questions Horn, 290;
Horn returns to, accompanied by Irish knights, 304;
recital of the fictitious plans of Horn to reach, within seven
years, 307

WHITBY. Hereward lands at, 339

WIG-LAF. Son of Weohstan; supports Beowulf in his fight with the

fire-dragon, 36-41

WILF-INGS. Hrothgar shields Ecgtheow from, 11

WILLIAM OF CLOUDESLEE. One of the famous outlaws of England, 226

WILLIAM TELL. William of Cloudeslee the, of England, 226;

Alice, wife of, 227;
goes to Carlisle, 227;
sheriff informed of his presence, 229;
attacked by sheriff and his men, 231;
capture of, 232;
sheriff sentences to be hanged, 232;
news of his sentence conveyed to the greenwood, 233;
Clym's stratagem to save, 234;
rescued from death, 237, 238;
visits London to see king, 241;
the king pardons, 243;
shoots apple from son's head, 245, 246;
receives royal favours from king and queen, 246

WILLIAM WENDUT. Second son of Grim; accompanies Havelok to Denmark,

87

WINCHESTER. Godrich takes Goldborough from, to Dover, 81

WLEDIG. See Maxen Wledig

WOMEN, CHAMPION OF. Hereward known as, 351

WYRD (weird). Goddess of Fate, 13, 34

YORK. Archbishop of, unites in marriage Havelok and Goldborough, 85;

Abbot of St. Mary's Abbey, in, 321

YORKSHIRE. Barnesdale, forest in, once dwelling-place of Robin Hood,

314, 315
 YULETIDE. King Arthur's knights keep, 267

ZACCH�US. Grandfather of Judas, 57

Transcriber's Note

Minor typographic errors in punctuation have been corrected without

note. Hyphen inconsistencies have been corrected without note where
there was a prevalence of one formation over another.

There is some variation in spelling, sometimes of proper names, often

between the main text and quoted texts, and a number of archaic words.
These remain as printed, unless they were an obvious typographic
error, which were amended as follows:

Page 48--need amended to heed--"... that when their

horses failed they gave no heed, but took others ..."

Page 73--crystalized amended to crystallized--"These

stories finally crystallized in a form ..."

Page 84--Havelock amended to Havelok--"... and so, in

great fear, Havelok agreed to the wedding."

Page 233--vension amended to venison--"... William had

given the boy many a dinner of venison, ..."

Page 338--Whereever amended to Wherever--""Wherever fate

and my fortune lead me," ..."

Page 355--7 amended to 74--"... and Havelok, son of, 74;"

Page 358--o amended to of--"... Daughter of King Alef,

affianced to Prince Sigtryg ..."

Page 359--Alaf amended to Alef--"Prince Sigtryg sends

forty to King Alef, 348;"

Page 362--Niger amended to Nigel--"Glen belonging to

MacGregors, given to Sir Nigel Campbell, 249;"

Page 366--Herebald amended to Herebeald--"brought up

with brothers, Herebeald and Hathcyn ..."

Page 372--missio nto amended to mission to--"Hereward's

mission to, 345-347;"

Page 375--332 amended to 232--"... capture of, 232;"

There were some instances of omitted text; these were all checked
against another edition of the text, and, in the case of the omitted
page references, cross-checked against this edition, and repaired as
follows:

Page 347--omitted word (marriage) inserted at the end of

the section just prior to "Return to Cornwall"--"... he
would save his betrothed from some other hateful
marriage."

Page 368--the entry for London had no page number

reference; 241 inserted.

Page 370--the entry for Priam had no page number

reference; 95 inserted.

The frontispiece illustration has been moved to follow the title page.
Other illustrations have been moved so that they are near the text
they refer to. Some of the illustration captions have the artist's
name included, some do not; these are all reproduced as printed.

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The Project Gutenberg EBook of Roumanian Fairy Tales, by Various

This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or
re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.net

Title: Roumanian Fairy Tales

Author: Various

Compiler: Mite Kremnitz

Editor: J. M. Percival

Release Date: February 10, 2007 [EBook #20552]

Language: English

*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK ROUMANIAN FAIRY TALES ***
Produced by David Edwards, Sankar Viswanathan, and the
Online Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net
(This book was produced from scanned images of public
domain material from the Google Print project.)

ROUMANIAN FAIRY TALES

_COLLECTED_

BY

MITE KREMNITZ.

_ADAPTED AND ARRANGED_

BY

J. M. PERCIVAL

NEW YORK

HENRY HOLT AND COMPANY

1885

COPYRIGHT, 1885,

BY

HENRY HOLT & CO.

* * * * *

PREFACE.

This collection contains translations of Roumanian tales which,

however, comprise but a small portion of the inexhaustible treasure
that exists in the nation. The originals are scattered throughout
Roumanian literature. The finest collection is Herr P. Ispirescu's,
from which the stories numbered in the contents 2, 4, 6, 8, 10, 12,
13, and 17 in the present volume have been selected. No. 11 is taken
from Herr T. M. Arsenie's small collection; the others have been drawn
from the columns of the periodical _Convorbiri Literare_. Of these
Nos. 5 and 14 are by the pen of Herr J. Creanga, No. 9 is the work of
Herr Miron Pompilin, while Nos. 1, 3, 7, 16 and 18 are by Herr
Slavice, who wrote No. 15 specially for this volume, in the Roumanian
language, just as it was related to him by the peasants.

* * * * *

CONTENTS.

1. STAN BOLOVAN

2. THE WONDERFUL BIRD

3. THE TWINS WITH THE GOLDEN STAR

4. YOUTH WITHOUT AGE AND LIFE WITHOUT DEATH

5. THE LITTLE PURSE WITH TWO HALF-PENNIES

6. MOGARZEA AND HIS SON

7. CUNNING ILEANE

8. THE PRINCESS AND THE FISHERMAN

9. LITTLE WILD-ROSE

10. THE VOICE OF DEATH

11. THE OLD WOMAN AND THE OLD MAN

12. THE PEA EMPEROR

13. THE MORNING STAR AND THE EVENING STAR

14. THE TWO STEP-SISTERS

15. THE POOR BOY

16. MOTHER'S DARLING JACK

17. TELLERCHEN

18. THE FAIRY AURORA

* * * * *

Stan Bolovan.
Once upon a time, something happened. If it hadn't happened, it
wouldn't be told.

At the edge of the village, where the peasants' oxen break through the
hedges and the neighbors' hogs wallow in the ground under the fences,
there once stood a house. In this house lived a man, and the man had a
wife; but the wife grieved all day long.

"What troubles you, dear wife, that you sit there drooping like a
frost-bitten bud in the sunlight?" her husband asked one day. "You
have all you need. So be cheerful, like other folks."

"Let me alone, and ask no more questions!" replied the wife, and
became still more melancholy than before.

Her husband questioned her the second time, and received the same
reply. But, when he asked again, she answered more fully.

"Dear me," she said, "why do you trouble your head about it? If you
know, you'll be just sorrowful as I am. It's better for me not to tell
you."

But, to this, people will never agree. If you tell a person he must
sit still, he is more anxious to move than ever. Stan was now
determined to know what was in his wife's mind.

"If you are determined to hear, I'll tell you," said the wife.
"There's no luck in the house, husband,--there's no luck in the
house!"

"Isn't the cow a good one? Are not the fruit-trees and bee-hives full?
Are not the fields fertile?" asked Stan. "You talk nonsense, if you
complain of any thing."

"But, husband, we have no children."

Stan understood; and, when a man realizes such a thing, it isn't well.
From this time, a sorrowful man and a sorrowful woman lived in the
house on the edge of the village. And they were sorrowful because the
Lord had given them no children. When the wife saw her husband sad,
she grew still more melancholy; and the more melancholy she was, the
greater his grief became.

This continued for a long time.

They had masses repeated and prayers read in all the churches. They
questioned all the witches, but God's gift did not come.

One day, two travelers arrived at Stan's house, and were joyfully
received and entertained with the best food he had. They were angels
in disguise; and, perceiving that Stan and his wife were good people,
one of them, while throwing his knapsack over his shoulder to continue
his journey, asked his host what he most desired, and said that any
three of his wishes should be fulfilled.

"Give me children," replied Stan.

"What else shall I give you?"

"Children, sir, give me children!"

"Take care," said the angel, "or there will be too many of them. Have
you enough to support them?"

"Never mind that, sir,--only give them to me!"

The travelers departed; but Stan accompanied them as far as the

high-road, that they might not lose their way among the fields and
woods.

When Stan reached home again, he found the house, yard, and garden
filled with children, in all not less than a hundred. Not one was
larger than the other; but each was more quarrelsome, bolder, more
mischievous and noisier than the rest. And, in some way, God made Stan
feel and know that they all belonged to him and were his.

"Good gracious! What a lot of them!" he cried, standing in the midst

of the throng.

"But not too many, husband," replied his wife, bringing a little flock
with her.

Then followed days which can only be experienced by a man who has a
hundred children. The house and village echoed with shouts of "father"
and "mother," and the world was full of happiness.

But taking care of children isn't so simple a matter. Many pleasures

come with many troubles, and many troubles with many joys. When, after
a few days, the children began to shout, "Father, I'm hungry!" Stan
began to scratch his head. There did not seem to him to be too many
children, for God's gift is good, however large it may be; but his
barns were too small, the cow was growing thin, and the fields did
not produce enough.

"I'll tell you what, wife," said Stan one day, "it seems to me that
there isn't much harmony in our affairs. As God was good enough to
give us so many children, He ought to have filled the measure of His
goodness, and sent us food for them, too."

"Search for it, husband," the wife answered. "Who knows where it may
be concealed? The Lord never does a thing by halves."

Stan went out into the wide world to find God's gift. He was firmly
resolved to return home laden with food.

Aha! The road of the hungry is always a long one. A man doesn't earn
food for a hundred greedy children in a trice. Stan wandered on, on,
on, till he had fairly run himself off his feet. When he had thus
arrived nearly at the end of the world, where what is mixes with what
is not, he saw in the distance, in the middle of a field which lay
spread out as flat as a cake, a sheep-fold. By it stood seven
shepherds, and in the shadow within lay a flock of sheep.

"Lord, help me," said Stan, and went up to the fold to see whether, by
patience and discretion, he might not find some employment there. But
he soon discovered that there was not much more hope here than in the
other places whither he had journeyed. This was the state of affairs:
every night, at precisely twelve o'clock, a furious dragon came and
took from the herd a ram, a sheep, and a lamb, three animals in all.
He also carried milk enough for seventy-seven lambkins to the old
she-dragon, that she might bathe in it and grow young. The shepherds
were very angry about it, and complained bitterly. So Stan saw that he
was not likely to return home from here richly laden with food for his
children.

But there is no spur more powerful than for a man to see his children
starving. An idea entered Stan's head, and he said boldly, "What would
you give me, if I released you from the greedy dragon?"

"One of each three rams shall be yours, one-third of the sheep, and
one-third of the lambs," replied the shepherds.

"Agreed," said Stan; yet he felt rather anxious, lest he might find it
too hard to drive the flock home alone.

But there was no hurry about that. It was some time before midnight.
And besides, to tell the truth, Stan did not exactly know how he was
to get rid of the dragon. "The Lord will send me some clever plan," he
said to himself, and then counted the flock again to see how many
animals he would have.

Just at midnight, when day and night, weary of strife, for a moment
stood still, Stan felt that he was about to see something he had never
beheld before. It was something that can not be described. It is a
horrible thing to have a dragon come. It seemed as if the monster was
hurling huge rocks at the trees, and thus forcing a way through
primeval forests. Even Stan felt that he should be wise to take the
quickest way off, and enter into no quarrel with a dragon. Ah! but his
children at home were starving.

"I'll kill you or you shall kill me!" Stan said to himself, and
remained where he was, close by the sheep-fold.

"Stop!" he cried, when he saw the dragon near the fold; and he shouted
as though he was a person of importance.

"H'm," said the dragon: "where did you come from, that you screech at
me so?"

"I am Stan Bolovan, who at night devours rocks and by day grazes on
the trees of the primeval forests; and if you touch the flock, I'll
cut a cross on your back, and bathe you in holy water."

When the dragon heard these words, he stopped in the midst of his
career; for he saw that he had found his match.

"But you must first fight with me," replied the dragon, hesitatingly.

"_I_ fight with you?" cried Stan. "Beware of the words that have
escaped your lips. My breath is stronger than your whole body." Then,
taking from his knapsack a piece of white cheese, he showed it to the
dragon. "Do you see this stone?" he said. "Pick one up from the bank
of yonder stream, and we'll try our strength."

The dragon took a stone from the shore of the brook.

"Can you squeeze buttermilk out of the stone?" asked Stan.

The dragon crushed the stone in his hand, so that he crumbled it into
powder. But he squeezed no buttermilk from it.

"It can't be done," he said rather angrily.

"I'll show you whether it can be done," replied Stan, and then
squeezed the soft cheese in his hand, till the buttermilk trickled
down between his fingers.

When the dragon saw this, he began to look about him to find the
shortest road to run away; but Stan placed himself before the forest.
"Let us have a little reckoning about what you have taken from the
fold," he said. "Nothing is given away here."

The poor dragon would have taken flight, if he hadn't been afraid that
Stan might blow behind him, and bury him under the trees in the
forest. So he stood still, like a person who doesn't know what else to
do.

"Listen!" he said, after a while. "I see that you are a useful man. My
mother has long been looking for a servant like you, but has not been
able to find one. Enter our service. The year has three days, and each
day's wages is seven sacks of ducats!"

Three times seven sacks of ducats! A fine business! That was just what
Stan needed. "And," he thought, "if I've outwitted the dragon, I can
probably get the better of his mother!" So he didn't waste many words
about the matter, but set off with the monster. A long, rough road;
but still it was too short, since it led to a bad end. It seemed to
Stan as if he had arrived almost before he started.

The old she-dragon, old as Time itself, was waiting for them. She had
made a fire under the huge caldron, in which she meant to boil the
milk and mix it with the blood of a lamb and the marrow from its
bones, that the liquid might have healing power. Stan saw her eyes
glistening in the darkness when they were still three gun-shots off.
But, when they reached the spot and the she-dragon perceived that her
son had brought her nothing, she was very angry. This she-dragon was
by no means lovable. She had a wrinkled face, open jaws, tangled hair,
sunken eyes, parched lips, and a breath reeking with the smell of
onions.

"Stay here," said the dragon. "I'll go and make arrangements with my
mother."

Stan would willingly have stood still further off, but he had no
choice now that he had once entered upon this evil business. So he let
the dragon go on.

"Listen, mother!" said the dragon, when he had entered the house.
"I've brought you a man to get rid of. He's a terrible fellow, who
eats pieces of rock and squeezes buttermilk out of stones." Then he
told her what had happened.

"Just leave him to me," she said, after hearing the whole story. "No
man ever slipped through _my_ fingers."
So the matter remained as it had first been settled. Stan Bolovan
became the servant of this monster and his mother. A terrible fix! I
really don't know what will come of it.

The next day, the she-dragon gave him his task. They were to give a
signal to the dragon world with a club sheathed in seven thicknesses
of iron. The dragon raised the club and hurled it three miles, then he
set off with Stan, that he might also throw it three miles, or, if
possible, further still. When Stan reached the club, he began to look
at it rather anxiously. He saw that he and all his children together
could not even lift it from the ground.

"Why are you standing there?" asked the dragon.

"Why, you see, it's such a handsome club. I'm sorry," replied Stan.

"Sorry? Why?" inquired the dragon.

"Because," answered Stan, "I'm afraid you'll never see it again in

your whole life, if I throw it; for I know my own strength."

"Don't fear. Just throw it," replied the dragon.

"If you really mean it, we'll first go and get provisions enough to
last three days; for we shall have to travel at least three days, if
not longer, to get it."

These words frightened the dragon, but he did not yet believe that it
would be so bad as Stan said. So they went home for the provisions,
though he wasn't at all pleased with the idea of having Stan serve his
year in merely going after the club. When they got back again to it,
Stan sat down on the bag of provisions and became absorbed in staring
at the moon.

"What are you doing?" asked the dragon.

"Only waiting for the moon to sail by."

"Why?"

"Don't you see that the moon is directly in my way?" said Stan. "Or do
you want me to fling the club into the moon?"

The dragon now began to be seriously anxious. It was a club that had
descended to him from his ancestors, and he wouldn't have liked to
lose it in the moon.

"I'll tell you what," he said. "Don't throw the club. I'll do it
myself."

"Certainly not. Heaven forbid!" replied Stan. "Only wait till the moon
passes by."

Then a long conversation followed; for Stan would not consent to have
the dragon throw the club again, except on the promise of seven sacks
of ducats.

"Oh, dear! mother, he's a tremendously strong man," said the dragon.
"I could scarcely prevent him from throwing the club into the moon."

The she-dragon began to be anxious, too. Just think of it! Would it be

a joke to have a person able to throw any thing into the moon? She was
a she-dragon of true dragon blood, however, and the next day had
thought of a still harder task.

"Bring some water," she said early in the morning, and gave each
twelve buffalo skins, ordering them to fill them by evening, and fetch
them all home at once.

They went to the well; and, before one could wink, the dragon had
filled the twelve skins, and was in the act of carrying them back.
Stan was tired, he had scarcely been able to drag the empty skins
along. A chill ran through his veins, when he thought of the full
ones. What do you suppose he did? He pulled a worn-out knife blade
from his belt, and began to scratch the earth around the well with it.

"What are you doing?" asked the dragon.

"I'm not a blockhead, that I should go to the labor of filling the

skins with water," replied Stan.

"But how will you carry the water to the house, then?"

"How? Just as you see," said Stan. "I'm going to take the well, you
goose!"

The dragon stood with his mouth wide-open in amazement. He wouldn't

have had this done on any account, for the well was one that had
belonged to his ancestors.

"I'll tell you," he said anxiously, "let me carry your skins home,
too."

"Certainly not. Heaven forbid!" replied Stan, digging on around the

well.

Now, another long discussion followed; and this time, too, the dragon
could only persuade Stan by promising him seven sacks of ducats.

On the third day, that is the last one, the she-dragon sent them into
the forest for wood.

Before one could count three, the dragon tore up more trees than Stan
had ever seen before in his whole life, and piled them up together.
But Stan began to examine the trees, chose the very finest, climbed up
into one and tied its top with a wild grape-vine to the next. So,
without saying a word, he continued to fasten one splendid tree to
another.

"What are you doing there?" asked the dragon.

"You see what I am doing," replied Stan, working quietly on.

"Why are you tying the trees together?"

"Why, to save myself unnecessary work in pulling them up one by one,"

said Stan.
"But how are you going to carry them home?"

"I shall take the whole forest, you goose! Can't you understand that?"
said Stan, continuing to fasten them together.

The dragon now felt as if he wanted to take to his heels, and never
stop until he reached home.

But he was afraid that he should suddenly find Stan pulling the whole
forest down on his head.

This time, as it was the end of the year's service, it seemed as if

the discussion would never cease. Stan did not want to listen at all,
but had set his mind upon flinging the forest on his back at any rate.

"I'll tell you what," said the dragon, trembling with fear, "your
wages shall be seven times seven sacks of ducats. Content yourself
with that."

"Well, be it so, as I see you are a good fellow," replied Stan, and
agreed that the dragon should carry the wood for him.

The year was now over. Stan was anxious only about one things--how he
was to drag so many ducats home.

In the evening, the dragon and his mother sat talking together in
their room; but Stan listened in the entry.

"Woe betide us!" said the dragon: "this fellow upsets us terribly.
Give him money, even more than he has, only let us get rid of him."

Ah, yes! but the she-dragon cared for money.

"Let me tell you one thing," she said: "you must kill this man
to-night."

"I am afraid of him, mother," he answered in terror.

"Have no fear," replied his mother. "When you see that he is asleep,
take your club and strike him in the middle of the forehead."

So it was agreed. Ah, yes! but Stan always had a bright idea at the
right time. When he saw that the dragon and his mother had put out the
light, he took the pig's trough, and laid it bottom upward in his
place, covered it carefully with a shaggy coat, and lay down himself
under the bed, where he began to snore like a person who is sound
asleep.

The dragon went out softly, approached the bed, raised his club, and
struck one blow on the spot where Stan's head ought to have been. The
trough sounded hollow, Stan groaned, and the dragon tiptoed back
again.

Stan then crept out from under the bed, cleaned it, and lay down, but
was wise enough not to close an eye all night long.

The dragon and his mother were rigid with amazement when they saw Stan
come in the next morning as sound as an egg.
"Good morning!"

"Good morning; but how did you sleep last night?"

"Very well," replied Stan. "Only I dreamed that a flea bit me just
here on the forehead, and it seems as if it still pained me."

"Just listen to that, mother!" cried the dragon. "Did you hear? He
talks about a flea, and I hit him with my club!"

This was too much for the she-dragon. She perceived that it isn't
worth while to argue with such people. So they hastened to fill his
sacks, in order to get rid of him as quickly as possible. But poor
Stan now began to perspire. When he stood beside the bags, he trembled
like an aspen leaf, because he was unable to lift even one of them
from the ground. So he stood staring at them.

"Why are you standing there?" asked the dragon.

"H'm! I'm waiting," replied Stan, "because I would rather stay with
you another year. I'm ashamed to have any body see me carry away so
little at one time. I'm afraid people will say, 'Look at Stan Bolovan,
who in one year has grown as weak as a dragon.'"

Now, it was the two dragons' turn to be frightened.

They vainly told him that they would give him seven--nay, three times
seven or even seven times seven--sacks of ducats, if he would only go
away.

"I'll tell you what," said Stan, at last. "As I see you don't want to
keep me, I won't force you to do so. Have it your own way. I'll go.
But, that I need not be ashamed before the people, you must carry this
treasure home for me."

The words were scarcely out of his mouth, when the dragon picked up
the sacks and set off with Stan.

Short and smooth, yet always too long, is the road that leads home.
But, when Stan found himself close to his house, and heard his
children's shouts, he began to walk slower. It seemed too near; for he
was afraid that, if the dragon knew where he lived, he might come to
take away the treasure. Only he was puzzled to find any way of
carrying his money home alone.

"I really don't know what to do," he said, turning to the dragon. "I
have a hundred hungry children, and fear you may fare badly among
them, because they are very fond of fighting. But just behave
sensibly, and I'll protect you as well as I can."

A hundred children! That's no joke! The dragon--though a dragon of

dragon race--let the bags fall in his fright. But, from sheer terror,
he picked them up again. Yet his fear did not gain the mastery till
they entered the court-yard. When the hungry children saw their father
coming with the loaded dragon, they rushed toward him, each one with a
knife in the right hand and a fork in the left. Then they all began to
whet the knives on the forks, shrieking at the top of their lungs, "We
want dragon meat!"
This was enough to scare Satan himself. The dragon threw down the
sacks, and then took to flight, so frightened that since that time he
has never dared to come back to the world.

The Wonderful Bird.

Once upon a time, something happened. If it had not happened, it would

not be told.

There was a good, pious emperor, who had three sons. Among many other
benefits bestowed upon the inhabitants of his empire he built a
church, about which marvelous stories were told, for he adorned it
with gold, precious stones and every thing the workmen of that country
regarded as beautiful and valuable. Within and in front of this church
were numbers of marble columns, and it was supplied with the finest
paintings, silver chandeliers, huge silver lamps, and the rarest
books. The more the emperor rejoiced in its beauty, the more sorrowful
he felt that he could not finish it, for the steeple continually fell
down.

"How is it that this sacred church can not be completed?" he asked. "I
have spent all my property and it is not yet done." So he ordered a
proclamation to be sent throughout the empire, stating that any
architect who could finish the church steeple would receive great
gifts and honors. Besides this, a second proclamation was issued,
commanding prayers to be read and services held in all the churches,
that God might take pity on him and send him a good architect. The
third night the monarch dreamed that if any one would fetch the
wonderful bird from the other shore and put its nest in the steeple,
the church could be finished. He told this dream to his sons, and they
vied with each other in offering to set out and devote themselves to
their imperial father's service.

The emperor replied: "I see, my sons, that you all desire to fulfill
your duty to God, but you can't all three go at once. My oldest son
shall set out first, if he does not succeed, the second one, and so on
until the Lord takes pity upon us."

The younger sons silently submitted; the oldest one made his
preparations for the journey. He traveled as best he could, and when
he had passed the frontiers of his father's empire, found himself in a
beautiful grove. After lighting a fire he stood waiting until his food
was cooked. Suddenly he saw a fox, which begged him to tie up his
hound, give it a bit of bread and a glass of wine, and let it rest by
his fire. Instead of granting the request the prince released the
hound, which instantly pursued the animal, whereupon the fox, by a
magic spell, transformed the emperor's son into a block of stone.

When the sovereign saw that his oldest son did not return, he listened
to the entreaties of his second son, and gave him permission to set
forth to find the wonderful bird. After making his preparations and
taking some provisions with him, this prince also departed. On the
spot where his brother had been turned to stone, the same thing
happened to him, because he also refused the fox's entreaties, and
tried to catch it, to get its skin.

The emperor grew very thoughtful, when after a long time his sons
failed to return, either with or without the wonderful bird.

At last the youngest said: "You see, father, it is now a long time
since my brothers set out to find the wonderful bird, and they haven't
come home yet; give me some money and clothes for the journey that I
may try my luck also. If I succeed, you will rejoice, because your
dream will be fulfilled, and if I do not, you will suffer no
mortification from it."

"Your older brothers have apparently been unable to get this wonderful
bird," replied the emperor; "nay, perhaps they have even lost their
lives, they have been absent so long. I am old; if you go too, who
will help me in the cares of government; if I die, who is there to
ascend the throne except you, my son? Stay here, my dear child, do not
leave me."

"You know, my royal father, that I have never swerved a hair's breadth
from your commands, and if I now venture to urge my petition it is
only because, if possible, I would fain fulfill a wish that gives you
no rest, which you have cherished so many years and striven to realize
at so great a cost."

After many entreaties, the emperor yielded. The prince chose from the
imperial stables a horse that pleased him, took a dog for a
companion, supplied himself with sufficient food and departed.

After some time had passed, the emperor's two older sons suddenly
arrived with the magic bird and a young girl, who was placed in charge
of the poultry-yard. Every body wondered at the beauty of the bird,
whose plumage glittered with a thousand hues, each feather shining
like the sun, and the church-steeple did not fall after the bird and
its nest were placed within. One thing, however, was noticed; the bird
seemed dumb, it never uttered a note, and all who saw it grieved that
so beautiful a creature should have no song; even the emperor, spite
of all the pleasure he took in the church and steeple, was sorrowful
because the bird did not sing.

People began to forget the youngest son, so great was the rejoicing
over the bird that seemed to keep the steeple from falling, and thus
enabled the workmen to finish the church; but the emperor grieved
because the prince was not there to share his subjects' pleasure.

One day the poultry-keeper came to him and said: "May thy face shine,
mighty emperor, the whole city is marveling at the singing of the
magic bird--a shepherd entered the church early this morning, and the
bird instantly began to sing as if it would burst its throat, and is
so happy that it can hardly keep in its nest. This has happened to-day
for the second time. While the shepherd is in the church the bird
never stops singing, but as soon as he goes away, it is silent."

"Let the shepherd be brought before me at once."

"Your majesty, the shepherd seems to be a stranger; no one here knows

him. Your majesty's sons, I hear, have set guards to arrest him."

"Silence," said the emperor; "do not mention my sons; it is not seemly
for you to speak against them."

The sovereign sent some of his most trusty servants to keep watch,
seize the shepherd as soon as he entered the church and the bird began
to sing, and bring him before him. But, not content with this, he went
himself the next holiday to hear the bird's wonderful singing with his
own ears, and see the shepherd. If he had not been present, a violent
conflict would have arisen between his own people and the spies sent
by his sons, who evidently wished to lay hands on the shepherd. The
emperor ordered that he should be brought to the palace, for a strange
feeling stirred in his heart when he saw the timid youth with the
figure of a hero.

When he came out of church, the monarch went directly home to his
palace, for his heart told him that there must be something unusual
about this shepherd. On seeing him, he said:--

"Tell me, my son, from what part of the country do you come? Have you
any parents, and how did you get here?"

"My story is a long one, most noble emperor. I have parents and
brothers. I shall need more time to tell you how I came hither, but if
it is your majesty's will, I am ready. I will come to your majesty
early to-morrow morning, it is too late to-day."

"Very well, my brave fellow, I will expect you at dawn to-morrow."

Early the next morning the shepherd came to await the emperor's
commands; but as soon as the emperor heard that he had arrived, he
summoned him.

"Tell me, my son, what is the reason the magic bird sings as soon as
you enter the church, and stops when you go out."

"To understand that and other things, your majesty, let me tell you my
whole story."

"I will listen; tell me anything you please."

The shepherd then began:--

"I have a father, and brothers. I left my home to do something to

please my father, who was sad because he had a wish that could not be
fulfilled. After a journey of several days I reached a beautiful
meadow, from which branched several roads. Intending to spend the
night there, I lighted a fire, took out some of the provisions I had
brought with me, and was just sitting down to eat them, when I
suddenly saw a fox beside me. Whence it came I did not know; it seemed
as if it had sprung up out of the earth.

"'Please let me warm myself by your fire,' it said. 'See, I am so cold

that my teeth chatter. Give me a bit of bread and a glass of wine,
that I may satisfy my hunger and thirst, and tie your dog, so I can
eat in peace and rest without fear.'

"'Very well,' I replied, 'come and warm yourself. Here are my

provisions and my flask, eat and drink as much as you choose.'

"I tied my dog, and we sat down by the fire and talked together. Among
other things, I told the fox where I was going, and even asked if it
could tell me what I should do to accomplish the task I had
voluntarily undertaken.

"'Have no anxiety about that,' replied the fox. 'We'll set out
together early to-morrow morning, and if I don't help you to the goal,
never trust me again.'

"We sat by the fire, feasting like two friends, then the fox bade me
good-night, and vanished like a shadow. I wondered how it had been
possible that I did not see what direction the animal took, and while
racking my brains to find out how it had managed to go and come
unperceived, I fell asleep. When the fox came at dawn next morning, it
found me gazing in astonishment at several blocks of stone, which
resembled two men, two dogs, and two horses. As soon as I saw the
animal, we prepared to set out.

"The fox turned three somersaults and suddenly changed into a handsome
hero. On the way he told me that the place where I had spent the night
was part of his property, that he was married and had several
children, but had been condemned to wear the form of a fox until some
human being would take pity on him and receive him, let him warm
himself by the same fire, give him a bit of bread and glass of wine.
As I was this man, he was now released from the spell, and would go
with me and never leave me until I had accomplished my object. This
event pleased me, and we journeyed on and on all through the long
summer day until late at night when we reached a mountain meadow,
where we encamped. My traveling companion told me that the next day we
should be obliged to pass through the lands of several dragons, and he
thought we should there find what we sought.

"The following morning we entered the dragons' country, though

somewhat timidly, and about noon reached the dragon-palace. It is
impossible to describe the magnificent things we saw there. Gardens
with all sorts of flowers and fruits, rooms that seemed lined with
silver, so that they shone in the sun like mirrors, walls covered with
paintings and carved flowers. Every corner of the palace was gilded,
and fountains cast jets of water into the air. Luckily for us, the
dragons were not at home when we arrived. On the threshold we met a
beautiful girl, a girl who looked as sweet as if she were made of
sugar, and who advised us not to enter the court-yard in the dragons'
absence, or we should meet with some misfortune. Then she wept for joy
at seeing people from the place from whence the dragons had stolen
her. When we asked her about the wonderful bird, she said it was in
the possession of some other dragons, relatives of those on whose
lands we were.

"'Go there,' she added, 'for with God's help, I hope you will succeed,
and when you return, take me with you.'

"After she had told us how we could enter the dragons' court-yard and
what we must do, I swore by what was dearest to me in the world, my
father, that I would not leave her in the dragons' power, but take
her away. Then we continued the journey. To tell the truth, I loved
her as soon as I saw her.

"When we reached the borders of the next dragon-kingdom, we stopped to

rest, but at dawn the following day we crossed the frontier and by
noon reached their palace, which was even more beautiful than the
first one. As soon as I had dismounted from my horse, I went to the
stable, but my companion turned back, for this was what the girl had
advised. The horses were at their cribs. One turned its head and
looked at me. I patted its eyes, pulled its ears, threw a bridle over
its neck, mounted it, and in riding by, took the cage with the magic
bird that hung in the entry."

"You brought the wonderful bird?" cried the emperor. "Then you are my
son, whom all believe dead."

"Even so, father." And after kissing the emperor's hand, he begged him
to send for the poultry-keeper. When she came, the shepherd said,
"This is the girl of whom I told you."

"How is that possible!" replied the emperor. "How did she become a
poultry maid?"

"She'll tell you that herself. I don't know. So, as I was saying," he
continued, "after I had snatched the cage I fled as fast as I could on
the horse I had taken from the dragons, but the other horses began to
neigh and make such a noise that my hair fairly bristled, yet I held
firm. The dragons chased me until I reached my comrade, who was
waiting for me on the frontier. If it had not been for him, they
would have seized me, and who knows what would have become of me then.
But my companion stretched out his hand, shouting, 'Stop!' The dragons
seemed to be suddenly turned to stone; not another step forward did
they take. After embracing and kissing me he admired the bird's
beauty. The dragons did every thing in their power to get it from me,
and made all sorts of promises, but when they saw they could not
persuade me, begged me at least to give them the horse. I perceived it
would not be right to leave them in such a sad state, so I returned
the horse and went on with my companion and the bird, but the dragons
almost stared their eyes out after it.

"When we reached the other dragon palace, the girl was waiting for us
at the gate. Cracking her whip three times the whole building changed
into an apple, which she put in her pocket. I passed my arm around
her, and we set out. But oh! dear, when the dragons discovered it! How
they chased us, roaring so that our blood curdled in our veins. I
summoned all my courage, spurred my horse, and fled like the wind with
my companion. But the dragons came as fast as thought. When my comrade
saw this, and perceived that there was no possibility of escape, he
stopped, made a sign and turned them into blocks of stone. Then we
continued our journey till we reached the field from which we had
started and which was part of the fox's property. After we had rested
and I had thanked God that we had accomplished our task, I asked my
comrade what those stone pillars meant.

"He answered: 'If you know you will regret it, and if you don't know,
you will also regret it.'

"'Pray tell me.'

"'These are your brothers,' he answered. 'Instead of kindly granting

my request, as you did, they set their hounds on me, which condemned
me to wear the loathsome fox-skin still longer, so I turned them to
stone.'

"'For my sake,' I entreated, 'for the sake of our friendship, make

them men again as they were before.'

"'I prize your friendship greatly,' he replied, 'so let it be as you

wish--but you'll repent it.'

"In an instant he made a sign with his hand, the stones suddenly
shook, and my brothers remained motionless with amazement, when they
saw us before them. We took leave of my comrade and set out on our way
home. But see what a fine trick my brothers played me.

"'Brother,' they said, after we had ridden about a mile, 'we are tired
by the long distance, and it is very warm. Let us go to a pond we know
here and each drink a little to cool ourselves.' I agreed, and we went
there. The oldest drank, so did the second one, but when I was going
to drink too, lying face downward at the edge of the pond, so that I
could reach the water with my lips, as they had done, I suddenly felt
a terrible burning sensation in both feet, and when I turned to see
the cause, could not get up; my brothers had cut off both my feet, and
then hurried off, without listening to my complaints and entreaties.

"I spent three days and nights beside the pond. When my good horse saw
a dragon coming, it lifted me by my clothes with its teeth, ran as far
as it could and kicked so violently that no wild beast could approach
us.

"At last, on the fourth day, I met a blind man groping his way along.
'Who are you?' I asked.

"'A poor, maimed fellow,' said he. Then, after he had told me that his
brothers, out of envy, had put out his eyes, I told him that my
brothers had cut off my feet.

"'I'll tell you what!' he exclaimed. 'We'll take an oath of

brotherhood. I have feet, you have eyes, so I'll carry you on my back.
I'll walk for you, and you shall see for me. A huge scorpion lives
close by, whose blood cures all kinds of diseases.'

"I accepted his offer, and we went to the scorpion's house. He was not
at home, so the blind man put me behind the door, telling me to kill
him with my sword as soon as he came in; then he hid himself behind
the stove. We did not wait long before the scorpion entered in a great
rage, for he had noticed that somebody had broken into his house. When
I saw him my heart shrunk till it was no bigger than a flea, but as he
came in I waited till he was close by me, then struck one blow that
chopped all three of his heads off at once.

"I instantly smeared myself with the hot blood and as soon as it
touched my feet they stuck as fast as if they had never been cut off.
I also smeared the blind man's eyes, and his sight returned. After
thanking God, each set out on his own way.

"I did not want to go home at once, but thought it best to hire out as
a shepherd and leave God to arrange things so that the criminals'
guilt should appear. I was not disappointed in my confidence, for you
see His power is great and His judgment just."

"Now tell me how you became a servant and poultry-maid," said the
emperor to the maiden.
"After your imperial majesty's oldest sons had cut off their youngest
brother's feet, one of them took me, the other the wonderful bird. I
thought my heart would dissolve with grief because I was obliged to
part from your majesty's youngest son, whom I loved because he was
such a noble man. They proposed that I should love one of them, and
promised that he would marry me as soon as we reached the emperor's
court. After refusing all their offers, I preferred to take service as
your majesty's poultry maid, rather than go any where else, for I knew
God would not let a man who did right perish, and now I thank Him for
having shown me that a good deed is never lost."

"Can you prove," asked the emperor, "that you are the girl and no one
else?"

"This apple will show every one that I am she," replied the girl,
drawing it from her bosom. "Your older sons knew nothing about it, or
they would have taken it from me."

With these words she went out of doors, cracked a little whip three
times over the apple and a magnificent palace, more splendid than any
in the kingdom, instantly arose.

The emperor himself was astonished. He wished to celebrate his

youngest son's return, but the latter said, "Father, before we thank
God that I have come home alive, let us three brothers submit to His
judgment."

The emperor could make no objection. The brothers were led before him
and he ordered the older ones to kneel and ask the youngest son's
forgiveness. But he replied: "If God forgives you, I will also."

As they could not avoid it, they went in front of the church, and set
out three bee-hives at equal distances apart. Each brother stood with
his feet in one, and hurled a stone into the air from a sling. The
elder brothers' stones in falling back struck them so hard on the head
that they were killed, but the youngest brother's fell in front of
him.

Many had assembled to witness this trial. After the wedding was over
and the emperor had married his son to the poultry-maid, he came down
from the throne and gave it to the prince, who, if alive, reigns there
still.

I was present at these events, and now tell them to those who listen.

The Twins With the Golden Star.

Once upon a time something happened. If it hadn't happened, it

wouldn't be told.

There was an emperor, who ruled over a whole world, and in this world
lived an old shepherd and shepherdess, who had three daughters, Anna,
Stana, and Laptitza.[1]

[Footnote 1: Little Milk-white, from "Lapte"--milk.]

Anna, the oldest sister, was so beautiful that the sheep stopped
feeding when she went among them; Stana, the second, was so lovely
that the wolves watched the herd when she was the shepherdess, but
Laptitza, the youngest, who had a skin as white as the foam of milk,
and hair as soft as the wool of the lambkins, was as beautiful as both
of her sisters put together, beautiful as only she herself could be.

One summer day, when the sunbeams were growing less scorching, the
three sisters went to the edge of the forest to pick strawberries.
While searching for them, they heard the tramp of horses' hoofs, as if
a whole troop of cavalry were dashing up. It was the emperor's son,
hunting with his friends and courtiers, all handsome, stately youths,
sitting their horses as if they were a part of their steeds, but the
handsomest and proudest of all rode the most fiery charger, and was
the emperor's son himself.

When they saw the sisters, they curbed their horses and rode more
slowly.

"Listen to me, sisters," said Anna; "if one of those youths should
choose me for his wife, I'd knead a loaf of bread which, when he had
eaten it, would make him always feel young and brave."

"And I," said Stana, "would weave my husband a shirt, in which he

could fight against dragons, go through water without being wet, or
fire without being burned."

"But I," said Laptitza, the youngest sister, "would give my husband
two beautiful sons, twin boys with golden hair, and on their foreheads
a golden star, a star as bright as Lucifer."

The youths heard these words, and turning their horses dashed toward
the maidens.

"Sacred be thy promise, thou shalt be mine, fairest empress," cried

the emperor's son, lifting Laptitza with her berries upon his horse.

"And thou shalt be mine!" "And thou shalt be mine!" said a second and
third youth; so bearing their lovely burdens on their steeds, all
dashed back to the imperial court.

The three weddings were celebrated the very next day, and for three
days and nights the festival was held throughout the empire with great
pomp and splendor. After three days and nights the news went through
the whole country that Anna had gathered grain, ground, boiled, and
kneaded it, and made a loaf of bread, as she had promised while
picking strawberries. Then, after three more days and nights, tidings
went through the land that Stana had collected flax, dried, and
hackled it, spun it into linen, wove the cloth, and made her husband a
shirt as she had promised while seeking for her strawberries. Laptitza
alone had not yet kept her word, but great things require time.

When seven weeks had passed, counting from the wedding day, the
emperor's son, now emperor, appeared before his brave companions and
the other courtiers with a very joyous face, and in a much softer
voice than ever before informed them that henceforth he should not
leave the court for a long time, his heart moved him to stay with his
wife night and day.
So the world, the country, and the whole empire rejoiced in the
expectation of seeing something never beheld before.

But many things happen in this world, among them much that is good and
much that is evil.

The emperor had a step-mother, who had brought with her to the palace
a daughter of her first husband, a girl with beautiful hair. But woe
betide those who have such relationships.

The step-mother had intended that her daughter should become the
emperor's wife and empress of the whole country, instead of little
Milk-white, the shepherd's daughter. Therefore she determined that if
things fell out as Laptitza had promised, the emperor and the world
should believe they did not happen according to the prediction.

But the step-mother could not carry out her plan, because the emperor
remained with his wife day and night. Yet she thought that gradually,
by coaxing and cunning, she might get rid of him, and then Laptitza
would be left in her care and she would provide for every thing.

But she could not get rid of the emperor by means of a few coaxing
words. The wind blew them away, and all her craft was useless. Time
passed, the day for the fulfillment of Laptitza's promise was drawing
near, and still the emperor never left his wife.

When the step-mother saw that no plot succeeded, she felt as if a

stone were lying heavy on her heart, and sent a message to her
brother, whose kingdom was very near, to ask him to come with his
soldiers and summon the emperor to a war.

This was a clever plan and, as will be seen, not an unsuccessful one.
The emperor fairly leaped into the air in his rage, when he heard that
hostile soldiers were on the march to attack his country, and that
something would occur which had not happened for a long time--a
battle, a terrible battle, a battle between two emperors. The young
husband saw that there was no help for it, he must do what needed to
be done.

That is the way with emperors. No matter how much they wish to guard
their wives--if they hear of war, their hearts fairly leap in their
bodies, their brains swell almost to bursting, their eyes grow dim,
and leaving wife and children in God's care, they dash like the wind
to battle.

The emperor departed at the first sign of peril, moved as swiftly as

one of God's judgments, fought as only he could fight, and at dawn on
the morning of the third day was back again at the imperial court, his
heart soothed by the battle, but full of unsatisfied longing to know
what had happened during his absence.

And--this had happened. Just at dawn on the morning of the third day,
when the stars were paling in the sky, and the emperor was only three
steps from the palace-gate, the Lord's gift came down to the earth,
and Laptitza's promise was fulfilled--two beautiful twin princes,
exactly alike, each with golden hair and a golden star on his
forehead.
But the world was not to see them!

The step-mother, as wicked as her thoughts, hastily put two puppies in

the place of the beautiful twins, and buried the golden-haired
children at the corner of the palace, just under the emperor's
windows.

When the monarch entered the palace he saw and heard nothing except
the two puppies the step-mother had put in the twins' place. No words
were wasted. The emperor saw with his own eyes, and that was enough.
Laptitza had not kept her promise, and there was nothing to be done
except mete out her punishment.

He could not help it, and though his own heart was torn, commanded
that the empress should be buried to her breast in the earth and so
remain before the eyes of the world, in token of what befell those
who tried to deceive an emperor.

The next day the step-mother's wish was fulfilled. The emperor married
a second time, and again the wedding festivities lasted three days and
three nights.

But God's blessing does not rest upon unjust deeds.

The two princes found no rest in the earth. Two beautiful aspens
sprang up where they were buried, but when the step-mother saw them
she ordered them to be pulled up by the roots. The emperor, however,
said: "Let them grow, I like to see them before the window. I never
beheld such aspens before."

So the trees grew, grew as no other aspens ever had grown, every day a
year's growth, every night another year's growth, but in the dawn of
morning, when the stars were paling in the sky, three years' growth in
a single moment. When three days and three nights had passed, the two
aspens were lofty trees, lifting their boughs to the emperor's window,
and when the wind stirred the branches, he listened to their rustling
all day long.

The step-mother suspected what they were, and pondered all day trying
to find some way to get rid of the trees at any cost. It was a
difficult task, but a woman's will can squeeze milk from a stone, a
woman's cunning conquers heroes--what force can not accomplish, fair
words win, and when these fail, hypocritical tears succeed.

One morning the empress sat down on the side of her husband's bed and
began to overwhelm him with loving words and tender caresses. It was
a long time before the thread broke, but at last--even emperors are
mortal!

"Very well," he said, reluctantly, "have your own way; order the
aspens to be cut down, but one must be made into a bedstead for me,
the other for you."

This satisfied the empress. The aspens were cut down, and before night
the beds were standing in the emperor's room.

When he lay down, he felt as if he had become a hundred times heavier,

yet he had never rested so well; but it seemed to the empress as if
she were lying on thorns and nettles, so that she could not sleep all
night long.

When the emperor had fallen asleep, the beds began to creak, and amid
this creaking the empress fancied she heard words that no one else
understood.

"Is it hard for you, brother?" asked one of the beds.

"No, it isn't hard for me," replied the bed in which the emperor was
sleeping, "I am happy, for my beloved father rests upon me."

"It's hard for me," replied the other, "for on me lies a wicked soul."

So the beds talked on in the empress's ears until the dawn of morning.

When daylight came, the empress planned how she could destroy the
beds. At last she ordered two bedsteads exactly like them, and when
the emperor went hunting, placed them in his room without his
knowledge; but the aspen beds, down to the very smallest splinter, she
threw into the fire.

When they were burned so entirely that not even a bit of charcoal
remained, the empress collected the ashes and scattered them to the
winds, that they might be strewn over nine countries and seas, and not
an atom find another atom through all eternity.

But she had not noticed that just when the fire was burning brightest
two sparks rose, and soaring upward, fell again into the midst of the
deep river that flowed through the empire, where they were changed
into two little fishes with golden scales, so exactly alike that
nobody could help knowing they were twin brothers.

One day the imperial fishermen went out early in the morning, and
threw their nets into the water. Just at the moment the last stars
were fading, one of the men drew up his net and beheld what he had
never seen before: two tiny fishes with golden scales.

The other fishermen assembled to see the miracle, but when they had
beheld and admired it, determined to carry the fish alive to the
emperor for a gift.

"Don't take us there, we've just come from there, and it will be our
destruction," said one of the fishes.

"But what shall I do with you?" asked the fisherman.

"Go and gather the dew from the leaves, let us swim in it, put us in
the sun, and don't come back again till the sunbeams have dried the
dew," said the second little fish.

The fisherman did as he was told, gathered the dew from the leaves,
put the little fish into it, placed them in the sun, and did not come
back till the dew was all dried up.

But what had happened! What did he see?

Two boys, handsome princes with golden hair and a golden star on their
foreheads, so exactly alike that no one who saw them could help
knowing that they were twin brothers.
The children grew very rapidly. Every day enough for a year, and every
night enough for another year, but in the dawn of morning when the
stars paled in the sky, enough for three years in a single moment.
Besides, they grew as no other children ever had grown, three times as
fast in age, strength, and wisdom. When three days and nights had
passed, they were twelve years in age, twenty-four in strength, and
thirty-six in wisdom.

"Now let us go to our father," said one of the princes to the

fisherman.

The fisherman dressed the lads in beautiful clothing, and made each a
lambskin cap, which the boys drew low over their faces, that no one
might see their golden hair and the golden star on their foreheads,
and then took the princes to the imperial palace.

It was broad daylight when they arrived.

"We want to speak to the emperor," said one of the princes to the
guard, who stood armed at the door of the palace.

"That can't be done, he's at table," replied the soldier.

"Just because he _is_ at table," said the second prince, passing

through the door.

The guards ran up and tried to drive the boys out of the court-yard,
but the boys slipped through their fingers like quicksilver. Three
paces forward, three up, and they were standing before the great hall,
where the emperor was dining with all his court.

"We want to come in," said one of the princes sharply, to the servants
who stood at the door.

"That can't be done," one of the lackeys answered.

"Indeed! We'll see whether it can be done or not," cried the other
prince, pushing the men aside right and left.

But there were a great many lackeys, and only two princes. A tumult
and uproar arose outside, that resounded through the palace.

"What is going on out there?" asked the emperor angrily.

The princes stopped when they heard their father's voice.

"Two boys are trying to enter by force," said an attendant,

approaching the emperor.

"By force? Who seeks to enter my palace by force? Who are these boys?"
cried the emperor in the same breath.

"We know not, your majesty," replied the lackey, "but there must be
something uncommon about them, for the lads are as strong as young
lions, they overpowered the guard at the gate, and have given us
plenty to do. Besides, they are proud, they don't lift their caps from
their heads."
The emperor flushed scarlet with rage.

"Throw them out!" he cried. "Set the dogs on them."

"Never mind, we will go," said the princes, weeping at the harsh
words, as they went down the steps again.

As they reached the gate, they were stopped by a servant, who was out
of breath from running to overtake them.

"The emperor has commanded you to come back, the empress wants to see
you."

The princes hesitated, then turned, climbed the stairs, and still with
their caps on their heads appeared before the emperor.

There stood a long, wide table, at which sat all the imperial guests;
at the head was the emperor, and beside him the empress, reclining on
twelve silk cushions.

As the princes entered, one of these twelve cushions fell to the

floor, only eleven remaining under the royal lady.

"Take off your caps!" cried a courtier.

"To wear the head covered is a token of rank among men. We wish to be
what we are."

"Why, yes!" exclaimed the emperor, softened by the musical words that
fell from the boys' lips. "Remain what you are, but who are you?
Whence do you come, and what do you want?"

"We are twin brothers, members of a family that is broken in twain,

half in the earth, half at the head of the table; we come from whence
we went, and have reached the place whence we came; we have had a
long journey, have spoken in the sighing of the wind, given a voice to
wood, sang in the ripples of the water, but now we wish to chant in
human language a song you know without knowing it."

A second cushion fell from under the empress.

"Let them go home with their nonsense!" she said to her husband.

"Oh! no, let them sing," replied the emperor. "You only wanted to see
them, but I wish to hear them. Sing, boys!"

The empress was silent, and the princes began to sing the story of
their lives.

"There was once an emperor," they began, and a third cushion fell from
under the empress.

When they described the emperor's departure to the war, three cushions
fell at once, and when the princes had finished their song not a
single one remained. But when they took off their caps and showed
their golden hair and the golden star on their foreheads, guests,
courtiers and emperor closed their eyes, that they might not be
dazzled by so much radiance.
 * * * * *

Afterward, what ought to have been from the beginning, happened.

Laptitza sat at the head of the table beside her husband, but the
step-mother's daughter served as the humblest maid in the palace, and
the wicked step-mother was fastened to the tail of a wild mare and
dragged around the earth seven times, that the whole world might know
and never forget, that whoever plans evil comes to a bad end.

Youth Without Age and Life Without Death.

Once upon a time something happened whose like never occurred

before--if it had not happened it would not be told--since the flea
had one foot shod with ninety-nine pounds of iron and jumped into the
skies to get us fairy tales.

There was once a mighty emperor and empress. Both were young and
handsome, and as they desired the blessing of children they did every
thing that was necessary to secure it, that is they went to the
witches and philosophers and asked them to read the stars to find out
whether they would have children or not. But it was all in vain.
Finally the emperor heard that a very wise old man lived in a
neighboring village, and sent for him. The messengers returned with
the answer: "Let him who needs me come to me." So the emperor and
empress set out for the wise man's house, taking with them several of
their courtiers, attendants, and soldiers. When the old man saw them
in the distance, he rose, went to meet them, and said at once:

"Welcome! But what do you want to know, oh, emperor! your wish will
bring you sorrow."

"I am not here to question you about that," replied the emperor, "but
to learn whether you have any plants you can give us that will bestow
the blessing of children."

"I have," the old man answered, "but you will possess only _one_
child. He will be a handsome, lovable boy, yet you will not be able to
keep him long."

After the emperor and empress had obtained the herbs they joyfully
returned to the palace. The whole empire, the courtiers, and all the
attendants rejoiced too. But when the hour of its birth came, the
child began to scream in a way no magic arts could silence. The
emperor commenced to promise it all the good things the world
contained, but it was impossible to quiet it.

"Hush, father's pet," said the emperor, "I will give you this or that
kingdom; hush, my son, I will give you this or that princess for your
wife." At last, when he saw the child would not stop, he added: "Hush,
my boy, I will give you youth without age and life without death."

Then the prince stopped crying; the courtiers beat drums and blew
trumpets, and there were great rejoicings throughout the empire for a
whole week.
The older the boy grew, the more thoughtful and reflective he became.
He went to the schools and the philosophers and gained every kind of
learning, so that the emperor died of joy and came to life again. The
whole realm was proud of having a prince so wise and learned, a
second King Solomon. But one day, when the lad had just reached his
fifteenth year and the emperor sat at a banquet with the nobles and
grandees of the country, the handsome prince rose, saying: "Father,
the time has come, you must now give me what you promised at my
birth!"

When the emperor heard this he grew very sorrowful and answered: "Why,
my son, how can I give you an impossible thing? If I promised it to
you then, it was only to hush you."

"If you can't give it to me, father, I shall be obliged to wander

through the whole world till I find what was promised to me, and for
which I was born."

Then all the nobles and the emperor fell at his feet and besought him
not to quit the country, because, as the courtiers said, his father
was growing old, and they would place him on the throne and give him
the most beautiful princess under the sun for his wife. But it was
impossible to shake his resolution, he remained as firm as a rock.
After his father had seen and duly considered all these things, he
gave his consent and prepared to supply the prince with provisions and
whatever else he might need for his journey.

The young hero went to the imperial stables, where the finest steeds
in the whole realm were standing, to choose one of them; but when he
laid his hand on the horse's tail he knocked it down, and so they all
fell, one after another. At last, just as he was going out, he let his
eyes wander around the building once more and saw in one corner a
sick, weak horse, covered with sores. He went up to it, and when he
grasped it by the tail, the animal turned its head, saying:

"What do you command, my master? I thank God that He has permitted a

hero's hand to touch me once more."

And, planting its feet firmly, it remained standing. The young prince
told it what he intended to do, and the horse replied:

"To obtain your wish, you must ask your father for the sword, lance,
bow, quiver of arrows, and garments he wore when a youth; but you must
take care of me with your own hands for six weeks and give me oats
boiled in milk."

When the prince begged the emperor for the articles the horse had
advised, the monarch called the major-domo of the palace and ordered
him to open all the chests of clothing, that his son might choose what
he pleased. The young hero, after rummaging them three whole days, at
last found in the very bottom of an old trunk the weapons and garments
his father had worn in his youth, but the arms were covered with rust.
He set to work to clean them with his own hands and in six weeks,
during the time he was taking care of the horse, he succeeded in
making the weapons as bright and shining as a mirror. When the horse
heard from the handsome prince that the clothes and arms were cleaned
and ready, it shook itself once. All the sores instantly fell off and
there it stood, a strong, well-formed animal, with four wings. When
the hero saw this, he said:

"We'll go in three days!"

"May you have a long life, master. From to-day I shall be at your
service," the horse answered.

On the morning of the third day there was great mourning throughout
the whole court and empire. The handsome prince, clad like a hero,
holding his sword in his hand and riding the horse he had chosen, took
leave of the emperor, the empress, the great nobles and lesser
grandees, the army, and all the attendants, who, with tears in their
eyes, implored him to give up the journey and not risk his life; but
setting spurs to his steed, he dashed through the gate like the wind,
followed by the carts loaded with provisions and money, and the two
hundred horsemen the emperor had commanded to accompany him.

After reaching the boundaries of his father's country and arriving at

the wilderness, the prince distributed all his property among the
escort, bade them farewell, and sent them back, keeping for himself
only as much food as the horse could carry. Then he turned toward the
east and rode for three days and three nights, till he came to a wide
plain where lay a great many human bones.

When he stopped here to rest, the horse said: "You must know, master,
that we are on the land of a Woodpecker Fairy who is so wicked that
nobody can enter her domain without being murdered. She was once a
woman, but the curse of her parents, whom she angered by her
disobedience, turned her into a woodpecker. She is with her children
now, but you will meet her to-morrow in yonder forest; she will come
to kill you. She is terribly big, but don't be frightened; hold the
bow ready to pierce her with an arrow, and keep your sword and lance
in hand, so that you can use them in case of need."

Then they went to rest, taking turns in watching.

At dawn the next morning they prepared to pass through the forest; the
prince saddled and bridled the horse, drew the girths tighter than
usual, and mounted. Suddenly he heard a tremendous crashing. "Make
ready, master," said the horse, "the Woodpecker Fairy is coming." As
she approached, she moved so fast that she tore the trees down; but
the horse leaped upward like the wind, so that it was almost over her,
and the prince shot off one of her feet with an arrow. Just as he was
about to discharge the second arrow, she cried:

"Stop, my young hero, I'll do you no harm." And seeing that he did not
believe her, she gave him the promise written with her own blood.

"Your horse can not be killed, my young hero," she added, "it is
enchanted; if it hadn't been for that, I would have roasted and eaten
you. Know that until to-day no mortal man has ventured to cross my
boundaries as far as this; a few bold wights who dared to make the
trial, reached the plain where you saw so many bones."

They now went to the fairy's house, where she entertained them as
guests. But while sitting at the table enjoying the banquet, the
Woodpecker Fairy moaned with pain, so the prince pulled the foot he
had shot off out of the traveling bag where he had put it, fastened it
on, and it instantly healed. The hostess, in her joy, kept open house
for three days, and begged the emperor's son to choose one of her
daughters, all three of whom were beautiful as fairies, for his wife.
He would not do that, but told her what he was seeking, and she
replied:

"With your horse and your heroic courage, I believe you will succeed."

After three days had passed, the prince prepared to continue his
journey and departed. He rode on, and on, and on; the road seemed to
grow longer and longer, but when he had finally crossed the frontiers
of the Woodpecker Fairy's kingdom, he entered a beautiful meadow, one
side of which was covered with blooming plants, but the other was
scorched.

The prince asked why the grass was singed, and the horse answered:

"We are now in the domain of the Scorpion Witch; she is the Woodpecker
Fairy's sister, but they are both so wicked that they can't live
together. Their parents' curse has fallen upon them, and so, as you
see, they have become monsters; their enmity goes beyond all bounds;
they are always trying to get possession of each other's lands. When
this one is very angry she spits fire and pitch; she must have had
some quarrel with her sister, and, to drive her out of her kingdom,
has burned the grass on which she was standing. She is even worse than
her sister, and has three heads. We will rest awhile now, and be ready
at the first peep of dawn to-morrow."

The next day they prepared themselves just as they did when they
expected to meet the Woodpecker fairy, and set out. Soon they heard a
howling and rustling unlike any thing ever known before.

"Make ready, master, the Scorpion Witch is coming."

The Scorpion Witch, with one jaw in the sky and the other on the
earth, approached like the wind, spitting fire as she came, but the
horse darted upward as swiftly as an arrow, and then rushed over her a
little on one side. The hero shot an arrow and one of her heads fell,
but when he was going to strike off another, the Scorpion Witch
entreated him to forgive her, she would do him no harm, and to
convince him of this she gave him her promise, written in her own
blood.

Like the Woodpecker Fairy, she entertained the prince, who returned
her head, which grew on again, and at the end of three days he resumed
his travels.

When the hero and his horse had reached the boundaries of the Scorpion
Witch's kingdom they hurried on without resting till they came to a
field covered with flowers, where reigned perpetual spring. Every
blossom was remarkably beautiful and filled with a sweet, intoxicating
fragrance; a gentle breeze fanned them all. They remained here to
rest, but the horse said:

"We have arrived so far successfully, master, but we still have one
great peril to undergo and, if the Lord helps us to conquer it, we
shall really be valiant heroes. A short distance further on is the
palace where dwell Youth without Age and Life without Death. It is
surrounded by a high, dense forest, where roam all the wild animals in
the world, watching it day and night. They are very numerous, and it
is almost beyond the bounds of possibility to get through the wood by
fighting them; we must try, if we can, to jump over them."

After resting about two days they prepared to continue their journey,
and the horse, holding its breath, said:

"Buckle my girth as tight as you can, and when you have mounted hold
fast to my mane and press your feet close to my neck, that you may not
hinder me." The prince mounted, and in a moment they were close to the
forest.

"Master," said the horse, "this is the time that the wild beasts are
fed; they are all collected together, now we'll jump over."

"Forward," replied the handsome prince, "and may the Lord have mercy
on us."

They flew upward and saw the palace, which glittered so that it would
have been easier to look at the sun. They passed over the forest, and,
just as they were descending at the palace steps, one of the horse's
hoofs lightly touched the top of a tree, which put the whole woods in
motion. The wild animals began to howl till it was enough to make
one's hair bristle. They hastily alighted, and if the mistress of the
palace had not been outside feeding her chickens (for that is what she
called the wild beasts), they would certainly have been killed. She
spared their lives out of pure pleasure, for she had never before seen
a human being. Restraining the savage beasts, she soothed them, and
sent them back to their haunts. She was a tall, slender, lovely
fairy, quite too beautiful. When the young hero saw her, he stood
still as though turned to stone. But as she gazed at him she pitied
him and said:

"Welcome, my handsome prince. What do you seek here?"

"We seek Youth without Age and Life without Death."

Then he dismounted from his horse and entered the palace, where he
found two other ladies, both of the same age, the elder sisters of the
first one. He began to thank the fairy for having delivered him from
danger, but she and her sisters, to show their joy, had a handsome
banquet served in golden dishes. They gave the horse liberty to graze
wherever it chose, and afterward made it acquainted with all the wild
beasts, so that it might rove about the forest in peace. The ladies
entreated the prince to stay with them, saying that it was so tiresome
to be alone. He did not wait to be asked a second time, but accepted
the offer with the satisfaction of a man who has found precisely what
he sought.

By degrees they became accustomed to live together; the prince told

them his story and related what he had suffered before meeting them,
and after some time he married the youngest sister. At their wedding
permission was granted to him to go wherever he liked in the
neighborhood; they only begged him not to enter one valley, which they
pointed out, otherwise some misfortune would befall him; it was
called, they said, the Valley of Lamentation.

The prince spent a very long time at the palace without being aware
of it, for he always remained just as young as he was when he arrived.
He wandered about the woods without ever having a headache. He amused
himself in the golden palace, lived in peace and quiet with his wife
and her sisters, enjoyed the beauty of the flowers, and the sweet,
pure air. He often went hunting; but one day, while pursuing a hare,
he shot two arrows at it without hitting the animal. Angrily chasing
it he discharged a third arrow, which struck it, but in his haste the
luckless man had not noticed that he had passed through the Valley of
Lamentation while following the game.

He picked it up and turned toward home, but was suddenly seized with a
longing for his father and mother. He did not venture to speak of this
wish to his wife, yet by his grief and restlessness both she and her
sisters instantly perceived his condition.

"Oh! luckless prince, you have passed through the Valley of

Lamentation," they said in terror.

"I did so, my dear ones, without meaning to be so imprudent, but now
the longing to see my parents is killing me! Yet I can not forsake
you. I have already spent several days with you and have no cause to
complain. So I'll go and see my parents once more, and then come back
to you, never to leave you again."

"Do not quit us, beloved prince! Your parents died two or three
hundred years ago, and if you go, we fear you yourself will never
return; stay with us, for a presentiment of evil tells us that you
will perish!"

All the entreaties of the three ladies, as well as those of the horse,
were unable to quiet the young hero's longing for his parents, which
was fairly consuming him alive.

At last the horse said: "If you don't listen to me, master, whatever
happens to you will be your own fault. I'll tell you something, and if
you accept my condition, I'll take you back."

"I'll accept it with many thanks," replied the prince; "let me hear
it."

"As soon as you reach your father's palace you will dismount, but I am
to return alone in case you stay even an hour."

"Be it so," the prince agreed.

They made their preparations for the journey, the prince embraced the
ladies and after having bade them farewell he rode away, but they
sobbed and wept bitterly when he left them.

They reached the country which had once been the kingdom of the
Scorpion Witch, but found cities there; the woods had become fields;
the prince questioned one person and another about the Scorpion Witch
and her house, but they answered that their grandfathers had heard
from their great, great grandfathers that such silly tales had once
been told.

"How is that possible!" replied the prince, "I came through this
region myself only a short time ago," and he told them all he knew.

The people laughed at him as if he were a lunatic or a person talking

in his sleep, and the prince angrily rode on without noticing that his
hair and beard were growing white.

When he reached the realm of the Woodpecker Fairy, the same questions
and answers were exchanged. The prince could not understand how these
places had altered so much in a few days, and again rode angrily on.
He now had a white beard that reached to his waist, and he felt as if
his feet were beginning to tremble.

Quitting this country he arrived in his father's empire. Here he found

new people, new towns, and every thing so much changed that he could
not recognize it. At last he came to the palace where he was born.
When he dismounted, the horse kissed his hand, and said:

"I wish you good health, master, I'm going back to the place from
which I came. If you want to go too, mount quickly, and we'll be off."

"Farewell, I too hope to return soon."

The horse darted away with the speed of an arrow.

When the prince saw the ruined palace and the weeds growing around it,
he sighed deeply and with tears in his eyes tried to remember how
magnificent these places had once been. He walked around the building
two or three times, tried to recollect how every room, every corner
had looked, found the stable where he had discovered the horse, and
then went down into the cellar, whose entrance was choked up with
fallen rubbish.

He groped hither and thither, holding up his eyelids with his hands,
and scarcely able to totter along, while his snowy beard now fell to
his knees, but found nothing except a dilapidated old chest, which he
opened. It seemed empty, but as he raised the lid a voice from the
bottom said: "Welcome, if you had kept me waiting much longer, I too
should have gone to decay."

Then his death, which had become completely shriveled in the chest,
seized him; but the prince fell lifeless on the ground and instantly
crumbled into dust.

Into the saddle then I sprung,

The tale to tell to old and young.

The Little Purse with two Half-pennies.

There was once an old man and an old woman. The old woman had a hen
and the old man had a rooster; the old woman's hen laid two eggs a day
and she ate a great many, but she would not give the old man a single
one. One day the old man lost patience and said: "Listen, old crony,
you live as if you were in clover, give me a couple of eggs so that I
can at least have a taste of them."

"No indeed!" replied the old woman, who was very avaricious. "If you
want eggs, beat your rooster that he may lay eggs for you, and then
eat them; I flogged my hen, and just see how she lays now."
The old man, being stingy and greedy, listened to the old woman's
talk, angrily seized his rooster, gave him a sound thrashing and said:

"There, now, lay some eggs for me or else go out of the house, I won't
feed you for nothing any longer."

As soon as the rooster escaped from the old man's hands it ran off
down the high-road. While thus pursuing its way, lo and behold! it
found a little purse with two half-pennies. Taking it in its beak, the
bird turned and went back toward the old man's house. On the road it
met a carriage containing a gentleman and several ladies. The
gentleman looked at the rooster, saw a purse in its bill, and said to
the driver:

"Get down and see what this rooster has in its beak."

The driver hastily jumped from his box, took the little purse from the
rooster's bill, and gave it to his master. The gentleman put it in his
pocket and drove on. The rooster was very angry and ran after the
carriage, repeating continually:

"Kikeriki, sir, Kikerikak,

To me the little purse give back."

The enraged gentleman said to the coachman as they passed a well:

"Take that impudent rooster and throw it into the well."

The driver got down from his box again, seized the rooster, and flung
it down the well. When the rooster saw that its life was in such great
danger, what was it to do?

It began to swallow the water, and drank and drank till it had
swallowed all the water in the well. Then it flew out and again ran
after the carriage, calling:

"Kikeriki, sir, Kikerikak,

To me the little purse give back."

When the gentleman saw this, he was perfectly amazed and said:

"Hoho! This rooster is a perfect imp
your neck, you saucy cockerel!" When
to take the rooster, throw it on the
and push a big stone in front of the
woman did what her master bade her.
of Satan! Never mind! I'll wring
he reached home he told the cook
coals burning upon the hearth,
opening in the chimney. The old

When the rooster saw this new injustice, it began to spit out the
water it had swallowed till it had poured all the water from the well
upon the burning coals. This put out the fire, cooled the hearth, and
made such a flood on the kitchen floor that the cook fainted away from
pure rage. Then the rooster gave the stone a push, came out safe and
sound, ran to the gentleman's window, and began to knock on the panes
with its bill, screaming:

"Kikeriki, sir, Kikerikak,

To me the little purse give back."

"Heaven knows that I've got a torment in this monster of a rooster,"

said the gentleman. "Driver, rid me of it, toss it into the middle of
the herds of cows and oxen; perhaps some bull will stick its horns
through it and relieve us." The coachman seized the rooster and flung
it among the herds. You ought to have seen the rooster's delight. It
swallowed bulls, oxen, cows, and calves, till it had devoured the
whole herd and its stomach had grown as big as a mountain. Then it
went to the window again, spread out its wings before the sun so that
it darkened the gentleman's room, and once more began:

"Kikeriki, sir, Kikerikak,

To me the little purse give back."

When the gentleman saw this he was ready to burst with rage and did
not know what to do to get rid of the rooster. He stood thinking till
at last an idea entered his head:

"I'll lock it up in the treasure-chamber. Perhaps if it tries to

swallow the ducats one will stick in its throat, and I shall get rid
of the bird." No sooner said than done. He grasped the rooster and
flung it into the treasure-chamber. The rooster swallowed all the
money and left the chests empty. Then it escaped from the room, went
to the gentleman's window, and again began:

"Kikeriki, sir, Kikerikak,

To me the little purse give back."

As the gentleman saw that there was nothing else to be done he tossed
the purse out. The rooster picked it up, went about its own business,
and left the gentleman in peace. All the poultry ran after the rooster
so that it really looked like a wedding; but the gentleman turned
green with rage as he watched, and said sighing:

"Let them all run off to the last chick, I'm glad to be rid of the
torment; there was witchcraft in that rooster!"

But the puffed-up rooster stalked proudly along, followed by all the
fowls, and went merrily on and on till he reached the old man's house
and began to crow: "Kikeriki!"

When the old man heard the rooster's voice he ran out joyfully to meet
the bird, but looking through the door what did he see? His rooster
had become a terrible object. An elephant beside it would have seemed
like a flea; and following behind came countless flocks of birds, each
one more beautiful and brilliant than the other. When the old man saw
the rooster so huge and fat, he opened the gate for it. "Master," said
the bird, "spread a sheet here in the middle of the yard."

The old man, as nimble as a top, laid down the sheet. The rooster took
its stand upon it, spread its wings, and instantly the whole yard was
filled with birds and herds of cattle, but it shook out on the sheet a
pile of ducats that flashed in the sun till they dazzled the eyes.
When the old man beheld this vast treasure he did not know what to do
in his delight, and hugged and kissed the rooster.

But all at once the old woman appeared from somewhere, and when she
saw this marvelous spectacle her eyes glittered in her head, and she
was ready to burst with wrath.

"Dear old friend," she said, "give me a few ducats."

"Pine away with longing for them, old woman; when I begged you for
some eggs, you know what you answered. Now flog your hen, that it may
bring you ducats. I beat my rooster, and you see what it has fetched
me."

The old woman went to the hen-coop, shook the hen, took it by the
tail, and gave it such a drubbing that it was enough to make one weep
for pity. When the poor hen escaped from the old woman's hands it fled
to the highway. While walking along it found a bead, swallowed it,
hurried back home as fast as possible, and began to cackle at the
gate. The old woman welcomed it joyfully. The hen ran quickly in at
the gate, passed its mistress, and went to its nest--at the end of an
hour it jumped off, cackling loudly. The old woman hastened to see
what the hen had laid. But when she glanced into the nest what did she
perceive? A little glass bead. The hen had laid a glass bead! When the
old woman saw that the hen had fooled her, she began to beat it, and
beat till she flogged it to death. So the stupid old soul remained as
poor as a church-mouse. From that time she might live on roast nothing
and golden wait a while, instead of eggs, for she had abused and
killed the poor hen, though it was not at all to blame.

But the old man was very rich; he built great houses, laid out
beautiful gardens, and lived luxuriously. He made the old woman his
poultry-maid, the rooster he took about with him everywhere, dressed
in a gold collar, yellow boots, and spurs on its heels, so that one
might have thought it was one of the Three Kings from the Christmas
play instead of a mere ordinary rooster.

Mogarzea and His Son.

There was once a young lad who had neither father nor mother. Every
thing his parents had left him was in the care of guardians, and at
last he could bear their unjust reproaches no longer, but went out
into the wide world, entered a path leading to a glade in the forest,
and followed it a long way.

When, in the evening, he grew tired and found no place to rest, he

climbed a hill and gazed around him in every direction to try to
discover a light; after a long search he saw the flicker of a tiny
spark and went toward it. He walked and walked half the night, then he
came to a huge fire, by which a man as big as a giant was sleeping.
What was the youth to do? After thinking a while, he crept into one
leg of the man's trowsers and spent the rest of the night there.

When the man rose the next morning, to his great astonishment, he saw
the youngster drop out of his breeches.

"Where did you come from?" he asked.

"I was sent to you for a son last night," replied the lad.

"If that is true," said the big man, "you may tend my sheep, and I'll
give you something to eat, but beware that you don't cross the
boundaries, or woe betide you!"
He pointed out to the boy the end of his land, and then added:

"God be with you!"

The lad tended the flock all day, and when he returned in the evening
found the fire lighted, and helped the giant milk the sheep.

After their work was done, they sat down to supper, and while they
were eating the boy asked:

"What is your name, father?"

"Mogarzea," replied the big fellow.

"I wonder you don't get tired of staying here alone in this
wilderness."

"Then you wonder without cause. Don't you know that the bear never
dances willingly?"

"Yes, you're right there," replied the boy. "But I see that you are
always dull and sad. Tell me your story, father."

"What can be the use of telling you things that would make you
sorrowful too?"

"Never mind, I should like to know them. Are you not my father? Do you
suppose you have me as a son for nothing?"

"Well then, if that's true and you wish it, listen to my story.

"My name, as I have already told you, is Mogarzea; I am a prince, and

set out to go to the Sweet-milk Lake, which is not far from here, to
marry a fairy. I had heard that three fairies lived there. But Fortune
did not smile upon me; wicked elves attacked me and took away my soul.
Since that time I have settled here to dwell with my sheep on this
little patch of land, without being able to take pleasure in any
thing, without having a moment's happiness, or even once enjoying a
laugh.

"The abominable elves are so quarrelsome that they let no one who
crosses their frontiers go unpunished. That's why I advise you to be
on your guard, lest something should happen to you also."

"All right, all right, just let me alone, father," replied the youth,
and they went to rest.

When day dawned, the lad rose and set off with the flock. I don't know
how or why, but he could not feel content to gaze at the elves'
beautiful meadows, while the sheep were grazing on Mogarzea's barren
ground.

On the third day, when he was standing in the shade of a tree playing
on the flute, for he was, as it were, a master of the art of flute
playing, one of the sheep strayed away into the flowery meadows,
others followed, then others, till, when the youth noticed them, a
number of the animals had crossed the boundaries.
Still playing on his flute, he went to drive back the sheep which had
left the flock, but he suddenly saw before him three merry maidens,
who stopped him and began to dance around him. When the lad
discovered the state of affairs, he summoned up his courage and blew
with all his might. They danced until the evening.

"Let me go now," he said, "poor Mogarzea will be hungry; to-morrow, if

you wish, I'll play still better."

"We will let you go," they replied, "but you know that if you don't
come you will not escape our punishment."

So they agreed that he was to come directly to them the next morning,
sheep and all, then each went home. Mogarzea wondered why the milk had
increased so much, and was not satisfied until the lad assured him
that he had not crossed the boundaries. They ate their supper and went
to rest.

The youth did not wait till it had become perfectly light, but at the
first streak of dawn set off with the sheep straight to the elves'
meadows. When he began to play on his flute, the elves instantly
appeared and danced and danced till evening. Then the youth pretended
to drop the flute and, as if by accident, stepped upon it and broke
it.

If you could have seen how he bewailed it, how he wrung his hands and
wept over the loss of his companion, you would surely have pitied him.
Even the elves were touched with compassion and tried to comfort him.

"I wouldn't care so much," he said, "only I shall never find another
flute that will sound as merry as this one, for it was made out of the
heart of a seven-year-old cherry tree."

"We have, in the court-yard, a cherry tree that is just seven years
old; if you want it, come, we'll cut it down and you can make yourself
another flute."

They all went there, felled the cherry tree, and for fear of touching
the pith while stripping off the bark, the youth requested all the
elves to help.

After having made a cleft in the trunk with his ax, large enough for
them to get their fingers in, he told them to take hold of it in order
to break it apart solely by the strength of their arms, that the blade
of the ax might not touch the pith of the wood. They were actually
stupid enough to do so as they stood around the trunk, and, while
saying "pull," he drew out the ax and caught their fingers in the
crack.

In vain the elves begged him to release them, in vain they said that
they were almost faint with pain; the lad would not even listen to the
fine promises they made, but remained as cold as a stone.

Finally he asked them for Mogarzea's soul.

"It is in a bottle on the window-sill," they said.

After he had fetched it, he inquired how he could restore it to its

place, and the elves explained, hoping he would then release them from
their torture.

"You have tormented many people so that they suffered terrible agony
all their lives; now you too can suffer for one night, it won't make
the sky fall."

With these words he took the sheep and Mogarzea's soul and departed;
but the elves wailed so that any one's heart might have been torn with
pity. When he reached home, Mogarzea scolded him for being late. The
boy's only reply was to ask him to lie down on his back, then
climbing upon his breast he jumped up and down several times, until
the lazy soul the elves had conjured into him darted out and the
youngster gave him his own to swallow; holding his mouth and nose with
his hands he made him drink the water that had been in the bottle, and
then put on a plaster he had brought from the elves.

He had scarcely got it on, when Mogarzea sprang up like a deer and
said:

"Whether you are my son or not, what do you want as a reward for what
you have done?"

"Tell me where the Milk Lake is, and what I am to do to obtain one of
the three fairies who are there for my wife, and let me be your son
forever."

Mogarzea granted the lad's wishes and they sat down to supper without
his wondering how the sheep gave so much milk; all night long they
amused themselves by shouting, singing and dancing.

Noticing that dawn was approaching before they had gone to rest, they
resolved to set out together to pay a visit to the cheated elves,--and
did so. When Mogarzea saw them, he took them, log and all, on his back
and went to his father's kingdom, where every body rejoiced when he
came home as brave and cheery as ever. But he pointed out his
deliverer, who was following behind with the sheep.

Then they all thanked the lad for his cleverness in rescuing Mogarzea
from misfortune, and the festivities at the palace lasted three whole
days.

After these three days had passed, the boy took Mogarzea aside and
said:

"I want to go now; please tell me where the Sweet-milk Lake is, and,
God willing, I'll come back again with my wife."

At first Mogarzea tried to detain him, but finding it no use to talk

till he was tired, he told him what he had heard--he had seen nothing,
on account of the elves.

The boy took his flute and some food for the journey, and then,
departing, walked three long summer days until the evening, before he
reached the Milk Lake, which was in a fairy's kingdom. Early the next
morning he began to play on his flute at the edge of the lake,--and
what did he see? A beautiful fairy, whose hair was exactly like gold,
and whose clothes were more costly than any he had ever seen; she was
more dazzling than the sun as she began to dance. The boy stood
motionless with his eyes fixed upon her, but when the fairy noticed
that he was no longer playing she vanished. The next day she did the
same thing. On the third, still playing, he approached, and as in the
pleasure of dancing she did not notice it, he suddenly rushed upon
her, clasped her in his arms, kissed her, and snatched the rose from
her head.

She screamed and then begged him to give her back the flower, but he
refused. Even wood and stone might have wept over her grief, as she
lamented and entreated. But when he fastened the rose in his hat, she
followed him.

Finding that he could not be persuaded to restore the rose, they

agreed to be married. So they went to Mogarzea, to be wedded by the
emperor, and remained there, but every year in the month of May they
returned to the Milk Lake to bathe their children in its waves.

After the emperor's death Mogarzea divided the kingdom with his
preserver.

Cunning Ileane.

Once upon a time something happened. If it had not happened, it would

not be told.

There was once an emperor who had three daughters; the oldest was
beautiful, the middle one more beautiful, but the youngest, Ileane,
was so fair that even the sun stopped to gaze at her and admire her
charms.

One day the emperor received the news that his neighbor, a mighty
monarch, was no longer friendly, but wanted to fight with him on
account of a great imperial feud. The emperor consulted the old men of
the country, and, seeing there was nothing else to be done, he
commanded his valiant soldiers to mount their horses, take their
weapons, and prepare for the terrible battle which was to be fought.

Before mounting himself, the emperor called his daughters, addressed a

few fatherly, touching words to them, and gave each one a beautiful
flower, a merry little bird, and a rosy-cheeked apple.

"Whoever has her flower wither, her bird mope or her apple rot, I
shall know has not kept her faith," said the wise emperor; then
mounting his steed he wished them "Good-health" and set off with his
brave soldiers on their toilsome way.

When the neighboring emperor's three sons heard the news that the
emperor had quitted his home and gone to the war, they made an
agreement among themselves and sprang on their horses to ride to the
palace and vex the monarch by making his three daughters faithless to
his trust. The oldest prince, a brave, spirited, handsome fellow, went
first to see how matters stood and bring tidings afterward to the
others.

Three days and three nights the champion stood under the wall, but not
one of the girls had appeared at the windows. In the gray dawn of the
fourth day he lost patience, plucked up his courage, and tapped on the
oldest princess's window.

"What is it--what is it? What is wanted?" asked the royal maiden,

roused from her sleep.

"It is I, little sister," said the prince, "I, an emperor's son, who
have stood under your window three days for love of you."

The princess did not even approach the window, but replied in a
prudent tone:

"Go back home by the way you came; may flowers spring up before you
and thorns remain behind."

After three more days and nights the prince again knocked on the
girl's window. This time the princess approached it, and said in a
more gentle voice:

"I told you to go back home by the way you came; may thorns spring up
before you and flowers remain behind."

Once more the prince waited three days and three nights under the
maiden's window. In the gray dawn of the tenth day, that is after
thrice three days and thrice three nights had passed, he smoothed his
hair and for the third time tapped on the window.

"What is it? Who is it? What is wanted?" asked the princess, this time
somewhat more sternly than before.

"It is I, little sister," said the prince. "For thrice three days I
have stood longingly under your window. I would like to see your face,
gaze into your eyes, and watch the words flow from your lips!"

The princess opened the window, glanced angrily at the handsome youth,
and said in a scarcely audible voice:

"I would willingly look into your face and say a word or two to you,
but first go to my younger sister--then come to me."

"I'll send my younger brother," replied the prince. "But give me one
kiss to make my way home pleasanter."

And almost before he had spoken, he snatched a kiss from the beautiful
girl.

"May no second one fall to your lot," said the princess, wiping her
mouth with her embroidered sleeve. "Go back home by the way you came;
may flowers spring up before you and flowers remain behind."

The prince went back to his brothers and told them all that had
happened, and the second took his departure.

After this prince had stood under the second princess's window nine
times nine days and nine times nine nights and tapped for the ninth
time at her window, she opened it and said to him kindly:

"I would like to look at you and say a word or two to you, but first
go to my youngest sister, then come to me."
"I'll send my youngest brother," said the prince. "But give me one
kiss, that I may hurry the faster."

He had scarcely said it, when he stole a kiss.

"May no second one fall to your lot," said this royal maiden too. "Go
back home by the way you came, may flowers spring up before you and
flowers remain behind!"

The prince returned to his brothers, told them all that had happened,
and--for the third time--a hero departed, the youngest son. When he
reached the palace where the three sisters lived Ileane was standing
at the window, and when she saw him, said merrily:

"You handsome champion with the royal face, where are you hurrying,
that you urge on your steed so hotly?"

When the prince saw Ileane's face and heard Ileane's words, he
stopped, gazed at her, and answered boldly:

"I'm hurrying to the sun to steal one of its rays, to give to its
sister and take her home, where she shall become my bride. Now, little
sister, I will stop on my way to look at you, gaze at the radiance of
your face, say a word to you and steal a word in reply."

Ileane cleverly answered: "If your nature is like your words, if your
soul is like your face, proud and beautiful, and mild and gentle, I
will gladly call you into the house, seat you at a banquet, give you
food and drink and kisses."

The prince sprang from his horse as he heard these words, and answered
boldly:

"My nature will be like my speech, my heart like my face; let me in,
seat me at the banquet, you shall never repent it from dawn till
nightfall."

He had scarcely uttered the words when he leaped upon the window-sill,
jumped through the window into the room, went through the room to the
table, and took his place at the very top, where the emperor had sat
when he was a bridegroom.

"Stop, stop!" said Ileane. "First let me see whether you are what you
ought to be, and then we'll talk and begin our love-making. Can you
make roses grow on burdocks?"

"No!" said the prince.

"Then the thistle is your flower," said clever Ileane. "Can you make
the bat sing in a sweet voice?"

"No!" said the prince.

"Then night is your day," said clever Ileane. "Can you make apples
grow on wolf's-bane?"

"That I can!" said the prince.

"Then that shall be your fruit!" replied the beautiful and cunning
Ileane. "Sit down at the table."

The prince took his place. Ah! but Ileane was indeed cunning Ileane.
Ere he had fairly seated himself, he dropped, chair and all, into the
deep cellar where the emperor's treasures were kept.

Ileane now began to scream: "Help!" and when all the servants came
rushing in to see what had happened, she told them she had heard a
noise and was afraid that some one had got into the cellar to rob the
emperor of his treasures. The servants did not waste many words, but
instantly opened the iron door and went into the cellar, where they
found the prince and brought him in disgrace to be sentenced.

Ileane pronounced judgment.

Twelve girls under punishment for some offense were to carry him out
of the country, and when they had reached the frontier with him, each
one was to give him a kiss.

The order was obeyed. When the prince reached home and joined his
brothers, he told them the whole story, and after every thing had been
related their hearts were filled with rage. So they sent word to the
two older princesses that they must arrange to have Ileane go to the
three princes' court, so that they might revenge themselves upon her
for the insult she had offered them. When the oldest daughter received
this message from the prince she pretended to be sick, called Ileane
to her bedside, and told her that she could not get well unless Ileane
brought her something to eat from the princes' kitchen.

Ileane would have done any thing for her sister's sake, so she took a
little jug and set off for the court of the three princes, to beg or
steal. When she reached the palace, she rushed breathlessly into the
kitchen and said to the head-cook:

"For heaven's sake, don't you hear the emperor calling you? Make
haste, and see what is the matter."

The cook took to his heels and ran as fast as he could, as though he
had received an imperial command. Ileane, left alone in the kitchen,
filled her jug with food, emptied all the dainty dishes that were on
the fire upon the floor, and went away.

When the princes heard of this insult they were still more enraged
than before, sent another message to the two sisters and again
prepared a revenge. As soon as the second sister received the news,
she, too, pretended to be ill, called Ileane to her bed, and told her
that she could not get well unless she tasted the wine in the princes'
cellar. Ileane would have done any thing for her sister, so she took
the little jug and prepared to go again.

When she reached the court she rushed into the cellar, and, panting
for breath, said to the head-butler:

"For heaven's sake, don't you hear the emperor calling you? Make haste
and see what is the matter." The butler took to his heels and ran as
if he had received an imperial command. Ileane filled her jug with
wine, poured out the rest on the cellar floor, and then hurried home.
The princes sent a third message to the two princesses and told them
they must send Ileane in a different way from what they had done
before. This time both the princesses feigned illness, called their
sister to them, and told her that they could not get well unless
Ileane brought them two of the princes' apples.

"My dear sisters," replied Ileane, "I would go through fire and water
for you, how much more willingly to the princes." Taking the little
jug she set off to find, seize, and bring back the fruit and save her
dear sisters' lives.

When the youngest prince learned that Ileane was coming to the garden
to steal the golden apples, he gave orders that, if groans were heard
there, nobody must dare go in, but let the person who was wailing,
moan in peace. Then he hid huge knives, swords, spears, and many other
things in the earth under the tree that bore the golden apples,
concealing them so that only the sharp points rose out of the ground.
After he had finished, he hid himself in a clump of bushes and waited
for Ileane. She came to the gate, and seeing the two huge lions that
kept guard there flung each of them a piece of meat; the lions began
to tear it, and the princess went to the apple tree, stepped
cautiously between the knives, swords, spears, and other things, and
climbed into it.

"May this do you much good, little sister," said the prince. "I'm glad
to see you in my garden."

"The pleasure is mine," replied Ileane, "since I have so brave and

handsome a prince for my companion. Come, climb the tree and help me
pick some apples for my dear sisters, who are dangerously ill and have
asked for them."

The prince wanted nothing better--he meant to pull Ileane from the
tree among the knives.

"You are very kind, Ileane," he replied, "be kinder still and give me
your hand to help me up into the tree."

"Your plan is wicked," thought Ileane, "but it shall work your own
misfortune." She gave him her hand, pulled him up the trunk to the
branches, and then let him drop among the knives, swords, spears and
other such things, which had been put there for her own destruction.

"There you are," she said, "now you will know what you meant to do."

The hero with the black soul began to shriek and groan--but nobody
came to help him; they left him, according to his own orders, to moan
in peace, and he was obliged to bear his terrible sufferings
patiently.

Ileane took her apples, carried them home, gave them to her sisters,
and then went back to the imperial palace and told the servants to go
and rescue their master from his great danger.

The prince, who had been so abominably treated, sent for the most
skillful witch in the whole country to come and give him a cure for
his wounds. But Ileane had gone to the witch first and offered her a
great deal of money to let her, Ileane, go to the court in her place.
So Ileane went to the palace disguised as the witch. She ordered a
buffalo hide to be soaked in vinegar three days and three nights, then
taken out and wrapped around the wounded youth. But the prince's cuts
only burned the more, and his sufferings became still more unbearable.
When he saw that he was in a bad way, he sent for a priest that he
might relieve his heart before he died and give him the sacrament. But
Ileane was not idle. She went to the priest, offered him a large sum
of money, and induced him to let her go to the palace instead. So
Ileane arrived at the court disguised as a priest.

When she approached the prince's bed he was at the point of death,
there were scarcely three breaths left in him.

"My son," said the false priest, Ileane, "you have summoned me to
confess your sins to me. Think of the hour of death, and tell me all
you have on your heart. Are you at variance with any one? Yes, or no?"

"With no one," replied the prince, "except Ileane, the youngest

daughter of the emperor, our neighbor. And I hate her out of love and
longing," he continued. "If I should not die, but recover, I will ask
the emperor for her hand in marriage, and if I don't kill her the
first night she shall be my faithful wife according to the law."
Ileane heard these words, said a few in reply, and then went home.
Here she soon understood why her sisters were wailing and lamenting,
for they had heard that the emperor was returning home from the great
war.

"You ought to rejoice," said Ileane, "when you hear that our kind
father is coming home safe and well."

"We should rejoice," replied the sisters, "if our flowers had not
withered, our apples had not rotted, and our birds had not stopped
singing; but now we have reason to cry."

When Ileane heard these words she went to her room, saw the flower
sprinkled with dew, the bird hungry, and the apple looking as if it
wanted to say: "Eat me, little sister!"

So, to help her dear sisters, she gave the flower to one and the bird
to the other, keeping only the beautiful apple for herself. So they
waited for the arrival of the emperor, who was very stern in his
commands.

When the monarch reached home, he approached his oldest daughter and
asked for the flower, the bird, and the apple. She showed him nothing
but the flower, and even that was half withered. The emperor said
nothing, but went to his second daughter. She showed him only the
little bird, and that, too, looked drooping. Again the emperor did not
speak, but silently went up to his youngest daughter, clever Ileane.

When the emperor saw the apple on Ileane's chest of drawers he could
almost have devoured it with his eyes, it was so beautiful. "Where did
you put the flower, and what have you done with the bird?" he asked
Ileane.

Ileane did not answer, but hurried to her sisters and brought back a
fresh flower and a merry little bird.

"May you prosper, my little daughter," said the emperor; "I see now
that you have kept faith with me."
From Ileane the emperor went to his second daughter, and then to the
eldest one.

When he questioned them about the three things he had trusted to their
care, they hastily brought Ileane's flower, bird, and apple. But as
God permits no falsehood to succeed, in their hands the flower
withered, the bird moped, and only the apple remained fresh,
rosy-cheeked, and eatable.

When the emperor saw this he understood every thing, and ordered the
two older princesses to be buried to their breasts in the earth, and
left there that they might be an example of the severity of an
imperial punishment. But Ileane he praised, kissed, spoke to her in
kind, fatherly words, and said: "May you have much happiness, my
child, for you have been faithful to your duty."

After the neighboring emperor's son had recovered, he mounted his

horse and set off to ask Ileane to be his wife. The old emperor,
Ileane's father, after hearing for what purpose the prince had come,
said to him kindly:

"Go and ask Ileane, my son and hero; whatever she wishes shall, with
God's help, be done."

Ileane said nothing, but permitted the prince to kiss her. The emperor
instantly understood the whole matter and said: "My dear children, I
see that you ought to be husband and wife; may it prove for your
good."

It was not long before Ileane married the bold, handsome, heroic
youth. Her wedding was so magnificent that tidings of it spread
through seven countries. Yes indeed! But Ileane had not forgotten the
evil the prince had in his mind; she knew that he would try some trick
upon her the first night after their marriage. So she ordered a sugar
doll to be made exactly the same size as she was herself, with face,
eyes, lips, and figure precisely like Ileane's. When it was finished,
she hid it in the bed where she was to sleep that night.

In the evening, when the relatives and friends had gone to rest and
Ileane, too, had been asleep, the prince said to his bride:

"Dear Ileane, wait a little while, I'll come back directly." Then he
left the room.

Ileane did not hesitate long, but jumped out of bed, left the sugar
doll in her place, and hid behind a curtain at the head of the bed.

She had scarcely concealed herself, when the prince returned to the
chamber with a sharp sword in his hand.

"Tell me now, my dear Ileane," he said, "did you throw me into the
cellar?"

"Yes," said Ileane, behind the curtain. The prince dealt one blow with
the sword on the doll's breast.

"Did you drive me out of the country with scorn and mockery?" he asked
again.
"Yes," said Ileane.

The prince cut the doll across her face.

"Did you empty my dishes of food?" asked the prince the third time.

"Yes," said Ileane.

The prince slashed the doll from head to foot.

"Did you pour out my wine?" was the prince's fourth question.

"Yes," said Ileane.

The prince cut the figure once across. Ileane began to breathe heavily
as if in the agony of death.

"Did you throw me among the knives?" he asked for the fifth and last
question.

"Yes," said Ileane.

The prince now thrust his sword into the figure's heart, slashed, and
hacked it in all directions, with all his strength, till the tears ran
down in streams. As dawn approached he began to sob bitterly. Suddenly
a bit of sugar popped into his mouth.

"Ah, Ileane! you were sweet in life, and remain sweet even in death,"
he said, weeping still more violently.

"Sweet indeed," said Ileane, coming out from behind the curtain, "but
from this hour forth I will be a hundred thousand times sweeter."

The prince seemed fairly petrified with delight, when he saw Ileane
safe and well. He clasped her in his arms, and for many years they
lived joyously and ruled the land in peace and happiness.

The Princess and the Fisherman.

Once upon a time something happened. If it had not happened, it would

not be told.

There was once a fisherman, neither very well off nor very poor, but
he was young, with a mustache that curled fiercely at the ends, you
know, and a fine-looking fellow. Whenever he passed the imperial
palace, the emperor's daughter sent for him, bought his fish, and gave
him ten times as much money as they were worth.

Our fisherman was spoiled by this wealth, and whenever he had nice
fresh fish he took them to the palace; not a day passed that the
princess did not buy fish if the fisherman went by.

One day, while paying for the fish, the princess pressed his hand, the
fisherman blushed as red as a beet, and cast down his eyes, but first
gave her one loving glance, for he had understood that she was willing
he should do so.

Then he entered into conversation with her, and took good care not to
say any thing stupid.

The next time the princess bought fish he began to talk about them at
great length, and made her comprehend that he had understood her
feelings, and that the fire of love which was consuming her burned no
less hotly in his heart than in her own.

Another time he spoke still more freely, and the princess learned that
he was unmarried; she was, besides, much pleased with his clever
answers, and as he was very attractive the royal maiden finally fell
in love with him. She gave him a purse filled with money to purchase
handsome clothes, and told him to come back afterward and show himself
to her.

After he had bought garments like those worn by gentlemen, he put them
on and returned to the princess. She would scarcely have recognized
him, for even his gait and bearing had become as stiff as a noble's.

At last, unable to repress the love that glowed in her heart, the
emperor's daughter told him that she would marry him.

The fisherman did not know much, but he was aware that such a dainty
morsel wasn't meant for his bill, and he could hardly believe what he
heard with his ears and saw with his eyes; but when the princess
assured him that she wasn't joking, he accepted her hand, though to
tell the truth with many doubts and blushes.

The marriage did not exactly suit the emperor, but as he loved his
daughter and she was her parents' only child, he yielded to her
wishes. The princess gave the fisherman another purse filled with
money, and told him to buy himself still handsomer clothes. When he
returned, in garments that fairly glittered with gold, the royal
maiden presented him to the emperor, and the monarch betrothed them to
each other.

Ere long a magnificent imperial wedding was celebrated. When the

company sat down to enjoy the banquet, a soft-boiled egg, which,
according to ancient custom, only the bride and bridegroom were
permitted to eat, was brought to the wedded pair. When the husband was
about to dip a bit of bread into the egg, the princess stopped him,
saying: "I must dip first, because I am the daughter of an emperor,
and you are a fisherman." The bridegroom made no reply, but rose from
the table and vanished. The guests, who did not know what had
happened, looked at one another and asked in surprise what this meant,
for they had not heard that the emperor's son-in-law had formerly been
a fisherman.

The bride repented her imprudence, bit her lips, and wrung her hands.
She ate what she was compelled to swallow, but she might just as well
have thrown it behind her, for not a morsel did her any good.

After the feast she went to her room, but all night long she could not
once close her eyes or fall asleep, she was so sorrowful. She thought
of her bridegroom so constantly that she was afraid she would fall ill
from longing. Her principal grief was that she did not know why he had
gone away without saying even one word.

The next day she went to the emperor and told him she was seized with
so great a longing for her husband that she was going to follow him
till she found him. The emperor tried to detain her, but she would
not listen and set out on her journey.

She searched up and down the whole city, but did not find him
anywhere. Then she wandered from place to place till she met him
serving in a tavern.

As soon as she saw him she went up and spoke to him, but he pretended
not to know her, turned his head away, made no answer, and went about
his business.

The princess followed him everywhere, begging him to say just one word
to her, but in vain. When the landlord saw that the stranger was to
blame for the interruption in the work, he said: "Why don't you let my
servant finish his work in peace? Don't you see he is dumb? Be kind
enough to go away from here, if you are a respectable woman."

"He isn't dumb," she cried, "this is my husband, who deserted and fled
from me on account of a fault of mine."

All the people in the tavern stood still in astonishment when they
heard her words, for she was not joking; but the landlord could not
believe it, he thought it would be impossible for a man who could
speak to live a whole week without saying even one word, and every
body really knew him as a dumb man, made him understand by signs, and
liked him for his industry.

The princess then entered into an agreement with them all, that she
would induce him to speak within three days if they would only allow
her to stay with him, but if she did not succeed she would be hung.
This agreement was put in writing and shown to the magistrates for
their sanction. When the contract was concluded, the three days' trial
was arranged to begin the next morning.

The fisherman at first knew nothing about this agreement, though he

heard of it afterward, but the emperor's daughter never left his side.

"My beloved husband," she said, "you know I am to blame. I chose you
because I loved you; I swear that I will never commit such a blunder
again; have pity on me, speak one word to me, save me from the
disgrace that is killing me. I know you have a right to be angry, but
for the sake of my love, forgive me."

The fisherman turned his head toward her, shrugged his shoulders, and
pretended that he did not know her, and did not understand what she
was talking about. One day, two days passed, and he did not even say
boo. When the third came the princess was terribly frightened, and
wherever the dumb man went she followed, beseeching him to say one
word to her.

But the fisherman, feeling that she was softening him by her
entreaties, fled like a savage that she might not assail him with
tears, and pretended his heart was a lump of ice; but she did not
cease imploring him a thousand times, so tenderly that it would have
softened even a wild beast.
At last the third day also passed, and the fisherman had not even said
baa.

Every body wondered over these things. Nothing was talked of in the
whole city, except the mute servant at the tavern and the beautiful,
charming girl, who, it was supposed, had mistaken the dumb man for
some one else, and had now brought herself into trouble.

The next day the gallows was ready, and the whole population gathered
around it to witness the end of the affair.

The magistrates were summoned to the place, and, against their will,
compelled to execute what was in the agreement.

The executioner came, and called upon the princess to submit to the
penalty, since she had not succeeded in fulfilling the obligations she
had imposed upon herself; the girl turned once more to the fisherman,
and, sobbing bitterly, tried to soften his heart, but in vain. When
she saw and understood that no escape was possible, she loosed her
hair and let it fall over her shoulders, wailing so piteously that it
was enough to make even wood and stone weep for her, and so walked
toward the place of execution. All the people, old and young, were
weeping around her, yet could not help her.

On reaching the gallows, she once more gazed hopefully at the dumb
man, who had come with the crowd, but stood as if he were perfectly
unmoved, and said to him:

"My dear husband, save me from death; you know my love for you, do not
let me perish so ignominiously. Speak but one word and I shall be
delivered." But the man only shrugged his shoulders and glanced
backward across the fields.

The executioner stood with the noose in his hand; two assistants led
her up the ladder, and the hangman slipped the rope around her neck.
One moment more, and the princess would have been a corpse! But just
at the instant the executioner was going to let her swing out into the
empty air, the fisherman raised his hand, shouting: "Hi! hi! stop!"

They all stood motionless, tears of joy streamed from every eye as the
hangman took the noose from the prisoner's neck. Then the fisherman,
looking at the royal maiden, said three times:

"Will you say fisherman to me again?"

"Forgive me, my dear husband," the princess hastened to reply, "I have
only said it once, and that was by mistake. I promise you not to do so
again."

"Let her come down, she is my wife."

He took her by the hand, and they went home together.

Afterward they lived in peace and happiness, and if they haven't died,
they are living still.

Into the saddle then I sprung,

This tale to tell to old and young.
Little Wild-Rose.

Once upon a time something extraordinary happened. If it had not

happened it would not be told. It was when the wolves lay down to rest
with the sheep, and the shepherds feasted in the green fields with
emperors and kings, when one sun rose and another set.

There was once a man, my dear good friends. This man would now--I am
telling no lie--this man would now be a hundred years old, if not
twenty more to boot; his wife, too, was older than any body I know;
she was like the Friday-goddess (Venus), and from youth to age had
never had a single child. Only those who know what children are in a
house can understand the uncontrollable grief in the empty home of the
old man and his wife. The poor old man had done every thing in his
power to have his house brightened and filled with joy by what he
himself so greatly desired. He had given alms to the convents and
churches, he had had liturgies read in seven churches, had sent for
priests with white beards, because they are the holiest men and have
more earnestness in prayer, and had had masses read for all the
saints and prayers for the last unction. But every thing was useless.
The old wife had clung to the witches and magicians. There was not an
enchanter to whom she had not gone for advice, even if he lived a
week's journey off. As I said before, what wouldn't she have done! But
it was vain, all was useless.

One day the old man said sadly and thoughtfully:

"Old wife!"

"What do you want?"

"Give me some provisions to take with me on my journey, for I intend

to travel through the wide world, looking wherever I go to try and
find a child, for my heart aches and burns when I think that the end
of my life is drawing near, and no heir will have my house after me,
but all my property fall into the hands of strangers. I have tried all
ways, now I will take this one. And I'll tell you one thing: If I find
no child, I won't come home any more."

With these words the old man took his knapsack on his back, went out
of the house, and began his journey. He walked on and on and on
through the kingdom and the world, as God willed. Listen, good
friends, I am telling the truth. He walked on till he came to a thick
forest, so dense that it seemed like a wall. Tree was intwined with
tree, bush with bush, so that the sun could not even send so much as a
ray of light through the foliage. When the old man saw these vast
woods he thrice made the sign of the cross toward the east, prostrated
himself three times, also toward the east, and then entered with great
sorrow. How long a time he spent in groping about the forest I don't
know, but I do know that one day he reached the entrance of a cave.
This cave was hundreds and thousands of times darker than the deep
forest, as dark as it is when we shut our eyes, as dark as it usually
is in endless caverns. The old man crossed himself three times, fell
on his knees several times, and then, with God's assistance, turned
around a projection of a rock. He went about the distance of a
gun-shot and saw a light in a cranny. Approaching nearer and nearer he
could not believe his eyes when he saw what was standing beside it. An
old hermit! He was very old, as ancient as the world. He had a white
beard that reached to his knees, and when he raised his eyebrows and
then lowered them again they shaded the whole cave.

The hermit stood like a pillar of stone, his eyes fixed on a

psalm-book on which his elbow rested, and which was sprinkled with big
red characters; it was very, very old, so old that God alone knew to
what period it belonged; and on a broad stone a yellow wax-candle
blazed with a red flame and a blue smoke that was as dense as a cloud.
The old man approached the praying saint and, again falling on his
knees, said:

"Good-evening, holy father!"

The hermit was so absorbed in his litany that he heard nothing. So our
old man spoke louder. The hermit did not stir, but made him a sign
with his crutch to move aside. The old man stood aloof till the hermit
had finished his prayer. When it was over, he raised his eyebrows and
began:

"My son, what do you seek from me in this dark, cheerless abode? For
many centuries my eyes have seen no human face, and now I wonder what
has led your footsteps hither."

The old man answered:

"I kiss your right hand. My unhappiness has brought me here. I have
lived with my wife many years, but we have no children, and I should
like to have an heir when I behold our Lord's glorious face."

The hermit took an apple, and, after having blessed it, cut it in two,
and said:

"Take these two halves of the apple; give this one to your wife, eat
the other yourself, and in God's name do not wander over the world
so."

The old man took the gift, kissed the hermit's right hand and feet,
and left the cave. Entering the dense forest, he walked a long time
before he came to the meadows. There a terrible thirst and burning
sensation in the throat seized upon him. What should he do, for he
found no water? He did precisely what he was destined to do. He took
the half apple and ate it. But instead of the half intended for him,
he ate his wife's. He had scarcely swallowed it when he felt as if he
could go no further. So he sank down on the grass where a quantity of
yellow cheese-wort was growing, and fell sound asleep. And the angel
of the Lord came down from Heaven, and watched beside him. When he
awoke, what did his eyes behold? The wonder of wonders! The most
marvelous of marvels! By his side, among the herbs, a little child was
crying and moving its tiny hands. The angel brought some basil and
some water that had been consecrated nine years, sprinkled the child,
and christened it, giving it the name of "Little Wild-Rose." The old
man, happier than he had ever been at the sight of the pretty little
girl, took her in his arms, kissed her, and set off with her to his
wife. When he reached the house he took a kneading-trough, put the
little thing in it, set it on the roof, and then crawled into the
cottage, saying:

"Come quick, wife, come quick, and see what a treasure of a daughter,
with golden hair and eyes like stars, our Lord has given me."

When they hurried out, to see the treasure of a girl and take the
trough down from the roof, they saw nothing, no trace of the child
anywhere. The old man crossed himself and sighed deeply. He searched
hither and thither, right and left, but the little girl was nowhere to
be found. He hunted through the straw in the hut and on the ground
behind it to see if she had fallen down; but if she wasn't there she
wasn't, and that ended the matter, for they couldn't stamp her out of
the earth.

Oh, heavens, how the old man grieved and wrung his hands in despair.
How could he help being startled by such a thing! He had put the child
in the trough and seen her after he had laid her in it, and knew
exactly where he had left her, and now to be unable to find her just a
moment after was quite too bad.

"What could have happened to the little girl? Has the angel of the
Lord taken her? Have the elves and wicked gnomes stolen her away?
What in the world could have occurred!" said the man, sighing.
Somebody had taken her, that was plain. But neither angels nor elves
nor wicked gnomes frequented the neighborhood. Now, my good friends,
just listen to the amazing event. A vulture or a griffin, whichever it
was, but we'll say a griffin, was passing by, and, hearing the child's
cries, swooped swiftly down, seized the little one, tucked her under
its right wing, soared up into the sky with her, and took her to its
eyry to feed its young. After putting her in its nest, the griffin
flew off again. But the young birds, instead of eating the little
girl, looked kindly at her, gave her some soft bread-crumbs, made a
bed for her, and covered her with their wings to protect her from the
chill of the morning air.

I must now tell you that in this terrible forest, at the bottom of a
well of pure poison, lived a dragon with twelve heads, and this well
was not far from the tree in whose top rested the griffin's nest. This
horrible dragon never let the little griffins grow up, but as soon as
they were ready to fly stretched out two of its fiery heads and put an
end to their lives, so that the poor old griffin had never yet, in all
its life, been able to see even one of its children fly off.

The present brood were now full-grown, and were waiting for daylight
to fly through the woods and mountains, when lo, just at midnight the
water of the well made a splashing noise, and what appeared in the
moonlight that flickered through the trees? Two fiery heads, which
approached the nest, setting up such a howling and wailing that the
mountains shook to their foundations and the valleys rocked to and fro
like cradles. Suddenly, in the twinkling of an eye, the joints of the
earth and sky trembled and quaked, and the archangel, grasping a sword
in his hand, appeared on a golden cloud, darting downward like a
thunderbolt. Just as the dragon was going to seize the young griffins,
the angel flashed his sword from east to west, and again from west to
east, cutting off both heads as easily as one drinks a spoonful of
water. Then two still more terrible ones came, but they were also
hacked into pieces. Two others next appeared; they, too, were
destroyed, and so fared all the twelve. Blood and poison flowed till
the whole forest and valley were turned into a marsh, and the heads
dashed against the tree which held the nest, so that the leaves fell
from the boughs for ten miles around. The angel took some basil plant,
and sprinkled the four quarters of the earth with water that had been
consecrated in Paradise nine years before. The pools of blood all
gathered into one spot, the heads lost their vitality, and the ground
opened, swallowing them up with all the blood, so that the wood once
more became pure and bright as God meant it to be.

When the griffin came back at dawn, found its children safe in the
nest, and saw that the accursed well had disappeared, it uttered such
a cry of delight that the earth for nine miles round trembled and
shook.

Then it waked the young birds and said:

"Tell me quickly, my darlings, who has done me this great favor?"

The young birds shook their heads and replied: "We don't know any
thing about it, we have been asleep all night."

As the griffin looked about,
whose golden hair and starry
sunlight like the torches of
darted through its mind that
the unspeakable benefit.
its glance fell upon the little girl,
eyes were glittering in the morning
Paradise, and the thought instantly
this beautiful light must have rendered

"Children," said the griffin, angrily, "you haven't eaten the little
girl, what does this mean?" The young birds kept as still as mice, but
the griffin straightway swallowed lovely little Wild-Rose, yet when
she appeared again she was seven times as beautiful as before.

The griffin now set about a great task; all day long it brought
flowers and soft green moss from the woodland meadows to make the
little girl a room like a fairy's nest, and this tiny chamber,
whenever the wind blew, rocked to and fro like a cradle. From this
time little Wild-Rose was as dear to it as its own children, nay, she
was the very apple of the griffin's eye, and it took care of her and
fed her with the very best things a griffin could find.

So the little Wild-Rose with the golden hair began to grow and
flourish like a stately lily. In the morning the merry dawn kissed and
woke her, at noon the shadows of the leafy boughs fanned her, and in
the evening she was lulled to rest by the gentle breezes and the tunes
that echoed through the forest from the shepherds' pipes.

So the little girl grew in beauty till she was able to stand alone,
and one day, just as the evening-star was bathing in the rosy light
left by the sun when it sank behind the mountains, the Lord permitted
what had been predestined to happen, though it was something that had
never occurred before, since this world was created and the sun began
its course through the sky. So it happened that little Wild-Rose stood
up, came out of her little room, and for the first time gazed into the
world. But when she looked at the evening-sky the air quivered, the
rising stars trembled, and on the eastern horizon a second sun, more
beautiful and a hundred times brighter than the one which had set
behind the mountains, rose upward in majesty and splendor as if
mounting from a sea of fire. The forests, chasms and valleys quaked,
the flowers whispered sweetly to each other and turned their little
heads toward the vivifying waves of light. And now behold--the fairest
flowers tried to drink in the little maid's glances, and the trees
around bowed their tops to rejoice in little Wild-Rose's beauty. In
short, the whole of God's creation, the birds in the sky as well as
the beasts in the forest, exulted and jumped for joy over the divine
miracle.

After that evening's festival, twice three days passed, then three
times three, finally still more until little Wild-Rose was fourteen
years old.

At fourteen little Wild-Rose was beautiful--so beautiful that I am

afraid to praise her and describe her perfections, lest you should
afterward say that you had seen some one equally handsome. But there
was no one like her under the sun. Lovely as she was, no human being
had seen her, and she had no idea of empires and cities; she lived on
sisterly terms with the flowers, danced with the butterflies, was
lulled by the murmur of the brook, vied with the birds in singing.
Now, my dear readers, forgive me for first telling you I would say
nothing, and afterward adding a few words in praise of little
Wild-Rose. Who that has ever seen her can help talking about her?

So the days passed like hours and the hours like minutes, until one
day a great hunt took place in the beautiful woods.

The emperor's son went to the chase too.

Well, evidently this ought to have been. The prince, in a good or evil
hour--I don't know which I ought to say--saw a deer bound into the
thicket, and hurried after the animal faster and faster and faster,
till the young hero found himself where he had never been even in his
dreams--in the very depths of the dense forest, which was still
untrodden by any human foot.

When the prince discovered his situation, he stood still and listened,
to try to hear some sound in this solitude; the barking of a dog, the
blast of a horn, the report of a gun, any thing of the sort would have
pleased the youth. But he listened in vain, utter silence and solitude
surrounded him. After gazing around him for some time a dazzling light
gleamed through the foliage. He glanced that way again, and felt that
he must know what was there. One, two, three, and he reached the spot
to see what it was. And he found--found the tree with the dainty
little swinging chamber, and the young griffins staring at him.
Whatever he may have thought, he drew his bow and would have instantly
shot off the heads of the whole brood, when, like a thunderbolt, a
blaze of light flashed into his face, dazzling him so that he dropped
the bow and covered his eyes with his hands. When he looked that way
again, he saw for half a minute the face and figure of little
Wild-Rose, felt as if he were in the other world, and could not help
falling on the grass in a fainting-fit. When he recovered his senses
he called to the young girl to come down. But how was Wild-Rose to do
such a thing? She did not go to a young man, but staid quietly at home
with her mamma.

When the prince saw this he went away as he had come. Yet no, not
exactly as he had come, for when he arrived his heart had not been
full of love and longing. Neither had he come through the bushes
without any trace of path or opening. But now he tumbled about
wherever he went, as though he had no eyes. Yet, however he returned,
he _did_ return, arriving just as the shepherds were driving their
cattle from the pasture into the village, and there he luckily met two
of his hunting companions.

Early the next morning heralds from the imperial court went through
the whole country, proclaiming that whoever would promise to bring a
wonder of a girl from the forest of the well with two trees, would be
received by the emperor as his councilor so long as he lived and the
whole court would do him honor. Lo, and behold! there came an old,
lame woman, with a hump on her back and as much hair on her head as
there is on the palm of the hand. "I am the person who can bring the
girl from the forest of the well with the two trees," she said. The
heralds looked at the old woman and burst out laughing.

"Are you from Satan's kingdom, you scare-crow?" said a herald. "Who,
in the Wood Witch's name, brought you in our way, for now we shall
have no luck. Begone from our sight."

But the old woman insisted that she could bring the girl from the
forest. And she stuck to the heralds like a bur to a sheep.

Then the oldest herald said: "Comrades, take her with us, for the
emperor said plainly that we were to bring to the court any person, no
matter who, that boasted of being able to execute his command; take
the old woman and put her in the carriage."

So they took the old woman and carried her to court.

"You have boasted that you could bring the girl from the forest?"
asked the emperor, seated on his throne.

"Long life to your majesty. Yes, I promised to do so."

"Then set to work."

"Let that be the old woman's care, but give me a kettle and a tripod."
She quickly received them and set off behind the emperor's huntsmen,
her mouth chattering and the kettle rattling, as the gipsies do when
they bring a bride to her wedding. The prince had not remained at
home either. How could he have staid behind and not known the why and
wherefore! When the party reached the forest, the hunters and the
prince halted and the old woman went on, like the Wood Witch, alone.

The shrewd, cunning old woman lighted a fire under the tree where the
girl was, placed the tripod over the flames, and hung the kettle on
it. But the kettle stood awry and upset as fast as she put it on.
Little Wild-Rose, who was looking down from her room and saw the old
woman's stupidity, lost her patience and called:

"Not that way, old woman, set the tripod the other way."

"But suppose I don't know how, my darling?"

And she vainly set it up, turned it round, and straightened it, the
kettle would not stand. Wild-Rose grew more and more impatient and
angry.

"Haven't I already told you once that it won't stand so? Turn the
handle of the kettle toward the trunk of the tree."
The old woman did exactly the opposite, and then said:

"Come down and show me, dear child."

And Wild-Rose, absorbed by that one idea, climbed quickly down the
tree to teach the crone. But the old woman taught her so that she
needed no second lesson. Seizing her by the arm, she lifted her on her
shoulder and ran off with her to the enamored prince. When the prince
saw Wild-Rose, he came to meet her, begged for her hand, and,
trembling, kissed her. Then she was clothed in magnificent garments,
which had been embroidered with gold and pearls by nine princesses.

She was placed in the imperial carriage, and the horses stopped only
once on the way home to take breath, for they had no equals except
among the steeds of the sun. When they reached the palace, the prince
lifted her out, led her in, and seated her at the table as if she were
a real princess. The young hero's parents gazed at her with delight,
and remembered their own youth. At the end of a week a magnificent
wedding was celebrated, which lasted for three days and three nights,
then, after twenty-four hours' intermission, three days and three
nights more were spent in splendid festivities.

I was there, too, but as I am lame in one foot, I did not arrive until
the wedding was over and had great trouble in finding some clear
broth, which I searched in vain for a crumb of meat and then sipped
from a sieve, so you can imagine how much I had and how I spent the
time.

The Voice of Death.

Once upon a time something happened. If it had not happened, it would

not be told.

There was once a man who prayed daily to God to grant him riches. One
day his numerous and frequent prayers found our Lord in the mood to
listen to them. When the man had grown rich he did not want to die, so
he resolved to go from country to country and settle wherever he heard
that the people lived forever. He prepared for his journey, told his
wife his plan, and set off.

In every country he reached he asked whether people ever died there,

and went on at once if he was told that they did. At last he arrived
in a land where the inhabitants said they did not know what dying
meant. The traveler, full of joy, asked:

"But are there not immense crowds of people here, if none of you die?"

"No, there are no immense crowds," was the reply, "for you see, every
now and then somebody comes and calls one after another, and whoever
follows him, never returns."

"And do people see the person who calls them?" asked the traveler.

"Why shouldn't they see him?" he was answered.

The man could not wonder enough at the stupidity of those who followed
the person that called them, though they knew that they would be
obliged to stay where he took them. Returning home, he collected all
his property, and with his wife and children, went to settle in the
country where people did not die but were called by a certain person
and never came back. He had therefore firmly resolved that neither he
nor his family would ever follow any body who called them, no matter
who it might be.

So, after he had established himself and arranged all his business
affairs, he advised his wife and all his family on no account to
follow any one who might call them, if, as he said, they did not want
to die.

So they gave themselves up to pleasure, and in this way spent several

years. One day, when they were all sitting comfortably in their house,
his wife suddenly began to call:

"I'm coming, I'm coming!"

And she looked around the room for her fur jacket. Her husband
instantly started up, seized her by the hand, and began to reproach
her.

"So you don't heed my advice? Stay here, if you don't want to die."

"Don't you hear how he is calling me? I'll only see what he wants and
come back at once."

And she struggled to escape from her husband's grasp and go.

He held her fast and managed to bolt all the doors in the room. When
she saw that, she said:

"Let me alone, husband, I don't care about going now."

The man thought she had come to her senses and given up her crazy
idea, but before long the wife rushed to the nearest door, hurriedly
opened it, and ran out. Her husband followed, holding her by her fur
sack and entreating her not to go, for she would never return. She let
her hands fall, bent backward, then leaned a little forward and
suddenly threw herself back, slipping off her sack and leaving it in
her husband's grasp, who stood stock still staring after her as she
rushed on, screaming with all her might:

"I'm coming, I'm coming."

When he could see her no longer, the husband collected his senses,
went back to the house, and said:

"If you are mad and want to die, go in God's name, I can't help you;
I've told you often enough that you must follow no one, no matter who
called you."

Days passed, many days; weeks, months, years followed, and the peace
of the man's household was not disturbed again.

But at last one morning, when he went to his barber's as usual to be

shaved, just as he had the soap on his chin, and the shop was full of
people, he began to shout:

"I won't come, do you hear, I won't come!"

The barber and his customers all stared in amazement. The man, looking
toward the door, said again: "Take notice, once for all, that I won't
come, and go away from there."

Afterward he cried:

"Go away, do you hear, if you want to get off with a whole skin, for I
tell you a thousand times I won't come."

Then, as if some one was standing at the door constantly calling him,
he grew angry and raved at the person for not leaving him in peace. At
last he sprang up and snatched the razor from the barber's hand,
crying:

"Give it to me, that I may show him what it is to continually annoy

people."

And he ran at full speed after the person who, he said, was calling
him, but whom nobody else could see. The poor barber, who did not want
to lose his razor, followed. The man ran, the barber pursued, till
they passed beyond the city limits, and, just outside of the town, the
man fell into a chasm from which he did not come out again, so he
also, like all the rest, followed the voice that called him.

The barber, who returned home panting for breath, told everybody he
met what had happened and so the belief spread through the country
that the people, who had gone away and not returned, had fallen into
that gulf, for until then no one had known what became of those who
followed the person that summoned them.

When a throng set out to visit the scene of misfortune, to see the
insatiable gulf which swallowed up all the people and yet never had
enough, nothing was found; it looked as if, since the beginning of
the world, nothing had been there except a broad plain, and from that
time the population of the neighborhood began to die like the human
beings in the rest of the earth.

The Old Woman and the Old Man.

Once upon a time there was an old man and an old woman, who had not a
single child in their old age, and it was very hard for them, because
they had no help, not even to light the fire; when they came home from
working in the fields, they were obliged to begin with lighting the
fire and then prepare their food.

One day, when they were fretting and consulting each other, they
determined to look for children whatever might happen.

The old man went one way, the old woman another, to find a child
somewhere.
The old man met a dog, the old woman a mouse. When they met again the
old woman asked:

"Husband, what have you found?"

"A little dog. And you, wife?"

"A little mouse."

They now agreed to adopt the mouse for a child and drive the dog away,
so the couple returned with the mouse, greatly delighted because they
had found what they sought, that is, a child.

On reaching home the old woman began to make a fire; then she set the
pot of sour buttermilk on to boil, and left the mouse to watch that it
did not fall over, while she went to work with the old man in the
fields.

After she had gone, the porridge boiled and splashed over the top of
the pot; the mouse, which was sitting on the hearth, said:

"Porridge, don't jump on me or I'll jump on you." But the buttermilk

did not stop and still splashed over the brim. When the mouse saw
this, it grew angry and leaped straight into the pot.

When the old people returned from hoeing and called their child, there
was no child to be found. After searching for it a long time without
success, they sat sadly down to eat their dinner. Yet they ate the
porridge with great relish until, when the old woman emptied the dish
she found at the bottom--what? The little mouse, their child, dead!
She began:

"Husband, husband, here it is, our child is drowned in the

buttermilk."

"How is that possible, wife!" replied the bearded old fellow.

When they saw this terrible accident, they began to weep and lament
bitterly; the old man in his grief tore his beard, and the old woman
pulled the hair out of her head.

The old man left the house with tearful eyes and touzled beard; on the
bough of a tree, in front of the hut, perched a magpie, which seeing
him asked:

"Why have you pulled out your beard, old man?"

"Oh, my dear bird, how can I help tearing my beard, when my little
child has drowned itself in the pot of porridge and is dead?"

When the magpie heard this, it tore out all its feathers, leaving
nothing but the tail.

The old woman set off with her bald head to the well, to get a jug of
water to wash the dead body of her child.

By the well stood a girl with a pitcher, who had come to draw water;
when she saw the old woman she asked:
"My, old woman, why have you torn the hair out of your head till you
are perfectly bald?"

"Alas, my darling, how can I help tearing my hair and making myself
bald, when my little mouse is dead?"

The girl, in her grief, smashed her pitcher in two, then she hurried
to the empress to tell her the story; the royal lady, as soon as she
heard it, fell down from the balcony, broke her ankle, and died, while
the emperor, out of love for his wife, went away and became a monk in
the monastery of Lies, beyond the Country of Truth; while I

Acquaintance made with grandsires old,

To whom this simple tale I told,
It seemed to them such perfect chaff
That its bare memory raised a laugh.

The Pea Emperor.

Once upon a time something wonderful happened. If it hadn't happened,

it wouldn't be told.

There was once a good for nothing fellow, who was so poor and needy
that he had not even enough to eat to be able to drink water after it.
When he had wandered through all the countries in the world, he
returned home somewhat more sensible. He had passed through many
perils abroad, knocked his head against the top of the door, been
sifted through the coarse and the fine sieve. He would now gladly have
pursued some trade, but he had no money. One day he found three peas.
After picking them up from the ground he took them on the palm of his
hand, looked at them, pondered a long time, and then said laughing:
"If I plant these seeds in the ground, I shall have a hundred in a
year; if I afterward plant the hundred, I shall have thousands, and if
I put these thousands in the earth I shall reap who knows how many!
Then, if I go on in this way, I shall finally become a rich man. But
if I could help wealth to come quicker--let me see!"

He went to the emperor and begged him to order through the whole
empire barrels in which to keep his peas.

When the emperor heard that he needed such a quantity of barrels, he

thought he must be stifling in money, and was more and more convinced
of it when he entered into conversation with him. What is true must
remain true; he didn't keep his mouth shut, but opened it and bragged
till it would have been supposed that real pearls fell from his lips.

He told the emperor what he had seen in foreign lands, related how
things were here and there, spoke of this and that, till the emperor
stood before him with his mouth wide open. When he saw that the
emperor marveled at his statements, he bragged more and more, saying
that he had palaces, herds, and other riches.

The sovereign believed the boaster's stories, and said to him:

"I see that you have traveled, know a great deal, and are cunning and
experienced; if you wish, I will gladly give you my daughter in
marriage."

The braggart now regretted having told so many lies, for he did not
know how to escape the monarch's proposal. After reflecting a short
time, he plucked up courage and said "I will gladly accept the
position of son-in-law you offer, and will try to show you that I am
worthy of it."

The necessary preparations were made, and after some time an imperial
wedding was celebrated in the palace. Then the man remained there.

One, two, several weeks elapsed, and no trace of peas and wealth
appeared. Finally the emperor began to repent what he had done, but
there was no help for it and the emperor's son-in-law perceived, from
the manner of the courtiers and nobles, that they had very little
respect for him.

His cheeks burned with shame. He made useless plans, tortured himself
to find some means of getting out of the scrape, and could not even
sleep at night. One morning without any one's knowledge he left the
palace at dawn, walked on till he came to a meadow, and wandered along
absorbed in thought, without knowing where he was going. Suddenly a
rosy-cheeked man stood before him, and asked: "Where are you going,
gossip, you look as sad and thoughtful as if all your ships had sunk
in the sea."

The emperor's son-in-law related his dilemma and what he was seeking,
and the man replied:

"If I deliver you from your difficulty, what will you give me?"

"Whatever you ask," he answered.

"There are nine of us brothers," said the man, "and each knows a
riddle. If you guess them our whole property shall be yours, but if
not, your first child must be ours."

The emperor's son-in-law, utterly crushed with shame, agreed, hard as

it was for him, hoping that before the child was born he might find
somebody who could tell him what to do.

So they set out together, that the stranger might show him the herds
of cattle he owned and his palaces, which were not far off. They also
instructed the herdsmen, swineherds, shepherds, and laborers what
they were to say, if any body asked to whom the flocks and herds
belonged.

The emperor's son-in-law returned to the palace and said that he would
take his wife home the next day. On his way back he met an old man in
the fields, and, seeing how aged and feeble he was, he pitied him and
offered him alms. The old man would accept nothing, but asked
permission to enter his service, telling him that he would be none the
worse for it, and the other received him. When the emperor heard that
his son-in-law wanted to go to his own palace, he was so delighted
that he commanded every thing to be arranged on a grand scale in order
to accompany him with imperial honors.

Therefore, on the following day, the whole court was filled with
nobles, soldiers, and attendants of all kinds. All the directions for
the journey had been given by the old man who had taken service with
the emperor's son-in-law; he said that he was the Pea Emperor's
steward, and all praised his energy, dignity, and industry.

The emperor was in high spirits and set out with the empress, the Pea
Emperor, and his bride, for his son-in-law's possessions. The old
servant went before and had every thing in good order. But the poor
Pea Emperor was as pale and dejected as if somebody had showered him
with boiling water. He was thinking of the riddles and how he could
guess them.

They drove and drove till they reached the fields. Here was a
beautiful meadow, beyond it a grove like the Garden of Paradise. When
the overseer of the fields saw them, he came up cap in hand.

"To whom do these estates belong, my friend?" asked the emperor.

"To the Pea Emperor," replied the man.

The emperor grew fat with joy, for he now believed that his son-in-law
really was no beggar. They drove on some distance further and met
numerous flocks and herds of all sorts of animals; the emperor asked
one keeper after another to whom they belonged, and all replied: "To
the Pea Emperor."

But when they reached the palace of the nine dragons the emperor
marveled at its magnificence. Every thing was in order. They were
received at the gate by a band of musicians, who played the most
beautiful tunes ever heard. The interior of the palace was adorned
with real gems. A magnificent banquet was hastily prepared, and they
drank the finest wine.

After the emperor had wished his son-in-law every happiness, he

returned to his own home greatly delighted with the riches he had
seen. But the Pea Emperor was almost dead with anxiety.

Evening came. The old servant said to his master:

"Master, what you have seen of me since I entered your service must
have convinced you of my fidelity. Now I assure you that I can help
you still more."

"Are you telling the truth?" asked the Pea Emperor.

"Do not doubt me for an instant, master! And I ask one thing besides:
let me spend the night in some corner of the chamber where you are
sleeping, even if it is behind the door. Moreover, I advise you not to
answer a single word, no matter who calls you by name or how great a
noise is made."

"Be it so!" said the Pea Emperor. And so it was.

After they had lain down and put out the light, they heard a dull,
rumbling noise like an approaching thunder storm. Then a hoarse, rough
voice said:

"Pea Emperor, Pea Emperor!"

"What do you want?" replied the old man.

"I'm not calling you," it replied, "I'm calling the Pea Emperor."

"That's just the same thing," replied the old man, "my master is
asleep, he's tired."

Then the noise of many voices was heard, as if people were quarreling!
Again the first one repeated: "Pea Emperor, Pea Emperor!"

"What is it?" the old man answered.

"What is one?"

"The moon is one."

"Is it you, master?"

"Burst, dragon!"

Then a terrible wailing arose, as if all the spirits of evil were

abroad, and another voice said:

"What is two?"

"Two eyes in the head see well."

"Is it you, master?"

"Burst, dragon!"

"What is three?"

"Where there are three grown daughters in a house, _beware_ of putting

your head in."

"Is it you, master?"

"Burst, dragon!"

"What is four?"

"The cart with four wheels runs well."

"Is it you, master?"

"Burst, dragon!"

"What is five?"

"Five fingers on the hand hold well."

"Is it you, master?"

"Burst, dragon!"

Again there was a noise like a thunder storm, and the palace shook as
if the earth was quaking. And again there was a shout for the Pea
Emperor. But the latter became more and more quiet, and scarcely
ventured to breathe, but remained perfectly still. This time, too, the
old servant answered. Another voice asked:

"What is six?"

"The flute with six holes blows well."

"Is it you, master?"

"Burst, dragon!"

"What is seven?"

"Where there are seven brothers, don't meddle with their affairs."

"Is it you, master?"

"Burst, dragon!"

"What is eight?"

"The plow with eight oxen furrows the earth well."

"Is it you, master?"

"Burst, dragon!"

"What is nine?"

"Where there are nine grown daughters in a house, it is not swept."

"Is it you, master?"

"Burst, dragon!"

The Pea Emperor, who heard all this, could not sleep all night long,
even when it grew so still that one might have heard a fly buzz; he
waited for daylight with the utmost impatience.

When he rose the next morning the old servant had vanished. He went
out of the palace, and what did he behold? The scattered corpses of
nine dragons, which he gave to the ravens. While thanking God for
having preserved his life and delivered him from disgrace, he heard a
sweet voice say:

"Your compassion for the poor man saved you. Always be charitable."

The Morning Star and The Evening Star.

Once upon a time something extraordinary happened. If it had not

happened it would not be told.

There was once an emperor and empress who were childless. So they
sought out all the wizards and witches, all the old women and
astrologers; but their skill proved vain, no one knew how to help
them. At last the royal pair devoted themselves to almsgiving,
praying, and fasting, until one night the empress dreamed that the
Lord had taken pity on her, and appearing to her, said: "I have heard
your prayers, and will give you a child whose like can not be found on
earth. Your husband, the emperor, must go to the brook to-morrow with
a hook and line, then you are to prepare with your own hands the fish
he catches, and eat it."

Before it was fairly daylight, the empress went to the emperor and
woke him, saying: "Rise, my royal husband, it is morning."

"Why, what ails you to-day, wife, that you wake me so early?" the
emperor replied. "Has any foe crossed the frontiers of my country?"

"Heaven forbid. I've heard nothing of that sort, but listen to my

dream."

And she told him about it.

When the emperor heard her story he jumped out of bed, dressed, took
the hook and line, and, gasping for breath, went to the brook. He
threw in the hook and soon saw the cork on the line bob. He pulled it
out, and what did he see? A big fish, made entirely of gold. It was a
wonder that he did not die of joy. But what did the empress say when
_she_ saw it? She was still more out of her wits.

The empress cooked the fish with her own hands, the royal couple ate
it, and the empress instantly felt that the promise would be
fulfilled.

The maid-servant who cleared away the table saw a fish-bone on the
empress' plate, and thought she would suck it, to know how food tastes
when prepared by royal hands.

One day the empress received the gift of a beautiful boy, as handsome
as a little angel. That same night the maid-servant, too, had a son
who looked so exactly like the prince that they could not be
distinguished from each other. The maid-servant's child precisely
resembled the royal one. The prince was named Busujok,[2] the
maid-servant's son was called Siminok.[3]

[Footnote 2: Busujok: Basil.]

[Footnote 3: Siminok: Geaphalium, cat's foot.]

They grew up together, were taught their lessons, and learned as much
in one day as other children in a whole year. When they were playing
in the garden, the empress watched them from her window with great
delight.

They became tall youths and looked so much alike that people could
never tell which was the prince and which the maid-servant's son. They
were haughty in bearing, both were charming, winning in speech, and
brave, brave to a fault.

One day they determined to go hunting. But the empress was constantly
fretting herself to find some way of recognizing her own son, for as
their faces were alike and their clothes precisely the same, she often
could not distinguish one from the other. She therefore thought of
putting some mark on the prince. So she called him, and while
pretending to be playing with his hair, knotted two locks together
without his knowledge. Then the youths went off to hunt.

They hurried joyously through the green fields, skipped about like
lambkins, gathered flowers, sprinkled themselves with dew, watched the
butterflies flit from blossom to blossom, saw the bees gather wax and
honey, and enjoyed themselves to the utmost. Then they went to the
springs, drank some water to refresh themselves, and gazed unweariedly
at the sky, which met the earth on the horizon. They would fain have
gone to the end of the world to see it close at hand, or at least far
enough to reach the spot where the earth grows marshy before it comes
to an end.

Next they went into the woods. When they saw the beauties of the
forest, they stood still with mouths wide open in astonishment.
Consider that they had not beheld any of these things in their whole
lives. When the wind blew and stirred the leaves, they listened to
their rustling, and it seemed as if the empress was passing by,
drawing her silken train after her. Then they sat down on the soft
grass, under the shade of a big tree. Here they began to reflect and
consult each other about how they were to commence hunting. They
wanted to kill nothing but wild beasts. They did not notice the birds
which hopped around them and perched on the boughs of the trees; they
would have been sorry to hurt them, for they liked to listen to their
twitter. It seemed as if the birds knew this; they showed no fear, but
sang as if they were going to split their throats; the nightingales,
however, trilled only from their craws, that their songs might be the
sweeter. While they stood there consulting, the prince suddenly felt
so overwhelmed with fatigue that he could hold out no longer, but
laying his head in Siminok's lap, asked him to stroke his hair.

While he was doing so, Siminok stopped and said:

"What is the matter with your head, Brother Busujok?"

"What should be the matter? How do I know, Brother Siminok?"

"Just see," replied Siminok, "two locks of your hair are tied
together."

"How is that possible?" said Busujok. This discovery vexed the prince
so much that he determined to go out into the wide world.

"Brother Siminok," he said, "I'm going out into the wide world,
because I can't understand why my mother tied my hair while she was
playing with it."

"Listen to reason, Brother Busujok, and do nothing of the sort,"

replied Siminok; "if the empress tied your hair, it certainly was not
for any evil purpose."

But Busujok remained firm in his resolve, and when he took leave of
Siminok, he said to him:

"Take this handkerchief, Brother Siminok, and if you ever see three
drops of blood on it, you will know that I am dead."

"May the Lord help you, Brother Busujok, that you may prosper; but I
beg you once more by my love, stay!"

"Impossible," replied Busujok.

Then the youths embraced each other, and Busujok departed; Siminok
remained behind, gazing longingly after him till he was out of sight.

Siminok then returned to the palace and related all that had happened.

The empress was insane with grief. She wrung her hands and wept till
it was pitiful to see her. But she did not know what to do, and at
last comforted herself a little by gazing at Siminok. After some time
the latter took out the prince's handkerchief, looked at it, and saw
three drops of blood on it. Then he said:

"Oh! my royal brother is dead. I shall go and look for him."

Taking some provisions for the journey, he set out in search of

Busujok. He passed through cities and villages, crossed fields and
forests, wandering on and on till he reached a small hut. There he
met an old woman, whom he asked about his brother. The crone told him
that Busujok had become the son of the emperor who reigned in the
neighborhood.

When Siminok reached this emperor's palace, the princess, as soon as

she saw him, thought that he was her husband and came running to meet
him. But he said: "I am your husband's brother; I have heard that he
is dead, and came here to learn something about him."

"I can not believe it," replied the princess. "You are my husband, and
I don't know why you deny it. Has my faith been put to any test, and
have I ever deceived you?"

"Nothing of the sort. But I tell you truthfully that I am not your
husband."

The princess would not believe this, so Siminok said:

"The Lord will show the truth. Let the sword hanging on yonder nail
scratch whichever of us two is mistaken."

Instantly the sword sprang down and cut the princess' finger. Then she
believed Siminok, and gave him the hospitality which was his due.

The next day he learned that Busujok had gone out hunting and had not
yet returned. So he, too, mounted a horse, took some greyhounds, and
rode after his brother, following the direction in which he had gone.
He rode on and on till he reached a forest, where he met the Wood
Witch. As soon as he saw her, he set off after her. She fled, he
pursued, until perceiving no way of escape she swung herself up into a
tall tree.

Siminok dismounted, tied his horse to a tree, made a fire, took out
his provisions, and began to eat, occasionally tossing the greyhounds
something.

"Oh, dear! Oh, dear! I'm so cold," said the Wood Witch, "my teeth are
chattering."
"Get down and warm yourself by the fire," replied Siminok.

"I'm afraid of the dogs," she said.

"Don't be frightened, they'll do you no harm."

"If you want to do me a favor," the Wood Witch answered, "take a

strand of my hair and tie your dogs with it."

Siminok put the hair in the fire.

"Oh! how horribly the hair I gave you smells--you have put it in the
fire."

"Go away from here and don't talk any more nonsense," replied Siminok.
"One of the hounds put its tail a little too near the fire and
scorched it, that's what smells so badly. If you are cold, come down
and warm yourself, if not, hold your tongue and let me alone."

The Wood Witch believed him, came down, approached the fire, and said:

"I am hungry."

"What shall I give you to eat? Take what you want of all I have."

"I should like to eat you," said the Wood Witch, "prepare for it."

"And I will devour you," replied Siminok.

He set the hounds upon her to tear her to pieces.

"Stop," cried the Wood Witch, "call off your dogs that they may not
tear me, and I'll give you back your brother with his horse, hounds,
and all."

Siminok called off the dogs.

The Wood Witch swallowed three times and up came Busujok, his horse,
and his dogs. Siminok now set his hounds upon her, and they tore her
into mince-meat. When Busujok recovered his senses, he wondered at
seeing Siminok there and said:

"Welcome, I'm glad to meet you so well and gay, Brother Siminok, but
I've been asleep a very long time."

"You might have slept soundly till the end of the world, if I had not
come?" he replied.

Then Siminok told him every thing that had happened from their parting
until that moment.

But Busujok suspected him; he thought that Siminok had won his wife's
love, and would not believe him when he told him the simple
truth--that such an idea had never entered his head.

Now that Busujok had once begun to be jealous of his bride, he acted
like a lunatic! So, being overpowered by evil thoughts, he made an
agreement with Siminok to bandage the eyes of their horses, mount
them, and let them carry their riders wherever they would.
This was done. When Busujok heard a groan he stopped his horse, untied
the bandage, and looked around him. Siminok was nowhere to be seen.
Just think! He had fallen into a spring, been drowned, and never came
out again!

Busujok returned home and questioned his wife; she told just the same
story as Siminok. Then, to be still more certain of the truth, he,
too, ordered the sword to jump down from the wall and scratch the one
who was wrong. The sword leaped down and wounded his middle finger.

The prince pined away, lamenting and weeping bitterly for the loss of
Siminok, and sorely repenting his undue haste, but all was vain,
nothing could be changed. So, in his grief and anguish, he resolved
not to live any longer without his brother, ordered his own eyes and
those of his horse to be bandaged, mounted it, and bade it hasten to
the forest where Siminok had perished. The horse went as fast as it
could, and plump! it tumbled into the very same spring where Siminok
had fallen, and there Busujok, too, ended his days. But at the same
time the morning star, the emperor's son Busujok, and the evening
star, the maid-servant's son Siminok, appeared in the sky.

Into the saddle then I sprung,

This tale to tell to old and young.

The Two Step-Sisters.

Once upon a time there was an old widower, who had one daughter; he
married again and took for his wife a widow, who also had a daughter.
The widow's daughter was ugly, lazy, obstinate and spiteful; yet as
she was her mother's own child, the latter was delighted with her and
pushed every thing upon her husband's daughter. But the old man's
child was beautiful, industrious, obedient and good. God had gifted
her with every virtuous and lovable quality, yet she was persecuted by
her spiteful sister, as well as by her step-mother; it was fortunate
that she possessed endurance and patience, or she would have fared
badly. Whenever there was any hard work to be done, it was put upon
the old man's daughter--she was obliged to get dry wood from the
forest, drag the heavy sacks of grain to the mill; in short, every
task always fell to her lot. The whole livelong day she had no rest,
but was kept continually going up stairs and down. Still the old woman
and her treasure of a daughter were constantly dissatisfied, and
always had something to find fault with. The step-daughter was a
heavy cross to the second wife, but her own daughter was like the
basil plant, which is placed before the images of the saints.

When the step-sisters went to the village in the evening to spin, the
old man's daughter did not allow herself to be interrupted in her
work, but finished a whole sieve full of spools, while the old woman's
daughter with difficulty completed a single one. When they came home
late at night, the old woman's daughter jumped nimbly over the fence
and asked to hold the sieve till the other had leaped over it too.
Meantime the spiteful girl hurried into the house to her parents, and
said she had spun all the spools. The step-sister vainly declared that
they were the work of her own hands; mother and daughter jeered at her
words, and of course gained their cause. When Sunday or Friday came
the old woman's daughter was brushed and bedizened as though the
calves had licked her. There was no dance, no feather-plucking in the
village to which the old woman's daughter did not go, but the
step-daughter was sternly denied every pleasure of the kind. Yet when
the husband came home, his wife's tongue ran like a mill-wheel--her
step-daughter was disobedient, bold, bad-tempered, this, that, and the
other; he must send her away from home, put her out at service,
whichever he chose; it was impossible to keep her in the house because
she might ruin her daughter too.

The old man was a jackanapes, or, as the saying goes, under petticoat
government. Every thing his wife said was sacred. Had he obeyed the
voice of his heart the poor old man might perhaps have said something,
but now the hen had begun to crow in the house, and the rooster was of
no consequence; yet, if he had thought of opposing them, his wife and
her daughter would have soon made him repent it. One day, when he was
unusually angry about what his wife had told him, he called the young
girl, and said:--

"My dear child, your mother is always saying that you are disobedient
to her, have a spiteful tongue, and are wicked, so that it is not
possible for you to stay any longer in my house; therefore go wherever
the Lord may guide you, that there may no longer be so much quarreling
here on your account. But I advise you as a father, wherever you may
go, to be obedient, humble, and industrious, for here with me all your
faults have been overlooked, parental affection has aided, but among
strangers nobody knows what sort of people you may meet, and they will
not indulge you as we have done."

When the poor girl saw that her step-mother and her daughter wanted to
drive her out of the house at any cost, she kissed her father's hand
with tears in her eyes, and went out into the wide world without any
hope of ever returning home. She walked along the road till she
chanced to meet a little sick dog, so thin that one could count its
ribs.

When the dog saw her, it said: "You beautiful, industrious girl, have
pity on me and take care of me, I will reward you some day."

The girl did pity the poor animal, and, taking it in her arms, washed
and cleaned it thoroughly. Then she left it and went on, glad that she
had been able to do a good action. She had not walked far when she
came to a fine pear-tree in full bloom, but it was completely covered
with caterpillars.

When the pear-tree saw the girl, it said: "You beautiful, industrious
girl, take care of me and rid me of these caterpillars, I will repay
you for it some day."

The girl, with her usual diligence, cleared the pear-tree from its dry
branches and most carefully removed the caterpillars; then she walked
quietly on to seek some place where she might enter into service.

On her way she came to a ruined, neglected fountain, which said to

her: "You beautiful, industrious girl, take care of me, I will reward
you some day."

The little maid cleared the fountain, cleaned it thoroughly, and then
went on again. As she walked she came to a dilapidated oven, which had
become almost entirely useless.

As soon as the oven saw her, it said: "You beautiful, industrious

girl, line me with stones and clean me, I will repay you some day!"

The young girl knew that work harms no one, so she rolled up her
sleeves, moistened some clay, stopped the holes in the stove, greased
it and cleaned it till it was a pleasure to see it. Then she washed
her hands and continued her journey. As she walked on, day and night,
it happened, I don't know how--that she missed her way; yet she did
not lose her trust in God, but walked on and on until early one
morning, after passing through a dark forest, she reached a beautiful
meadow. In the meadow she saw a little house, completely overgrown
with vines, and when she approached it an old woman came out kindly to
meet her, and said: "What are you seeking here, child, and who are
you?"

"Who should I be, good dame! A poor girl, motherless, and I may say
fatherless, too, for God alone knows what I have suffered since my own
mother's hands were folded on her breast. I am seeking service, and as
I know nobody and am wandering from place to place I have lost my way.
But the Lord guided me, so that I have reached your house and I beg
you to give me a shelter."

"Poor child!" replied the old dame. "Surely God himself has led you to
me and saved you from danger. I am the goddess of Sunday. Serve me
to-day, and I promise that you shall not leave my house empty-handed
to-morrow."

"Very well, but I don't know what I have to do."

"You must wash and feed my little children, who are now asleep, and
then cook my dinner; when I come home from church I want to find it
neither hot nor cold, but just right to eat."

When she had said this, the old woman set off for church. The young
girl rolled up her sleeves and went to work. First of all she prepared
the water for the bath, then went out-doors and began to call:
"Children, children, children, come to mother and let her wash you."

When she looked up, what did she behold? The court-yard was filled
and the woods were swarming with a host of dragons and all sorts of
wild beasts of every size. But, firm in her faith and trust in God,
the young girl did not quail, but taking one animal after another
washed and cleaned it in the best possible way. Then she set about
cooking the dinner, and when Sunday came out of church and saw her
children so nicely washed and every thing so well done she was greatly
delighted. After she had sat down to the table, she told the young
girl that she might go up into the attic, choose whichever chest she
wanted, and take it away with her for her wages; but she must not open
it until she reached her father's house.

The maiden went to the garret, where there were a number of chests,
some old and ugly, others new and beautiful. But as she was not a bit
covetous, she took the oldest and ugliest of them all. When she came
down with it, the goddess of Sunday frowned slightly, but there was no
help for it, so she blessed the girl, who took her trunk on her back
and joyfully returned to her father's house.
On the way, lo and behold! there was the oven full of beautifully
risen, nicely browned cakes. The girl ate and ate, as many as she
could, then took some with her for her journey and went on. Soon she
came to the fountain she had cleaned, and which was now filled to the
brim with water as clear as tears and as sweet and cold as ice. On the
edge stood two silver goblets, from which she drank the water until
she was entirely refreshed. Then, taking one goblet with her, she
walked on. As she went, lo and behold! there stood the pear-tree she
had cleaned, full of pears as yellow as wax, perfectly ripe, and as
sweet as honey. When the pear-tree saw the girl, it bent its branches
down to her, and she ate some of the fruit and took more pears to eat
on the way, just as many of them as she wanted. From there she
journeyed on again, and lo and behold! she next met the little dog,
which was now well and handsome; around its neck it wore a collar of
ducats which it gave the old man's daughter as a reward for taking
care of it in its sickness.

So the young girl at last reached her father's house. When the old man
saw her his eyes filled with tears and his heart throbbed with joy.
The girl took out the dog's collar and the silver goblet and gave them
to her father; when they opened the chest together, out came countless
numbers of horses, cattle, and sheep, till the sight of so much wealth
instantly made the old man young again. But his wife stood as if she
were dazed, and did not know what to do in her rage. Her daughter,
however, plucked up courage and said:--

"Never mind, mother, the world isn't emptied yet; I'll go and fetch
you still greater treasures."

After saying this she angrily set off at once. She walked and walked
along the same path her step-sister had followed. She, too, met the
sick, feeble dog, passed the pear-tree covered with caterpillars, the
dry, neglected fountain, and the dilapidated oven which had become
almost useless; but when dog, tree, fountain and oven begged her to
take care of them, she answered rudely and scornfully: "Do you
suppose I'll soil my delicate hands! Have you often been tended by
people like me?"

As they all knew that it is easier to get milk from a dry cow than to
make a spoiled, lazy girl obliging, they let her go her way in peace,
and no longer asked her for help. As she walked on and on, she too at
last reached the Goddess Sunday. But here also she behaved sullenly,
saucily, and awkwardly. Instead of cooking the dinner nicely and
washing Sunday's children as thoroughly as her step-sister had done,
she burned them all till they screamed and ran off as though crazed by
the burns and the pain. The food she scorched, charred, and let curdle
so that no one could eat it, and when Sunday came home from church she
covered her eyes and ears in horror at what she found in her house.
Even the gentle, indulgent goddess could not get along with such an
obstinate, lazy girl as this one, so she told her to go up into the
garret, choose any chest she wanted, and then in God's name continue
her journey.

The girl went, took the newest and handsomest trunk, for she liked to
get as much as possible of the best and finest things, but was not
willing to do faithful service. When she came down she did not go to
the Goddess Sunday to receive her blessing, but hurried off as if she
were quitting an evil house. She nearly ran herself off her feet, in
the fear that her mistress might change her mind and follow her to get
her trunk back. When she reached the oven there were some nice cakes
in it, but when she approached to satisfy her hunger the fire burned
her and she could take none. The silver goblets were again at the
fountain and the fountain was full of water to the brim, but when the
girl tried to seize the cup to drink, the goblets instantly vanished,
the water dried up, and the girl almost died of thirst. When she came
to the pear tree it stood full of pears, but do you suppose the
traveler could taste even one of them? No! The tree had made itself a
thousand times as tall as before, so that its boughs touched the
clouds! So the old woman's daughter might pick her teeth, she obtained
nothing else. Going further on she met the dog, which again had a
collar of ducats round its neck; but when the girl tried to take it
off the dog bit her so that he tore off her fingers and would not let
her touch him. The girl, in rage and shame, sucked her delicate little
hands, but it did no good.

At last, after great difficulty, she reached her mother's house, but
even here she did not find herself rolling in money, for when the old
man's wife opened the chest, out came a host of dragons, which
swallowed her and her daughter as if they had never been in the world.
Then dragons, trunk, and all vanished.

The old man could now live in peace, and possessed countless riches;
his daughter he married to a worthy, capable man. The cocks now crowed
on the gate-posts, the threshold, and everywhere, but the hens no
longer crowed as an evil omen in the house of the old man, who had not
many days of life remaining. He was bald and bent, because his wife
had quarreled with him too often and looked to see if he didn't need a
drubbing.

The Poor Boy.

Once upon a time something happened. If it hadn't happened, it

wouldn't be told.

There was once a poor widow, so poor that even the flies would not
stay in her house, and this widow had two children, a boy and a girl.
The boy was such a brave fellow that he would have torn the snakes'
tongues out of their mouths, and the girl was so beautiful that the
emperor's sons and handsome princes of every land were waiting
impatiently for her to grow up, that they might go and court her. But
when the girl had reached her sixteenth year, the same thing befell
her that happens to all beautiful maidens--a dragon came, stole her,
and carried her far away to the shore of another country. From that
day the widow loved her son hundreds and thousands of times better
than before, because he was now her only child and the sole joy she
had in the world. She watched him like the apple of her eye and would
not let him go a single step away from her. But much as she loved him
she was cheerless and sad, for, dear me! a boy is only a boy, but a
girl is a girl, especially when she is beautiful.

The boy, seeing his mother so melancholy, tried to grow stronger and
stronger, and counted the days before he should be large enough to go
out into the world and seek his sister, little Rosy Cheeks, along
untrodden paths filled with thorns. When he had reached his eighteenth
year he made himself a pair of calf-skin sandals with steel soles,
went to his mother, and said:--

"Mother, I have neither rest nor peace here so long as I see you so
sick and sorrowful from constantly thinking of my sister; I have
determined to go out into the wide world and not return till I can
bring news of her. I don't know whether I shall find her, but at least
I hope so, and that hope I leave with you for your consolation."

When the widow heard these words she was forced to struggle with her
feelings ere she answered: "Well, my son, my child! Do what you can
not help doing; when you return I shall see you again, and if you
don't come back I shall not weep for you, because the journey you have
in view is a long one; therefore if you are absent a long time there
will always be the hope of your return."

After saying this she mixed three loaves for him with her own milk,
one of meal, the second of bran, and the third of ashes from the
hearth. The lad put the loaves into his knapsack, bade his mother
farewell, and went out into the world like a poor boy to whom all
roads are equally long, all bridges equally wide, and who does not
know what direction to take. At the gate he stood still, cast one
glance to the east, one to the west, one to the north, and one to the
south, then took a handful of dust from under the threshold of the
door, scattered it on the wind, and turned his steps in the direction
that it was carried by the breeze.

The Poor Boy walked and walked, further and further, through many a
rich country, till he came to a moor on which no grass grew and no
water flowed. Here he stopped and pulled out his three loaves. He
began with the one made of meal, because it was the handsomest, and as
he ate it his strength increased and his thirst was quenched. Again
the Poor Boy walked on, journeying across the wide moor a whole long
summer day until nightfall, when he reached a vast forest as extensive
as the heath he had passed, but which was dense, gloomy, and forsaken
even by the winds. When he entered the wood, he saw by the trunk of a
tree an old woman with a bent figure and a wrinkled face. The Poor
Boy, who for so long a time had seen no human countenance and heard no
human speech, was greatly delighted and said merrily:--

"Good luck, mother! But how do you happen to come here, and what are
you doing in this wilderness of a forest?"

"Your words are kind!" replied the old woman sighing. "Alas, age has
brought me down to this; I wanted to walk a little distance and can go
no further because my feet will no longer carry me."

When the Poor Boy heard this he pitied the old woman, went up to her,
and asked whence she came, where she was going, and on what business
she was bent. The luckless fellow did not know that this person was no
other than the Wood Witch, who waits on the edge of forests and meets
those who wander in these desolate regions, in order to delude them
with fair words and then lead them to destruction. When he saw her so
feeble, the boy remembered his three loaves, and, as if he were going
home the very next day, thought he would share his provisions with her
that she might get a little strength.

"I thank you," replied the Wood Witch, who had other designs upon him
in her mind; "but see, I have no teeth to chew your dry bread. If you
want to do any thing to help me, take me on your back and carry me, I
live close by."

"But just taste it," said the boy, who in his kindness of heart wanted
to do her some good. "It is only hunger that has made you so weak, and
if this doesn't help you I'll carry you as you wish."

When the Wood Witch saw the loaf made of meal she gazed at it with
delight; there was something about it--I don't know what--that made
even the Wood Witch long for a morsel. And as she bit into it her
heart grew softer. After she had eaten three mouthfuls she felt as if
she were a human being, like the rest of us, with her heart in the
right place and a gentle temper.

"Learn, my son," she said to him, "that I am the Wood Witch, and know
very well who you are, whence you come, and where you are going. It is
a great task you have before you, for your sister is in the other
world, which inhabitants of this earth can reach only in one way."

"And what is that?" asked the Poor Boy impatiently.

The Wood Witch looked doubtfully at him.

"I don't advise you to take it," she said, "it would be a pity to lose
your young life. But who knows, perhaps you'll have good luck; I see
that you have a tender heart, and whoever has that can bring many
things to pass; besides, I know you--you will have no rest till you
have found her. So learn--far away from here, after you have crossed
six moors and six forests, you will meet on the edge of the seventh
forest, which extends to the frontiers of the next world, an old
witch; this witch has a drove of horses, and among them is an
enchanted horse which can carry you to the other shore. But this steed
can be obtained only by the person who knows how to choose it from the
whole drove, after he has served the old witch for a year."

This was what the Poor Boy had wanted to know. He lost no more time,
thanked the Wood Witch for her explanations, and set off, keeping
straight through the dense forest, because his road was long and he
was in a hurry. The Poor Boy walked like one who goes on a good
errand, and hurried like a person who wants to get home early. How far
he walked and how much he hurried any one can imagine, who remembers
how long a time he himself required to cross a single moor and a
single forest. But, when his strength failed, he bit off a piece of
his loaf and instantly revived again.

As he came out of the sixth forest and passed near the clear waves of
a brook, he saw a wasp struggling in the water and pitied the insect.
So he took a dry branch and held out one end of it to the wasp, that
it might crawl up on it and then use its wings. But this wasp happened
to be the queen of all the wasps in the woods, and when she found
herself saved by the boy's kindness she flew upon his shoulder and
said:

"Wherever you go, may good-luck be your companion. Please pull out a
hair from under my right wing and take good care of it, for who knows
whether it will not prove useful to you some day. If you need me,
shake this hair and I'll come to you, in whatever part of the world
you may be."
The Poor Boy pulled out the hair, put it carefully away, and journeyed
on. Who knows how far he walked before he came to a great lake, on
whose shore he saw a fish flapping on the dry land. He pitied the poor
creature, which had scarcely a breath of life left, so he picked it up
and tossed it into the water. But this fish was king of all the
fishes, and had jeweled scales and golden fins. It swam once around
the lake, breathed two or three times to recover its strength, and
then came back to the boy and said:

"Wherever you go, may good-luck be your companion. Please pull off a
scale from under my right fin and keep it carefully, who knows whether
it may not be useful to you some day. If you ever need me, rub this
scale and I'll come to you wherever you may be, as far as the water
extends around the earth."

The Poor Boy took the scale, put it carefully away, and journeyed on.
Who knows how far he walked ere he reached the seventh moor, where no
grass grew and no water flowed. There he found in his path a mole
which had been surprised above ground by the daylight, and was now
groping piteously about in its blindness, unable to find its burrow
where its children were starving, though it was only one jump away.
The youth pitied the mole, too, took it and carried it to its hill.

"Wherever you go," said the mole, "may good-luck be your companion.
Please take a claw from my right paw and keep it carefully; who knows
whether it may not be useful to you some day. But if you need me,
scratch on the ground with this claw and I will come to you in
whatever part of the earth you may be."

The Poor Boy took the claw, put it carefully away, and went on again
over the endless moor toward the invisible forest that lay on the
frontiers of the other world. How many days and nights he journeyed
over this moor heaven only knows; but one morning, when he woke, he
saw in the distance, as far off as if it were in the other world, a
streak of light like the fire shepherds build at the entrance of the
fold. This was the home of the witch who had the enchanted horse.

The Poor Boy was greatly delighted when he found himself so near the
end of the world, and his joy increased till, on the evening of the
third day, he reached the enchantress's house. Oh, dear! there he
was, in the midst of the moor, just at the edge of the forest, which
stretched far beyond his sight in the dusk of twilight, upon a wide
plain covered with green grass, through which flowed streams of clear
water, but in the middle of this plain rose a number of tall poles, on
each of which was a human skull. The witch's hut stood in the midst of
these poles, with a tall poplar in front of it, and on the right and
left a willow tree. This proved that the Wood Witch was right--life
here was by no means merry. The Poor Boy plucked up his courage and
approached to enter the hut, which stood as if deserted in the middle
of the moor.

The old witch sat on a high three-legged chair in the entry, but
before her stood a huge kettle on a big tripod, over a fire that
burned without smoke. In one hand she held the shin-bone of a giant,
which she used to stir the herbs stewing in the caldron. When the Poor
Boy bade her good evening, she eyed him from top to toe.

"Welcome, my hero! I've expected you a long time, for this caldron has
long been rattling and telling me continually that you were on the
way."

The lad was much pleased with this kind reception, for the old woman
did not seem to him at all peevish, as she looked kindly at him and
spoke in a gentle voice. She, too, was glad, because she had again
laid hands on a man, for the poles bearing human skulls protected her
from the malicious elves, who could not pass through them; and there
was still one piece of ground large enough for three heads, where
poles had not yet been put.

They now agreed that the Poor Boy should watch the drove a whole year,
and in payment receive the horse he himself should choose; but if he
should lose the drove he was to give up his head to the witch. The old
woman instantly stuck a pole in the ground and put the hero's hat on
it. Then the youth ate something, that he might not go with the drove
to the pasture hungry. While the boy was eating, the witch led the
mares behind the hut and began to beat them with the giant's shin
bone, telling them not to drink any water during the night, nor allow
the others to do so, because the water from the springs in the plain
would put them to sleep, and the old woman wanted the herd to graze
all night. The boy knew nothing about this.

When he came to the pasture with the drove he was attacked by so great
a thirst, that he would have walked from morning till night to find a
drop of water; so to quench it he lay down by a spring and drank, and
even while drinking he fell asleep.

When in the first gray dawn of the next morning he woke from his
slumber, the drove had vanished, leaving no trace anywhere! It is only
necessary to remember that the lad's cap was already hanging on the
pole to understand how great was his despair. But he gazed around him
in every direction without discovering even a sign of a horse; the
morning twilight was fast vanishing, and he stood utterly forsaken,
not knowing which way to turn. Then he recollected the service he had
once rendered the wasp, and thought that a wasp flies so fast that it
might discover the drove and bring him news of their hiding-place, so
he took the hair he had pulled from under the wasp's right wing and
shook it. Quick as thought a buzzing noise was heard from every
direction--it grew louder and louder, till one might have thought the
world was going to ruin. Good gracious! There came one wasp after
another, one swarm behind another, whole ranks, great clouds of wasps
of all sizes, all ready to circle the earth and obey the Poor Boy's
commands.

"Have no anxiety," said the Wasp Queen; "if the drove still remains on
the earth, we'll bring the horses back to you ere sunrise."

Then every thing became quiet, because the wasps flew off to every
quarter of the globe and scattered all over the world. Ere long a
cloud of dust appeared in the distance, swept with mad haste over the
wide plain in the midst of the moor, and the drove of horses, urged by
the wasps' stings, dashed up so swiftly that the earth fairly groaned
under their hoofs. The Poor Boy thanked the wasps for their help, and
then went to the hut as if nothing had happened.

The old woman looked askance at him, said he had done well, and then
beat the mares again, ordering them to hide carefully at night. That
evening the lad would eat nothing, because he thought the witch's food
had caused his terrible thirst the night before; but when he went with
the drove to the pasture, a burning, consuming thirst seized upon him
as soon as he saw the clear water, and wherever he went springs
bubbled from under his feet. At last he could no longer control
himself, and relying upon the aid of the wasps, lay down beside a
spring and had scarcely drunk when he instantly fell asleep. This time
he woke later than on the night before, because he had gone to sleep
later, so he was later in shaking the hair he had pulled out from
under the wasp's wing, and the swarms of wasps were later in coming to
seek and drive the horses home.

But what did the youth see? Ere long one swarm after another returned,
each bringing news that the drove could not be found on the surface of
the earth and must have hidden somewhere in the sea.

The sun was about to rise. The Poor Boy took the fish-scale, rubbed
it, and suddenly there appeared in the springs at his feet a school of
tiny fish, that filled every channel, and asked what were his wishes
and commands. He told them what he desired and instantly all the
waters on the earth, rivers, lakes, and seas, began to swell and dash,
while the wasps flew off to be ready to pounce upon the drove as soon
as the fish forced the horses to appear.

The Poor Boy had scarcely time to collect his horses and take them
home when the sun rose.

The old woman looked angrily at him, but said again that he had done
well, and gave the mares a still more terrible beating; for the year
consisted of three days, and if they did not hide successfully that
night the hero might demand his wages.

The Poor Boy knew this too. So he began to eat his meal-loaf as he
went with the drove to the pasture, and whenever he bit off a piece
his strength increased and his thirst was quenched. Yet, whenever he
saw the springs or heard the water rippling over the pebbles, he grew
thirsty again, and so devoured the whole of the meal-loaf. He ought
now to have taken the bran loaf, but did not venture to do so because
he still had a long journey before him, and was afraid of being
without food. Therefore he again relied on the aid of the wasps and
fishes, lay down by a spring, and as soon as he had drunk fell asleep.

When he awoke it was broad daylight, though the sun had not yet risen.
He shook the hair, but the wasps came with the tidings that the drove
was not on the surface of the earth, he rubbed the fish-scale, but the
fishes said the horses were not under the water either; so, in his
despair, he seized the mole's claw and scratched on the ground with
it.

Then you should have seen the wonder! The wasps buzzed, the fish
searched all the water in the world, and the moles began to rummage
the earth, furrowing it in every direction as if they meant to make it
into pap. When the first sunbeams touched the top of the poplar before
the hut, the drove dashed like hunted ghosts to the Poor Boy; if the
horses tried to go into the water the fish scared them back, if they
tried to hide themselves in the ground the claws of the moles drove
them out, and so they were forced to go wherever the wasps guided
them.

The Poor Boy thanked his friends for their help, and returned home
just as the sun shone upon the hut. The old woman looked angrily at
him, but said nothing.

But now trouble came. The year was over, and the Poor Boy began to
rack his brains because he did not know which horse in the drove he
ought to choose. That's the way with over-hasty people. The Wood Witch
could probably have told him this, too, if he had not left her so
quickly. Now he went to work hap-hazard. Still, he thought, whatever
he might hit upon he should not fare badly, for on a long journey it
was better at any rate to be on horseback than on foot. Besides, he
had seen the old witch's horses run and knew that they were fine
animals, no worthless jades. So he went through the drove, and as he
walked noticed a sick filly, which he pitied because it looked so
neglected, but he did not think of choosing it. But, no matter how
much he turned and twisted, he always stopped beside this animal, for
he was very kind-hearted and told himself that, even if he could not
make much use of it, he could at least do the poor creature some
service.

"Who knows," he said, "if I should comb, brush, and curry it, perhaps
it may yet make a good horse!"

So he chose it, and resolved to take with him the pouch containing the
comb, brush, and curry-comb, in order to carefully tend his horse.

The old witch turned green with spite when she heard that the youth
had chosen this steed, for it was the very one. But what could she do?
She was obliged to keep her promise. She merely advised him to select
another, better animal, telling him that he would soon be without a
horse, and that good work deserved good wages, but at last she gave
it to him.

Still, a witch always remains a witch, and when the Poor Boy had
mounted, taken leave of her, and ridden off, she went to the big
caldron, took it off and mounted the tripod, then she changed herself
in face and figure and hurried after with the speed of curses, to
catch him, kill him, and get her horse back. The Poor Boy felt that
something terrible was pursuing him, and set spurs to his steed.

"It's no use to spur me," said the horse, "we can't outrun her, so
long as we are on her lands. But throw the comb behind you, to put an
obstacle in her way."

Now the Poor Boy knew that he had chosen wisely when he took the sick
filly. So he drew the comb out of the bag, flung it behind him, and it
instantly became a long, high fence, which the witch could not climb
over, so she was obliged to go a long way round, and he thus gained a
start.

"Throw down the brush," said the horse, when it again heard the
trampling of the tripod near them.

The rider threw the brush, which turned into a dense growth of reeds,
through which the old hag forced her way with much difficulty and many
a groan.

"Throw the curry-comb," cried the horse for the third time. When he
had flung that down, the Poor Boy looked back and saw a whole forest
of knives and swords, and among them the witch trying to get through
and being cut into mince-meat.

When they reached the seventh forest, where the witch's kingdom ended,
the sick horse shook itself and became a handsome, winged steed, whose
like was never seen before or since.

"Now hold fast," said the horse, "I am going to carry you as never
hero went from this world to the other, for I, too, have a sister
there whom I seek."

The Poor Boy was dazed by the swiftness with which the horse flew over
the forest and alighted in the other world through a large opening in
another part of the woods. When he recovered his senses, he found
himself on the shore of the other world with the horse, which now
shook itself a second time, changed into a handsome prince with long,
curling locks, and said:

"Wherever you go, may good luck be your companion, for you have
released me from the spell the Wood Witch laid upon me. Learn that I
am the son of the Red Emperor and set out to seek my sister, but on
the edge of the forest I met the Wood Witch, who complained that she
could walk no further and begged me to carry her on my back; but when,
out of pity, I let her get on my shoulders, she changed me into a
horse and condemned me to retain that form until a hero took pity on
me and mounted me, that I might carry him to the other world, there I
was to regain my human form."

The Poor Boy was greatly overjoyed to find himself no longer alone. He
took the bran loaf, broke it in halves, and gave one portion to the
prince, that they might be brothers till death. The prince tasted the
bread, and as he ate his strength and his love increased. They told
each other their experiences, and then went on their way.

Far, far off, just at the end of the coast-line, rose shining
buildings, which must be the dragons' palaces. The country here was so
beautiful, that one would have gladly traveled through it forever, it
was so radiant with light, so green, so rich in flowers, birds of
beautiful plumage, and tame, sportive animals. And in this country men
never grew old, but remained exactly the same age as when they entered
it, for here there were no days, the sun neither rose nor set, but the
light came of itself, as if from a clear sky. The dragons, however,
were nowhere to be seen, and the two brothers for life continued their
way. After they had walked as far as a three-days' march, they reached
the beautiful palaces and paused before them, because they were so
marvelously lovely, with high towers, and walls built of stones as
soft as velvet, covered with plates of snow that had been dried in the
sun. But they seemed empty and deserted.

The Poor Boy and the prince entered, went through all the rooms filled
with costly ornaments, and, seeing no one, thought that the dragon
must surely have gone hunting and determined to wait for him. But they
were surprised that they did not find their sisters here. Each
stretched himself on one of the beautiful divans and was going to
rest, when suddenly both started up, amazed by what they heard.

Dear me! It was a song, so touching that it would have softened the
very stones; it made those who listened feel as if they were in
heaven, and the notes were in a woman's voice. The two companions did
not listen long, but hurried off in the direction from which the sound
came.

This is what they saw--in one part of the palace was a glass tower,
and in this tower sat a girl spinning, singing, and weeping, but her
tears, in falling, were instantly changed to pearls. This maiden was
so beautiful that, if she had been in the world, two men would have
killed each other for her sake. When the heroes beheld her, they stood
motionless and gazed longingly at her, but the girl stopped spinning,
and neither sang nor wept, but looked at them in amazement.

She was not the sister of either youth, but as usually happens in such
cases, the Poor Boy supposed she was the prince's sister, and the
prince thought she was the sister of the Poor Boy.

"I'll stay here," said the Poor Boy, "and you can go on, deliver my
sister, and marry her."

"No, I'll stay here," replied the prince, "you can go on and release
my sister, for this maiden shall be my wife."

Now came trouble! When they understood that the lovely girl was the
sister of neither, the handsome heroes seized their swords and were on
the point of fighting as men do fight when they are obliged to divide
any thing.

"Stop," said the fair girl, "don't attack each other. It is better
first to discover whether I am really what I seem to you, or, after
all, only a shadow! I am the Bodiless Maiden, who will not obtain
form in this world until the dragon has stolen me from the other
shore. I shall then be as you see me now, shall spin, sing, and weep,
because I shall think of my mother who is spinning, singing, and
weeping; and your sisters, who were stolen by the two older brothers
of the dragon who rules this palace spin, sing, and weep, too."

On hearing this, the two heroes wanted to set off at once, in order to
lose no more time on the way.

"Stop, don't be over hasty," said the Bodiless Maiden. "You probably
think that you will conquer the dragons by mere will? Great deeds
await you. The old she-dragon put me here, that I might constantly
spur on her youngest son, because it is written that all three
brothers are to be married at the same time. The two older brothers
keep your sisters prisoners, but can not wed them till the youngest
son has stolen me. Whenever he comes home from hunting, he stops there
where you are standing, gazes longingly at me, then arranges his
weapons and feeds his horse with red-hot coals, but can't set out yet
because my hour has not come. So stay and conquer him here, that he
may not steal me while you are on your way, for you would then be too
late in reaching your sisters. Yet mind one thing; you can not conquer
him outside of his court-yard, because he is invisible. So, when he
comes home, he throws his club at the gate with so much force that the
earth quakes, the walls fall down, and any mortals who might be inside
are buried alive. If you feel that you have strength enough to hold
the gates on their hinges, so that they can not give way when he hurls
the club against them, stay, otherwise go, in God's name, for it would
be a pity to lose your young lives."

The Poor Boy and the prince looked at each other, understood that the
deed must be done, and resolved to stay. While the Poor Boy went to
the gates to hold them, the prince drew his sword and awaited the
dragon in the middle of the court-yard. You can perceive that this was
no joke.

Very little time passed, when suddenly, crash! the club struck against
the iron-barred gates so that one might have believed the world was
falling to pieces. The Poor Boy thought the muscles of his heart would
crack in two under the terrible strain, and the walls would crumble to
their foundations--but he held the gates on their hinges. When the
dragon saw that the palace did not fall down, he stood still in
surprise.

"What does this mean?" he said. "I must have grown very weak since
yesterday." He did not suspect what awaited him.

When, with some difficulty, he opened the gate, he did not notice the
Poor Boy, but went straight toward the prince, who stood in mortal
terror in the middle of the court-yard, for, after all, what would you
expect? A dragon is a dragon, and not a girl in woman's clothes.

We won't linger over the story any longer, we know what always happens
when dragons and princes meet. They began the battle. The prince was a
hero, but the dragon was the youngest of three brothers! They fought
with swords, who knows how long? then, when they saw that neither
could conquer the other in that way, they fought hand to hand, while
the Poor Boy held up the palace, that it might not fall down on their
heads.

When the Poor Boy saw that his strength was failing and neither was
conquering the other, he called loudly: "Seize him and throw him on
the ground, I can hold out no longer."

The prince grasped the dragon, summoned up all his strength, and
hurled him on the ground so that his bones cracked and he lay
senseless; then he hastily took to flight, ran through the half-open
gate, and pulled the Poor Boy after him; the walls fell, the huge
splendid palaces toppled down, and, as it were, buried the dragon
alive. Nothing remained standing except the glass tower, now empty and
deserted. The Bodiless Maiden had vanished from it the very moment
that there was no longer any one who could have stolen her from the
other world.

The two comrades thanked the Lord that they had been able to
accomplish their task so far, and journeyed on, walking and walking,
till they reached the palace of the second dragon. Already in the
distance they saw the glass tower and heard the wailing song; but the
Poor Boy's heart beat higher, because the nearer he approached the
more distinctly he recognized his sister's voice. When they reached
the beautiful great palace and saw the girl in the glass tower, both
rushed up to break into the turret and clasp her in their arms.

But affairs could not be managed so easily. The girl in the glass
tower, who was really the Poor Boy's sister, looked at them in
surprise; but when he told her that he had come to rescue her from the
dragon's claws, she replied that she did not know him, and that
neither in face nor form did he bear any resemblance to her brother.
Great was the Poor Boy's grief when he saw that his sister wanted to
have nothing to do with him, though for her sake he had crossed so
many moors and encountered so many dangers, but his sorrow became
still greater when she began to complain that she was dying of love
for the dragon. Every day, she said, he came and gazed ardently at
her, yet day after day kept her a prisoner and did not marry her.
Still, this was endurable to the Poor Boy, because she was only his
sister; but when the prince saw the girl, heard her voice, and
perceived her love for the dragon, he became perfectly frantic.

"Well then, if you won't come, we'll carry you off by force!" he said,
ready to take the whole palace on his back and fly with it to the
other shore.

"Gently, gently," said the girl; "if it came to that, I need only pull
a nail out of this glass wall to bring the whole palace toppling down
upon your heads. But I pity your youth, and advise you not to stay
here long, because my betrothed husband might catch you, and you will
have no one to mourn for you."

The Poor Boy now took his ash-cake from his knapsack and said:
"Sister, just taste this bread, and then say that I am not your
brother."

She held out her hand and the glass walls opened; but after she had
taken the bread and tasted it she felt that it had been mixed with
her own mother's milk, and was seized with such terrible homesickness
that one might have wept for pity. "Forward!" she said hastily, "let
us fly, for if he finds us here, woe betide you."

The Poor Boy took her in his arms and kissed her, because she was his
sister, but the prince embraced and kissed her, too, because--because
he was the Poor Boy's sworn brother.

Then they agreed to serve this dragon as they had served his brother,
so they waited awhile, received the dragon as he deserved, conquered
him, and after thanking God that they had overcome this peril too,
journeyed on again to deliver the emperor's daughter.

But now came fresh trouble. The princess did not want to be rescued,
and the prince had no token with him by which she might have
recognized him as her brother. In vain the Poor Boy told her that if
she did not come willingly, he would carry her off by force; she kept
her hand on the dangerous nail and it was impossible to coax her.

I must mention that it would go hard with them if they waited for the
dragon; for there were only two champions, and if one held up the
palace by keeping the gates on their hinges and the other waited for
the dragon in the middle of the court-yard, there was no one who could
protect them from the nail.

"Let me attend to it," said the Poor Boy, who, since he had seen the
princess, had grown fairly frantic. "Either his life or mine!"

As we perceive, he had determined to fight the dragon in the open

ground, where he could not see him,--a thing never heard of since
fairy princes first began to fight the dragon's brood; for if it is
hard to conquer a dragon at all, it is doubly difficult to vanquish
one when he is invisible, and no one had ever thought of such an
exploit.

The prince and the Poor Boy's sister hid themselves in a ditch near
the palace, that the dragon might not see them; but the Poor Boy
stationed himself a little behind the gate and waited for the dragon
to hurl his club, in order to get near him, for when he no longer had
a club he would be obliged to fight either with his sword or with his
fists.

Ere long, crash! the club struck the iron-barred gate, but the Poor
Boy was not slow, he opened the other gate and ran out with it,
leaving the palace to fall in ruins behind him.

"Come on, if you have the courage to show yourself," he shouted,

believing that the dragon would make some reply and thus betray
himself.

But the dragon felt that he had found his match, and did not think of
speaking, but, invisible to the youth, approached, drew his sword, and
aimed straight at his enemy's head to hack it off, but the blow only
broke the lad's jaw. The wound hurt the Poor Boy, but it pleased him,
too, because he now knew where to look for his foe; so he rushed in
the direction from which the blow had come, struck out, and felt that
he hit flesh, struck again, and again felt that he had hit, and so
continued to deal short, swift thrusts, with, which he drove the
dragon before the point of his sword. Suddenly he perceived that he
no longer hit any thing and the dragon had escaped, so he stood
cowering, like a person who does not know from whence the next blow
will come.

The dragon again aimed straight at the Poor Boy's head, and as he
hacked, struck off his right ear.

"I'll pay you for that," shouted the youth, rushing upon him again.
But his strength was now greatly diminished, and he only hit the
dragon twice before he lost him from the point of his saber.

The princess was watching their battle from her tower, which had
remained standing, and as she watched wondered at the Poor Boy's
heroic courage; but when she saw the dragon aiming a third blow at the
youth's head, she called: "Dear hero, turn to the right and spit three
times, then you can see your foe."

When the Poor Boy heard this, he felt a hundred thousand times
stronger than he had been before, and as he turned to the right, spit,
and saw the dragon, he rushed upon him, seized him in his arms, and
squeezed him so that he crushed all his bones and flung him on the
ground as dead as a mouse.

The prince and the Poor Boy lost no time, but prepared to journey
home. The princess kissed the Poor Boy and his ear and his chin
instantly healed, so that he looked even handsomer than before. Then
the two comrades went to the dragon's stables, which were hidden under
the foundations of the fallen palace. Each took an enchanted horse,
mounted, lifted his betrothed bride upon it, and hurried homeward.

If the Red Emperor had been only an ordinary mortal he would have
rejoiced, but he was a sovereign to boot! He divided his empire
between his son and his daughter's husband; the Poor Boy went to his
poor mother's house to bring her to court and, when she had arrived, a
wedding was celebrated, dear me! a wedding that will be talked about
as long as the world stands.
 Into the saddle then I sprung,
This tale to tell to old and young.

Mother's Darling Jack

Once upon a time something happened. If it had not happened it would

not be told.

There was once a man who had a child. This child was the youngest of
seven which the Lord had given him, so it was destined from its birth
to be lucky. It was christened John, because all dunces and upstarts
are named John. The father loved little Jack like the very apple of
his eye. It could not have been otherwise, since the boy was the
youngest of seven children and the smallest, chubbiest, and fattest of
them all. But the father doesn't count for every thing. He comes and
goes, appears and vanishes, the house is only a sleeping-place for
him. The mother is the real soul of the household; she bathes one,
feeds another, and scrubs for a third. Jack was his mother's boy, his
mother's pet, his mother's darling, his mother's handsomest and
brightest child.

They say it is not well for one person to be every thing, the lowest
to be highest, and the child to govern the house. Jack grew larger
every day, and the larger he grew the more quarrelsome, obstinate,
and consequently self-willed he became. So there was often, nay, to
tell the whole truth, _very_ often, anger in the house on the boy's
account. Jack daily heard some harsh word; but as it proved that words
made no impression, punishment frequently followed. Ah! but Jack was
the youngest of seven. The one who punished suffered, not the one who
was chastised. If the father whipped Jack, the mother wiped away his
tears; if the mother slapped him, she took care not to let her husband
know it. It is a bad example, when a child breaks a pot, for the
mother to set to work to pick up the pieces; things are then in a bad
way, and it is well not to waste another word about them.

So it ended. Jack became a very disobedient child, and disobedience

avenges itself on the disobedient. If his father wanted to teach him
anything, and said: "My dear Jack, look, do it so, this is right; this
is the way oxen are harnessed in front of carts, this is the way the
nail is driven into the wheel, this is the way sacks are carried," and
other useful lessons, Jack's mind was fixed on other things, and he
replied, "Oh! let me alone." And so from one "Oh! let me alone," to
another "Oh! let me alone," Jack grew into a big boy without having
even learned so much as that a plow has handles, a mill is not a
mortar, and a cow is not an ox. And he couldn't do much in this way.

One day his father was preparing to go to the fair. Every thing was
ready except one pin, which had not yet been put through the yoke.

"Father," said Jack, "I'm coming with you."

"It will be better for you to stay at home, that you may not be lost
in the market," replied his father.
"I want to go--"

"I won't take you."

"I _will_ go."

"I won't take you."

Every body knows what forward children are. The instant they are told
that a thing can't be had, they want to seize it by force. His father
could not help himself, so he set Jack in the wagon and drove off with
him to the fair.

"Mind," he said, "you must keep close to me." "Yes, father," said
Jack, obediently, for the first time in the memory of the family. And
until they reached the end of the village, Jack sat as if he were
nailed to the back of the cart. At the end of the village he put out
one foot, then he raised his head and began to look around him.
Finally he stood up, leaned on the side of the cart, and began to
watch the wheels. He could not understand how one wheel moved of its
own accord, how one spoke hurried after another, constantly going
forward without stirring from the spot, nay, without moving from under
his own nose.

They reached the woods. Jack perked up his nose and stared with his
mouth wide open. The trees on the right and left set out and ran with
all their might, one after another. There must be witchcraft in it.
Jack jumped out of the cart and again felt the solid ground under his
feet. But he once more stood with his mouth wide open. The trees now
stood still, but the cart moved on further and further. "Stop,
father, stop, so I can see how the wheels turn," the boy called after
a while.

But now his hair fairly bristled with fear. He heard his shout
repeated from ten different directions, while his father drove on
without noticing his cry. "Father!" he called again, and again he
heard the word ten times. Jack was terribly frightened, and seeing
that no place was as pleasant as home, began to run back there.
Nothing but a cloud of dust could be seen behind him. He ran on and on
toward home till he turned into the wrong road.

Now you can see how unfortunate it is for inexperienced people not to
listen to the advice of wiser ones! Jack had done wrong in trying to
run home when he did not know the way through the forest. He ran for a
long time, then gradually slackened his pace and at last began to
walk, but kept on through forest after forest, across a meadow, and
through the woods again, then across another meadow, till he was
completely tired out, and weary of his life.

"Lord, have mercy on me, I will always be obedient in future," he

cried, at last--and his heart must have been very heavy when he
uttered such words.

After that he did not walk much further. A short distance off, on the
edge of the woods, stood a village. Jack jumped for joy when he saw
it, and did not stop till he was in the middle of it. Then he went
from house to house, and the further he went the more he wondered that
he found all kinds of houses except his own home. He did not know what
to do, and began to cry.
"What are you crying about, my son?" asked a man who was coming back
from the fields in front of a cart drawn by four oxen.

Jack told his story, and the man pitied him. "What is your name?"
asked the kind-hearted peasant. "Jack," replied the boy.

"But your father, what is his name?"

"His name is father," the lad answered.

"What is the village where you belong called?"

"Village!" he said.

So Jack could answer no questions, and the man could do nothing to

help him. He therefore took him into his service as plow-boy, for he
needed just such a lad to guide the oxen while he held the handles of
the plow. Thus Jack became the servant of a worthy man in the village
on the edge of the forest. But he was of little use, because he had
not paid attention when good instruction was given him. And whoever
does not know how to do any thing well, must expect a great deal of
scolding.

One day Jack's master was preparing to go to market. "Listen, Jack,"

he said, "grease the cart thoroughly, for we're going to market
to-morrow."

Jack said "Yes," took the grease, and began to scratch his head. He
did not know how to grease a cart. He had never listened when he had
been told, nor looked when he might have seen it; so now he did not
know what to do. Finally, from what he had hitherto learned, he
recollected that the beginning of a cart is at the yoke, that is, the
pole. So he thought he must commence there if he wanted to do the
business thoroughly. He greased the thills, the pole, even the rack
of the cart. Here he stopped, for there was no grease left. So he went
to ask for some.

"Master," he said, after entering the room, "give me some more

grease."

"Why in the world do you want more grease?" replied his master
angrily, "I gave you enough to grease the cart three times over."

Jack said that there had only been enough for the thills, pole, and
rack. When his master heard such words, he took Jack by the ear, led
him out, and gave him such a beating that never again in his whole
life did he forget that only the axles of a cart are to be greased.
Well, what was the mother's darling to do--he was obliged to bear it,
and then pay attention, that he might learn how to grease a cart.

After the cart was ready, the oxen were put in and the master took his
seat in front, but Jack crouched in the back of the cart like a little
heap of misery, sobbing now and then from having wept so much.
"Silence," said his master sternly, "don't let me hear another word
from you!" This was the last thing before they drove off.

Jack sat as still as a mouse; he was almost afraid to breathe. At

last, this grew tiresome. So he began to watch the wheels again. But
he was wiser now, and did not wonder at the wheels or the trees. Yet
he saw something he could not understand. Often as he had seen a wheel
go round, he had never noticed the pin spring from it. The cart passed
over a big stone, and, "klirr," the pin bounced out of the axle and
fell on the ground. It was pretty to look at, but the lad didn't
understand it. He would have liked to ask his master, but the farmer
had ordered him to be silent. After some time the nut loosened. Jack
thought he understood why. Directly after--bump dropped the nut, too,
and was left behind the cart. Jack started and was going to say
something, but looked at his master and remembered that he had been
ordered to keep still. But one thing he did understand--if the nut had
dropped on account of the nail, the wheel would come off for want of
the nut. He had scarcely comprehended this, when crack! the wheel fell
into the dust and was left behind the cart.

The cart moved on awhile upon three wheels, then it upset, breaking
the pole in two. Now they were in a bad fix.

"There it is," cried Jack in terror, "didn't I say that would happen?"

We will waste no more words on this subject! The farmer was in _such_
a rage! To be in the middle of the road with a broken pole is no joke.
The farmer seized Jack, gave him another sound thrashing, and then
told him to be off that he might cause him no more trouble. He was
really in the wrong, for he had himself forbidden Jack to speak. But
Jack was to blame, too--if he had always obeyed, he would have learned
long before just how far such an order went. He had been too obedient,
obstinately obedient. And that isn't well either.

The farmer continued his journey as best he could, but Jack was left
on foot in the middle of the road. Alas! Woe betide him, I really
don't know what he is to do. He turned into a path he did not know,
and hoped to reach home. Again he walked over meadows and through
forests, walked for a long, long time, till his feet would scarcely
carry him. This time he found a village in a beautiful meadow, and
outside the village was a man watching a flock of sheep grazing.

"How do you do, good sir!"

"Thank you kindly, may you grow tall, my son."

One word led to another, and Jack briefly told the man his whole
story, from beginning to end, and the peasant was pleased, because,
just at that time, he needed a shepherd-boy to drive the little flock
to pasture, lead them to water, and watch them that they might not
mingle with others. They were a particular breed of sheep, and he
would not have had them injured on any account. Such sheep, it was
reported, were owned only by one emperor, from whom the peasant had
obtained the single lamb. So they were sheep, well--we can imagine how
beautiful they were, since they had descended from a lamb that
belonged to an emperor!

Jack was glad, too, because he found himself in luck again. So they
made a bargain, and Jack became a shepherd boy.

"You must watch the sheep the whole livelong day, drive them down into
the valley to drink, and when it grows dark bring them back to the
fold. If it seems cold, make a fire at the entrance of the pen, and
that the sheep may not freeze, drive them into the fold." These were
the peasant's orders, and Jack said he would do exactly as he was
told.

During the day Jack watched the sheep; when he was thirsty he led them
down to drink, and as it grew dark drove them to the fold. This fold
was a strange contrivance. Jack had never seen one before. It was
inclosed by a fence of woven willow branches, roofed with rushes that
the rain might not injure it, but in one place an opening had been
left, over which was a roof made of reeds, supported by posts. "That's
the entrance to the fold," said Jack to himself, delighted with his
penetration.

As he was cold he made a fire in the opening, just under the

reed-roof. A fire is a fine thing, and Jack warmed himself by it. Then
he remembered that his master had told him he must drive the sheep
into the fold, to keep them from freezing. True, he did not understand
why they should be any warmer inside the fold than outside, but he did
as he was ordered. Seizing the finest ram, the one which wore the big
bell round its neck, he pushed it through the opening into the fold.
But lo and behold! The fire was burning in the gap, and the ram was so
scorched that not a thread of wool was left on its body.

"Oho, now I understand it," cried Jack, still more pleased. "The sheep
must go through the fire to keep them from freezing."

And, as he felt that he was doing right, he thrust all the sheep into
the fold one after the other.

Suddenly he noticed that the fence, the thatching, and the roof above
the opening had all taken fire and were blazing merrily. Jack stood
perfectly still. He had never seen any thing of the sort and rejoiced
over carrying out his orders so well, for he perceived that the sheep
could not possibly be cold in the midst of the fire. So he contentedly
watched the work he had accomplished. One thing he did wish--that his
master was there, so that he might have said, "See how well I
understand tending sheep."

And the wish was fulfilled. His master was just sitting at the table
eating bread and onions, because it was a fast day. He looked out of
the window and saw a great fire on the mountains, and gazing more
attentively at it, noticed that it was in the direction of his fold.
This seemed queer. With his mouth full he left the house, walked
faster and faster, broke into a run, and went higher and higher up the
hill-side till at last, panting for breath, he reached his fold.

Alas! Alas! What a sight! The fold burned down, the sheep of the
imperial breed one and all roasted, so that one might have supposed
they were nothing but overripe melons. That was a bad job, really a
very bad job! Jack had done a great deal of mischief, and might be
thankful to escape with a flogging. And so it happened. The farmer,
enraged, nay, fairly furious, seized the cunning shepherd and beat
him, beat him so that he would have nearly killed him had not Jack
luckily escaped from his hands. But after he got away Jack took to his
heels and ran with all his might, so that he did not look round until
he was in the woods.

What was to be done then? That's the way a person fares when he has
no sense! If he had behaved himself, he would have been sitting
quietly in the house eating barley-sugar and milk.
Jack walked on and on through the forest, turning to the right and
left, forward and backward, hither and thither, on and on he went,
poor boy, trying to find some path that led home. He was so hungry and
thirsty that he sucked the dew from the leaves and ate the oak-apples
and acorns he found on the ground; then he grew tired and cross and
frightened. Woe betide any one who loses the way in a forest!

Night came on, and darkness surprised him in the terrible woods. His
hair stood on end and he was so terrified that a chill ran through
every vein when he heard the wolves, bears, and all sorts of wild
beasts howling and panting in the forest. There was no escape now.
Then he saw a large tree with a hole in its trunk big enough to
shelter him. Nearing it he noticed that this hole had been hollowed
out. That was all right. He would hide in it to keep from being
devoured by the wild beasts, and was so delighted to find himself safe
that he no longer felt sorrowful or hungry. When we have escaped a
great danger, we no longer think of small annoyances. Jack fell asleep
from fatigue, and was just dreaming that he was at home eating millet
and milk, when suddenly, piff, paff, puff, he heard a shot and started
up in terror.

What had happened? Only a few paces from him twelve big, horrible
robbers, foot-pads, had assembled with their captain, made a fire,
roasted an ox, and were just tapping a cask of good wine; they were
going to have a carouse. When Jack saw the ox on the spit he began to
feel almost famished. Dear me! he was so hungry that he would gladly
have turned into a wood-worm and gnawed the tree. The poor lad, in his
inexperience, did not know what terrible people robbers are, so he
came out of the hole and approached them. This was not wise. Robbers
are not to be trifled with.

Jack said he would like something to eat too. The robbers all stared
at him, then drew their knives and swords and began to whet them to
cut him in pieces and kill him before you could say Jack Robinson.
That's the way with robbers. They don't stand on much ceremony.

"Stop," said one of them. "Might not this boy be useful to us?"

"How?" asked another.

"Perhaps he's the seventh child, then he can find the iron-wort for
us," said the first speaker.

"That's true!" they all shouted.

So they questioned Jack, and were wild with delight when they learned
that he actually was the seventh of seven children. The point in
question was this--the robbers had learned that the emperor had
received an immense sum of money, all in gold, from a merchant who had
long been his debtor; the wicked men wanted to steal this treasure.
But the emperor had put it in a room closed with seven iron-barred
doors, and on each door were seven locks wrought with great skill, so
that no one could open them. So this was a real imperial business,
which required careful consideration. Therefore, the robbers had gone
to a witch, that she might give them instruction and a powerful charm
by means of which they could force their way through the royal locks
and iron-barred doors. The witch had told them that nothing except
iron-wort would open the locks, and that the plant could be found only
by the seventh of seven children while he was still an innocent child,
in the gray dawn of morning, when it gleamed in the meadows among the
other herbs. Moreover, whoever had the plant must then make a gash in
his finger, lay it in the cut, and leave it there till the wound had
healed, so that it might remain in the finger. After that any piece of
iron, lock, bolt, or chain, no matter how strong it might be, would
open at his bidding. Such a plant would be to the robbers not merely a
source of amusement, but a valuable possession. So they entertained
Jack and made him a soft bed where he could sleep soundly; but they
told him that they would kill him if he didn't find the plant. All
night long poor Jack dreamed of searching for the stalk of the herb.
At the first gray dawn the robbers waked the boy and sent him to look
for it.

Jack crept along on all fours, and while in this position, looking
over the stalks of the plants in the meadow, he instantly saw one that
glistened. That was the one he wanted! That was iron-wort!

Among the robbers was a one-eyed man, who had been locked up in the
imperial dungeons and escaped loaded with fetters. The chains had
afterward been filed off, but the handcuffs were made of a special
kind of iron which fire did not melt and the file did not scratch.
Jack touched the handcuff with the plant, and "klirr!" it fell
rattling to the ground.

"Aha, may you be lucky, my son, you have freed me from an annoyance,"
said the delighted robber.

But when the captain took the plant from Jack's hand to remove the
second handcuff, he labored in vain, the iron would not obey him. The
witch had not told them that the herb would obey no one except the
person appointed by fate to find it.

So the robbers saw that the iron-wort would do them no good, and
perceiving this they became very angry and sharpened their knives and
swords to kill Jack.

"Stop," cried the one-eyed brigand. "You have said that you would not
murder him if he could find the plant for us. He has found it. As men
of our word, we must not kill him."

And they did not, for robbers are men of their word; whether it is
good or evil, what they have promised they perform. Yet, fearing Jack
might give them up to justice, they found another way to get rid of
him.

What did they do? They seized Jack and put him in an open cask, then
closed it, drove iron bands around it, and went away. It was an evil
deed.

So Jack went from good to bad, and from bad to worse, till at last we
see him fastened up in a wine-cask. What was to become of him! just
think, inside of a cask--that's the end of every thing! Jack began to
cry, howl, and shriek till the hungry wolves heard him and came
running up, thinking they could devour him. But they could do nothing
but lick their chops. Jack was shut up in the cask. As soon as he
discovered that the wolves were near, he looked through the bung-hole
and kept perfectly still.
The wolves then fell upon the remains of the ox and fought greedily
over the bones. One, the largest and fiercest, seized a bone and
crouched down with it close by Jack's cask--Jack hardly dared to
breathe.

Suddenly he saw the wolf's hairy tail come through the bung-hole. Jack
was terribly frightened. The tail came further and further in, and
Jack grew more and more alarmed. At last the wolf shook itself and
leaned further back, so that the whole tail entered and touched Jack's
nose. This was a bad business! Jack trembled with fear, and in his
terror clutched the wolf's tail with both hands and held on with all
his might. The wolf was frightened, too, and took to flight, dragging
the cask after it. You ought to have seen the wonder; helter-skelter
went the brute, banging the cask against the trees, up hill and down
dale. The wolf running, the cask following, Jack holding tight to the
tail--that was worth seeing! Suddenly, helter-skelter the cask struck
against a wall and burst open. The wolf ran on, but Jack found himself
at home again, holding fast in both hands the wolf's tail, which had
been torn off.

So fared mother's darling Jack. Whoever knows any thing more may
continue his story.

Tellerchen.

Once upon a time something very extraordinary happened. If it had not

happened, it would not be told.

There was once a husband and wife. The husband had a son by a former
marriage, and the wife had a daughter by her first husband. This
wicked woman could not bear the sight of her husband's son. One day
she said: "Husband! If you don't send that boy away, I can't eat at
the same table with you any longer."

"But where shall I send him, wife? Let him stay till he is a little
older, then he will set up housekeeping for himself."

"I mean just what I told you--choose."

When the man saw that he could do nothing with his wife, he said to
the boy: "My dear son, you see I am growing old. I can no longer do
work enough to need no assistance. Your mother won't have you here. So
go wherever the Lord may lead you to earn your daily bread, and, if it
is His will, I'll come to see you now and then if I can."

"I see, dear father, that my step-mother can't bear the sight of me,
yet I don't know why. I have never been disobedient to her, but have
always done every thing she told me; still, it is all in vain, she
can't endure me. So I will go and work wherever God may guide me. I
shall be able to earn my daily bread, for I'm a stout, capable lad.
But come and see me if you can, father, for I feel as if I should die
of longing for you."

"Go and prosper, my dear son; may the Lord help you."
"May we have a happy meeting, dear father."

And the poor boy, with tears streaming down his cheeks, left his
father's house. He walked on till at last he met a rich man, to whom
he hired himself as a servant. He remained in service seven years, and
his master was well satisfied, but suddenly such a longing for his
father seized upon him that he could bear it no longer. He told his
employer that he was going to see his parents, and his master said:

"Boy, you have worked on my farm seven years, and served me well. Does
the place no longer suit you, or have you been offered higher wages
elsewhere, that you want to leave me?"

"No indeed, master. But I long to go home,--I feel as if I wanted to

see my father again. If you think you still owe me any thing, please
settle my account."

"Well, my boy, one can't keep a servant by force, and you fixed no
rate of wages when you came to me. As a reward for the services you
have rendered, you may choose from my herds two head of horned cattle
and ten smaller ones."

When the boy heard this, he hardly knew what to do with himself in his
delight at the thought of having earned so much by his labor. He went
among the herds and flocks, looking up and down, and wondering which
animals he should choose. He did not want to take the best ones,
because he thought his services were not worth so much. But neither
did he want to select the worst, he could not make up his mind to
that. So he chose from those of medium value. He did the same with the
horned cattle. But in searching his eyes fell upon an ox, which also
gazed longingly at the youth. So he took this ox and a cow.

Now he had no other thought in his mind except to go to his parents,

believing that his step-mother would no longer look askance at him. So
he bade his master good-by and went away. Just think, the ox was
bewitched, but the boy did not know it. He named the animal
Tellerchen.

He reached home. His father died of joy and came to life again when he
saw his son, who had grown tall and handsome, and so sensible too. But
the wicked old step-mother behaved like seven evil demons,--nay, like
the witch she was. The youth staid in his father's house, helped him
work in the fields, drove the cattle to pasture, and made himself very
useful. Whenever he went to the pasture with the cattle his mother
gave him a cake; but it was made of ashes, and he could not eat it.
What was he to do? At noon, instead of having something to eat like
every body else, he sat under the shade of a tree and wept over his
lot, but he could not bring himself to tell his father, lest he should
make trouble between him and his wife. He had no comfort at home, no
companions abroad, and so he grew sad and thoughtful. One day, when he
was crying with hunger, and even the herdsmen who had left their oxen
were eating, Tellerchen suddenly began to speak and said:

"Master, don't grieve any longer, throw the ash-cake away, seize my
right horn, and eat and drink what you will find there."

"Why, Tellerchen," replied the youth, "there must be witchcraft about

you too. Where was such a thing ever heard of, and how long have you
been able to talk?"
"Mind what I tell you. I see you are an excellent lad, and I am sorry
you should weep your youth away. Just try my advice, and you'll see
that it will be profitable to you."

And it was. The youth seized Tellerchen's right horn. Behold what
happened! He drew out a roll as white as snow, and a glass of wine
which would have made any one's mouth water. The lad ate and drank.

The step-mother noticed that the youth's face had grown fuller, that
he was in good spirits, and did all his work cheerily. Instead of
seeing him grow thinner day by day, as she had expected, he constantly
gained flesh. She soon discovered that Tellerchen must be at the
bottom of the mystery, for she perceived that the boy took much better
care of him than of the other cattle. How should she manage to find
out what he did and ate in the woods? She secretly sent her daughter
after him, and ordered her to watch what the youth did while pasturing
the cattle. The girl followed her step-brother without his knowledge,
watched him, returned to her mother and said, "Mother, what I have
seen to-day is beyond telling!"

"You met the Wood Witch?"

"A wrong guess," the daughter replied.

"You have seen a wizard, a dragon, or a griffin?"

"No indeed! Heaven forbid!"

"Or did a handsomer, richer, and more sensible youth follow you?"

"What an idea! But it's useless for you to rack your brains, you can't
guess."

"Then tell me what you saw, and don't chatter about it any longer."

"Mother, my step-brother's ox is enchanted."

"Didn't I always say that there was something the matter with the
accursed beast?"

"If you could have seen how he hugged and kissed him, sometimes on the
right and sometimes on the left cheek, mother. I really felt as though
my heart would stop beating. Then directly after he seized his right
horn and pulled out some white rolls and wine, which he devoured as if
the wolves were after him. I tell you my mouth watered when I saw him
eat so greedily. Yet what amazed me still more was to hear the ox
talk. I stood with my mouth wide open, staring at him."

"Never mind, I'll get even with him."

The step-mother did not like the ox, and urged her husband to have him
slaughtered, neither more nor less. All night long she teased him
about it. The poor old man told her that the animal was not his, but
his son's, that he was a fine beast and might yet be very useful to
them. But she would not listen, and never stopped talking until he had
promised to kill the ox. Luckily the youth was awake and heard it all.
As soon as morning dawned he went to Tellerchen to curry and clean the
animal as he always did, but began to weep, and told the ox the fate
in store for him. Tellerchen told him he must stand outside the house
on the bench by the door, and when the people were chasing him, to
catch him and take him to the shambles, he must jump on his back as he
passed by. This was done, and after the ox had escaped he took his
master to a forest far more beautiful than any the boy had ever seen.
There they built huts, and lived as if they were in clover, for the
grass in the surrounding meadows was so tall that a man might have
lost himself in it, and was always so green and blooming that it made
excellent pasturage.

One day, when the youth was sitting comfortably before his hut,
playing on the flute, while the ox grazed at some distance, up came an
enormous bull, so fat that his hide seemed ready to burst.

"Why did you come here, youngster, with your Tellerchen, to drink my
water and feed on my grass?" he asked.

"I didn't know that this was your property," answered the youth,
"Tellerchen brought me here."

"Then tell him he must come to the Gold Bridge to-morrow and fight
with me." After saying this, he went away.

When the ox came home at night he found the youth more sorrowful than
ever before. "What ails you, master, that you stand there as if you
were stupefied?" asked the ox.

"What ails me?" replied the youth. "Why, I'm in a fine fix!" And he
repeated all that the bull had said.

"Never mind, master, don't worry about it, leave that to me."

Early the next morning the ox left the lad in the hut and set off to
the Gold Bridge to fight with the bull; he fought till he had pushed
him under the bridge, and then came back home safe and sound.

Two days after another bull came, somewhat smaller than the first one.
After saying the same things the other had said, he summoned
Tellerchen to fight at the Silver Bridge. The ox again found his
master weeping, soothed him as he had done before, and went to fight
the second bull and hurl him under the bridge.

After several days a third bull appeared, a feeble, unsightly, ugly,

dirty animal, and said to the boy: "Who gave you leave to come here
with your Tellerchen to drink my water and spoil the grass in my
meadows?"

"What business is it of yours?" replied the youth pertly.

"If it isn't my business, whose affair should it be?" replied the

bull. "Whichever of you two will dare to fight with me may come
to-morrow to the Copper Bridge."

"Don't worry," replied the youth carelessly, "we will come."

When Tellerchen returned from the pasture in the evening, his master,
with great amusement, told him every thing that had happened.

"Your mirth is out of place," replied the ox, "for my time has now
come. The bull, sick and emaciated as he was, will overpower me. Watch
our battle to-morrow, for I will not let you fight with him; you are
young and delicate, and still have a great deal to see in the world.
When you perceive that he is conquering me and about to push me under
the bridge, rush forward and seize my left horn, but don't open it
till you have reached home."

When the youth heard this, he began to weep so that he could not be
quieted, and grieved so much all night long that he had no sleep.

Early the next morning he went with Tellerchen to the Copper Bridge,
where the puny-looking bull awaited them. They began the struggle, and
fought and fought until toward the afternoon. Sometimes the ox gored
the bull, at others the bull the ox, and the victory still remained
undecided. But when the afternoon was nearly over the ox's strength
failed, and, while the bull was carrying him off and in the very act
of hurling him under the bridge, the boy rushed up and wrenched off
his left horn.

He wept,--Heaven knows how bitterly the poor lad wept by the bridge.
But seeing that his Tellerchen did not come out again from under the
bridge and it was growing dark, he set off with his horn, and a heart
bleeding with grief. He spent the night on a hill. The next day hunger
vexed him, and thinking he should find something to eat in the horn
Tellerchen had left him, he opened it.

What, I beg to ask you, do you suppose happened then! Whence came the
countless multitude of all sorts of cattle? How could he drive them
home? and to get them back into the horn again was impossible. He
owned this to himself and began to weep bitterly. While thus
lamenting, lo and behold! a dragon came up to him and said:--

"What will you give me, boy, if I put all these beasts back into the
horn for you?"

"Half of them," replied the lad.

"I've no fancy for _that_," said the dragon, "I want something else."

"Tell me what it is, and I'll see."

"When you love life best I am to be allowed to come and take the
dearest thing you have, to devour it."

The lad, without exactly knowing what he was doing, agreed.

The dragon rapped three times with its tail and put all the cattle
back in the horn, which the boy then took and went to his father, whom
he found alone. No one knew what had become of the old woman and her
daughter, they had vanished from the house.

When the peasant saw his son grown into a youth he almost lost his
senses with joy, but managed to calm himself. His son opened the
horn, and instantly the fields and surrounding country were so filled
with cattle that every body was bewildered.

"Do all these flocks and herds belong to you?" asked the old man.

"All, father. What shall we do with this multitude of beasts."

"Relieve the sorrows of the widows and the poor," he replied.

The youth followed his father's advice. There was no day the Lord
bestowed on which he did not render some service to those who needed
aid. So it happened that not a single pauper was left in the
neighborhood. News of the wealth and benevolence of the old man's son
reached the imperial court, and as the emperor had a very clever and
beautiful daughter, he sent to ask the youth to become her suitor.

When the young man heard that the emperor wanted him for a son-in-law
he was greatly astonished. But, on being summoned to the court, he
went there and behaved with so much good sense and dignity that the
sovereign was not at all sorry he had cast his eye upon him. The
princess liked him because he was a handsome, proud, spirited
Roumanian youth. Then, after having agreed among themselves, a wedding
was celebrated whose fame spread through the whole country. The young
man's father was there too.

After the dances and amusements of the marriage were over and every
body had gone home, the old man, according to ancient custom, placed
in the room where the emperor's son-in-law and his bride were to
sleep a roll of snow-white bread. Then he, too, went to rest.

What happened during the night? The emperor's son-in-law suddenly saw
the dragon, which, with one jaw on the upper cornice of the door and
the other on the threshold beneath, told the young fellow it had come
to settle their account and he must now give up to be devoured the
bride sleeping beside him, whom he loved like the apple of his eye.

The old man's son, who had long since forgotten the settlement, did
not know what to do. He dared not rush upon the dragon and kill it,
because he knew that they had made this bargain; his father had often
told him that, when a man has given his word, he has also pledged his
soul. Yet his heart would not let him yield up his beloved wife for
the dragon to devour. While he was torturing himself in trying to
think what he could do to neither break his promise nor give up his
bride, the bread on the table began to jump about and said:

"Hi, dragon, I've been sowed, grew up, was mowed down and fastened
into a bundle, yet I bore it, do you now bear your trouble, too, and
go into the depths of the sea."

The dragon stood waiting. The bread went on:

"Then I was carried to the barn, horses trampled on me, I was winnowed
and taken to the mill. Bear your troubles as I've borne mine, and go,
that we may hear your name no more."

The dragon still waited, and its tongue darted about in its mouth like
lightning. The emperor's son-in-law and his bride remained perfectly
quiet. The bread spoke again:

"Then I was ground, taken home, sifted, kneaded with water, put into
the oven, and baked till my eyes almost started out of my head, yet I
bore it. Do you bear it too, you accursed dragon, and may you burst."

The noise that echoed through the air, as the dragon burst, was so
loud that every body in the palace awoke. Men came running to the
spot, what did they see? A monster of a dragon, burst and split open.
It was so huge that all shrank away in terror.

Afterward they took the carcass, carried it out of the palace, and
gave it to the ravens. Then the emperor's son-in-law related the whole
affair. When the people in the palace heard it, they all thanked God
for having worked such a miracle and permitted the emperor's children
to escape safe and sound. Then they lived in peace and happiness and
did good every where, and if they have not died, they may be alive
now.

Into the saddle then I sprung,

This tale to tell to old and young.

The Fairy Aurora.

Once upon a time something happened. If it hadn't happened, it

wouldn't be told.

There was once a great and mighty emperor, whose kingdom was so large
that no one knew where it began and where it ended. Some believed it
was boundless, others said that they dimly remembered having heard
from very old people that the emperor had formerly engaged in war with
his neighbors, some of whom had proved greater and more powerful,
others smaller and weaker than he. One piece of news about this
emperor went all through the wide world--that he always laughed with
his right eye and wept with the left. People vainly asked the reason
that the emperor's eyes could not agree, and even differed so
entirely. When great heroes went to the emperor to question him, he
smiled evasively and made no reply. So the enmity between the
monarch's eyes remained a profound mystery, whose cause nobody knew
except the emperor himself. Then the emperor's sons grew up. Ah, what
princes they were! Three princes in one country, like three morning
stars in the sky! Florea, the oldest, was a fathom tall, with
shoulders more than four span broad. Costan was very different, short,
strongly built, with a muscular arm and a stout fist. The third and
youngest prince was named Petru--a tall, slender fellow, more like a
girl than a boy. Petru did not talk much, he laughed and sang, sang
and laughed, from morning till night. Only he was often seen in a
graver mood, when he pushed back the curling locks from his forehead
and looked like one of the old wiseacres who belonged to the emperor's
council.

"Come, Florea, you are grown up, go to our father and ask him why one
of his eyes always weeps and the other always laughs," said Petru, one
fine morning to his brother Florea. But Florea would not go; he knew
by experience that the emperor was always vexed if any one asked him
that question.

Petru fared just the same when he went to his brother Costan.

"Very well, if nobody else dares, I'll venture it!" he said at last.
No sooner said than done, Petru instantly went and asked.

"May your mother blind you! What's that to you?" replied the emperor
wrathfully, giving him one cuff on the right ear and another on the
left. Petru went sadly away, and told his brothers how his father had
served him. Yet, after the young prince had asked what was the matter
with the eyes, it seemed as though the left one wept less and the
right one laughed more.

Petru plucked up his courage and
the ear is a box on the ear, and
thought than done. He fared just
left now only wept occasionally,
younger.
went to the emperor again. A box on
two of them are two! It was no sooner
the same the second time. But the
and the right one seemed ten years

"If that's the way things stand," thought Petru, "I know what I have
to do. I'll keep going to him, keep repeating the question, and keep
receiving the cuffs on the ear until both eyes laugh."

No sooner said than done. Petru never made the same remark twice.

"My son Petru," began the emperor, this time in a pleasant tone and
laughing with both eyes, "I see that you can't drive this anxiety out
of your head, so I'll tell you what is the matter with my eyes. Know
that this eye laughs when I see that I have three such sons as you,
but the other weeps because I fear that you will not be able to reign
in peace and protect the country against bad neighbors. But if you
bring me water from the fountain of the Fairy Aurora that I may bathe
my eyes with it, both will laugh, because I shall then know that I
have brave sons on whom I can rely."

Such were the emperor's words. Petru took his hat from the bench by
the stove, and went to tell his brothers what he had heard. The
princes consulted together and soon settled the matter, as is proper
among own brothers. Florea, being the oldest, went to the stables,
chose the best and handsomest horse, saddled it, and bade farewell to
home.

"I will go," he said to his brothers; "and if, at the end of a year, a
month, a week, and a day, I have not returned with the water, you can
follow me, Costan." With these words he departed.

For three days and three nights Florea did not stop; his horse flew
like a ghost over the mountains and valleys till it reached the
frontiers of the empire. But all around the emperor's dominions ran a
deep gulf, and across this abyss there was only a single bridge. Here
Florea halted to look back and bid farewell to his native land.

May the Lord preserve even a Pagan from what Florea now beheld when he
wanted to go on--a dragon! But a dragon with three heads and the most
horrible faces, with one jaw in the sky and another on the earth.
Florea did not wait for the dragon to bathe him in flames, but set
spurs to his horse and vanished as if he had never been in existence.
The dragon sighed once and disappeared, without leaving a trace
behind.

A week passed; Florea did not return; a fortnight slipped by, but
nothing was heard of him. A month elapsed; Costan began to search
among the horses to choose one. When morning dawned after a year, a
month, a week, and a day, Costan mounted his horse, took leave of his
youngest brother, and saying to him, "Come, if I am lost too," rode
off as Florea had done.
The dragon at the bridge was now still more terrible, his heads were
more frightful--and the hero fled still faster. Nothing more was heard
of the two brothers; Petru remained alone.

"I am going to follow my brothers," he said one day to his father.

"Then may God go with you," replied the emperor. "He alone knows
whether you will have better luck than your brothers."

So the monarch's youngest son also bade him farewell and set off for
the frontiers of the empire. On the bridge stood a dragon still larger
and more horrible, with jaws even more yawning and frightful. The
creature now had seven heads instead of three.

Petru stopped when he beheld this monster. "Get out of the way!" he
shouted. The dragon did not stir. Petru called a second and a third
time, then rushed forward with uplifted sword. Instantly the sky
darkened so that he saw nothing but fire--fire on the right, fire on
the left, fire before him, fire behind him. The dragon was spitting
fire from every one of its seven heads. The horse began to neigh and
rear, so that our hero could not strike with his sword.

"Hold! This won't do!" said Petru, dismounting and seizing the horse's
bridle with his left hand, while he held his sword in the right.

That plan would not do either. The hero saw nothing but fire and
smoke.

"I'll go home--to get a better horse," said Petru, and he mounted his
steed, and went away to come back again.

When he reached the place his nurse, old Birscha, was waiting for him
at the court-yard gate.

"Ah, my son Petru! I knew you would be obliged to come back again,
because you didn't set out right."

"How ought I to have gone?" asked Petru, half angrily, half sadly.

"You see, my dear Petru," the old nurse began, "you can't reach the
fountain of the Fairy Aurora unless you ride the horse which your
father the emperor rode in his youth; go, ask where and whose that
horse is, then mount it and depart."

Petru thanked her for her directions, and then went off to inquire
about the horse.

"May the light grow black to you!" said the emperor. "Who told you to
ask me that? It must surely have been that witch of a Birscha. Are you
crazy? Fifty years have passed since I was young, who knows where the
bones of the horse I rode then are rotting? It seems to me that
there's one strap of the bridle lying on the stable floor. It's all I
have left of the horse."

Petru went off in a rage and told his old nurse the whole story.

"Just wait," cried the old woman, laughing. "If that's the way things
are, very well. Go and bring me the piece of the bridle, I shall know
how to turn it to some account."

The floor was covered with saddles, bridles, and straps; Petru chose
the most tattered, rusted, and blackest, and carried it to the old
woman, that she might do with it what she had promised. The old nurse
took the bridle, smoked it with incense, muttered a short spell over
it, and then said to Petru. "Now take the bridle and strike the
pillars[4] of the house with it."

[Footnote 4: Roumanian peasant cottages usually have several pillars

in front, which support the projecting roof.]

Petru did as he was told. The old woman's charm worked well. Scarcely
had Petru struck the pillars when something happened--I don't know
how--that utterly amazed him. A horse stood before him, a horse whose
superior the world never saw. Its saddle was made of gold and jewels,
its bridle glittered so that one dared not look at it for fear of
being blinded. A beautiful horse, beautiful saddle, and beautiful
bridle for the handsome prince!

"Jump on the bay's back, my young hero," cried the old woman, making
the sign of the cross over horse and rider; then she repeated a short
charm and went into the palace.

After Petru had leaped on the horse he felt thrice as much strength in
his arm and thrice as much courage in his heart.

"Hold fast, master, for we have a long journey and must go swiftly,"
said the bay, and the hero soon saw that they galloped, galloped,
galloped, as never horse and hero had galloped before.

On the bridge now stood a dragon whose like had never been there, a
dragon with twelve heads, each one more terrible, more fiery than the
others. Ah, but the monster found its match. Petru did not quail, but
began to roll up his sleeves and spit upon his hands. "Out of the
way!" he shouted. The dragon began to spit fire. Petru wasted no more
words, but drew his sword and prepared to rush upon the bridge.

"Hold, calm yourself, master," said the bay, "do as I tell you; press
the spurs into my flanks, draw your sword, and be ready, for we must
now leap over the bridge and the dragon. When you see that we are
directly over the monster, cut off its head, wipe the blood from your
sword on your sleeve, and put it in the sheath, that you may be
prepared to fight when we touch the earth again."

Petru struck in the spurs, drew his sword, hacked off the head, wiped
the blood away, thrust the blade into its sheath, and was ready when
he again felt firm ground under the horse's hoofs. So they crossed the
bridge.

"Now we must go on," Petru began, after he had cast one more glance
back to his native land.

"Forward," replied the bay, "but you must now tell me, master, how we
are to hasten. Like the wind? Like thought? Like longing? Or like a
curse?"

Petru looked before him and saw nothing but sky and earth--a
wilderness which made his hair bristle with horror.
"We will change our pace and ride like each in turn,--not too fast
that we may not grow weary, and not too slow lest we should be late."

They rode on,--one day like the wind, one like thought, one like
longing, and one like a curse, until in the gray dawn of the morning
of the fourth day, they reached the end of the wilderness.

"Now stop and go on at a walk, that I may see what I have never
beheld," cried Petru, rubbing his eyes like a person waking from sleep
or one who beholds something that seems like an illusion. Before the
eyes of the young prince stretched a copper forest--trees, saplings,
shrubs, bushes, ferns, and flowers of the most beautiful varieties,
all made of copper. Petru stood staring, as a man gazes who beholds
something he has never seen or heard of. He rode into the wood. The
blossoms along the wayside began to praise themselves and tempt Petru
to gather them and make a garland:

"Take me, I am beautiful and give strength to him who breaks me," said
one.

"Oh, no, take me, for whoever wears me in his hat will be loved by the
greatest beauty in the world," said another. Then a third and a
fourth, each lovelier than its companions, stirred, and in sweet tones
tried to persuade Petru to gather it.

The bay sprang aside whenever it saw its master stoop toward a flower.

"Why don't you keep quiet?" cried Petru, somewhat sternly.

"Pick no blossoms, you will fare badly if you gather them," replied
the bay.

"Why should I fare badly?"

"A curse rests on these flowers--whoever gathers them must fight with
the Welwa[5] of the wood."

[Footnote 5: Welwa, an indescribable monster that exists in the

imagination of the Roumanian peasantry.]

"With what sort of a Welwa?"

"Now let me alone! But listen; look at the flowers and gather none of
them, keep quiet." Having said this the horse went on at a walk. Petru
knew by experience that he would do well to heed the bay's advice. So
he turned his thoughts away from the flowers. But it was all in vain!
If one is unlucky, he can't get rid of his ill-fortune even if he
tries with all his might. The flowers still offered themselves to him,
and his heart grew weaker and weaker.

"Come what may," said Petru after a while, "I shall at least see the
Welwa of this wood, that I may know what the monster is like and with
whom I have to deal. If I am fated to die by its hands, it will kill
me in some way, and if not I shall escape, though there should be
hundreds and thousands like it." Then he began to pull off the
flowers.

"You have done wrong!" said the bay anxiously. "But as the thing has
happened it can't be changed, so gird yourself and prepare to fight,
for here is the Welwa."

The bay had scarcely spoken and Petru had hardly twined his wreath,
when a light breeze blew from all quarters of the compass and soon
rose to a gale. The gale increased until everywhere there was naught
save gloom and darkness, gloom and darkness. The ground under Petru's
feet trembled and shook, till he felt as though somebody had taken the
world on his back and was dragging it away at full speed.

"Are you afraid?" asked the bay, shaking its mane.

"Not at all," replied Petru, summoning up his courage, though chills

were running down his back. "If a thing must be, all right; let it be
as it is."

"You need not fear," replied the bay, to encourage him. "Take the
bridle from my neck and try to catch the Welwa with it."

The horse had just time to say this and Petru had not even a chance
to unfasten the bridle properly, when the Welwa stood before him, a
monster so frightful, so terrible, that he could not look at it. It
has no head, yet it is not headless, it does not fly through the air,
yet neither does it walk on the earth. It has a mane like the horse,
horns like the stag, a face like the bear, eyes like the polecat, and
a body that resembles every thing except a living being! Such was the
Welwa which rushed upon Petru.

Petru rose in his stirrups and began to strike, sometimes with his
sword, sometimes with his arm, till the perspiration ran down his body
in streams.

A day and night passed away; the battle was not yet decided.

"Stop, so that we can rest a little while," said the Welwa, panting
for breath.

The hero let his sword fall.

"Don't stop!" cried the bay quickly, and Petru set to work again with
all his might.

The Welwa now neighed once like a horse, then howled like a wolf, and
again rushed upon Petru. The battle went on for another day and night,
and was even more terrible than before. Petru grew so weary that he
could scarcely move.

"Stop now! I see I am dealing with a person who understands fighting.

Stop!" said the Welwa for the second time. "Stop and let us settle our
quarrel."

"Don't stop!" cried the bay.

Petru fought on, though he could scarcely breathe. But the Welwa no
longer rushed so fiercely upon him and began to act with more care and
caution, as people do when they feel they have not much strength. So
the fight lasted till the dawn of the third day. When the rosy light
of morning began to glimmer, Petru--how, I don't know, it's enough
that he did it--threw the bridle over the head of the wearied Welwa,
which instantly became a horse--the handsomest horse in the world.

"Sweet be your life, for you have delivered me from enchantment," said
the transformed Welwa, and began to caress the bay charger. Petru
learned from their conversation that the Welwa was a brother of the
bay horse, and had been bewitched many years before by Holy
Wednesday.[6]

[Footnote 6: Miercuri-Mittwoch (Wednesday) and Mercuria, that is,

feminine form of Mercury.]

Petru tied the Welwa to his horse, sprang into the saddle, and
continued his journey. How did he ride? That I need not say. He rode
swiftly till he got out of the copper forest.

"Stand still, and let me look at what I have never seen before," said
Petru again, when they came out of the copper forest. A still more
marvelous one now stretched before him, a forest of glittering bushes
bearing the handsomest and most tempting flowers--he was entering the
Silver Wood. The blossoms began to talk still more sweetly and
enticingly than they had done in the Copper Forest. "Gather no more
flowers," said the Welwa that was tied to the bay, "for my brother is
seven times stronger than I."

But did my fearless hero restrain himself? Scarcely two minutes had
passed ere he began to gather flowers and twine them into a wreath.
The tempest howled louder, the darkness was greater, and the earth
quaked still more than in the Copper Forest; the Welwa of the Silver
Wood rushed upon Petru with seven-fold greater fierceness than the
other Welwa had done. But he was not idle either. The battle again
lasted for three days and three nights, and at dawn on the fourth
morning our hero bridled the second Welwa.

"Sweet be your fortune, for you have delivered me from enchantment!"

said the Welwa, and they pursued their journey along the road by which
they had come.

"Stop, stand still, go on at a walk, and let me gaze at what I have

never seen before," cried Petru for the third time; then he covered
his eyes with his hand lest he should be blinded by the rays streaming
from the Gold Forest. He had already beheld marvelous things, but
never even dreamed of a sight like this.

"We will stand here or we shall fare badly," cried the horses in one
breath.

"Why should we fare badly?" asked Petru.

"You'll pluck the flowers again. I know your heart will give you no
rest until you do! And our youngest brother is seven times seven times
stronger and more terrible than we three together. So let us go round
the forest," said the bay.

"Certainly not," replied Petru; "let us go through it! Let us see all,
since we have seen something, and experience all, now that we have
experienced part. Have no fear, I have none!"

I need not tell you that Petru did again what he had already done
twice. Oh dear! How could he help it?
Scarcely was the wreath twined when something began which had never
been experienced before. It was not a more furious tempest or greater
darkness, neither did the earth quake more violently. No! I don't know
how or what it was, but it seemed to Petru as though somebody had got
into the middle of the earth to overturn it. What happened was
something awful, and may Heaven preserve any one from it!

"You see!" said the bay angrily, "why couldn't you keep quiet?"

Petru saw that he saw nothing more, began to feel that he felt nothing
more, and understood that he could understand nothing more, so he made
no reply, but girded his sword tighter and prepared to fight. "Now the
Welwa can come," he cried, "I will die or throw the bridle over its
head." He had scarcely uttered the words when something whose like he
had never beheld before approached him. A dense fog surrounded Petru,
a fog so dense that he could not even see himself in it.

"What's this?" cried the champion, somewhat startled, when he began to

feel that he was aching all over. But he was still more alarmed when
he perceived that he could not hear his own voice through the mist. So
he began to strike about him with his sword to the right and left,
before and behind, in every direction, and with all the strength he
had--as a man does when he sees that matters are growing serious. So
he fought on during a day and a night, without seeing any thing
except thick darkness, or hearing any thing except his own
perspiration trickling down his horse's flanks. For some time he had
even felt as if he were no longer alive, but had died long before.
Suddenly the fog began to scatter. At dawn on the second day it
disappeared entirely, and when the sun rose in the sky Petru's eyes
again saw the light. He felt as if he had been born anew.

The Welwa? it seemed to have vanished from the earth.

"Get your breath now, for the battle will begin again presently," said
the bay.

"What was that?" asked Petru.

"The Welwa," replied the horse, "the Welwa changed into fog. Get your
breath, it is coming again."

The bay had hardly spoken and Petru had hardly had time to breathe,
when he saw approaching from one side something,--but what it was he
did not know. Water, yet it was not like water, for it did not seem to
flow on the earth, but in some queer fashion to fly, or move in some
way--Enough, it left no trace behind and did not fly high. It was
something that appeared to be nothing.

"Oh, dear!" cried Petru.

"Take courage and defend yourself, don't stand still," said the bay,
but could not utter another word, for the water filled its mouth.

The fight began again. Petru struck about him without stopping for a
day and a night, not knowing at what he was aiming, and fought without
knowing with whom. When the next day dawned he felt that his feet
were paralyzed.
"Now I am lost!" he cried somewhat angrily; yet he began to show
himself doubly brave and dealt still stronger blows. The sun rose and
the water vanished, one could not tell how or when.

"Get your breath!" said the bay, "get your breath, for you haven't
much time to lose. The Welwa will come back directly."

Petru made no answer; the poor fellow was so tired that he did not
know what to do. So he settled himself more firmly in the saddle,
seized his sword with a tighter grip, and thus prepared awaited the
approach of the foe he saw advancing.

Such a thing, how can I describe it? It was like a man dreaming that
he sees something which has what it has not, and has not what it
has--this was the shape in which the Welwa now appeared to Petru. Oh,
heavens! how could the Welwa now be a gold forest after having twice
left it in disgrace? It flew with its feet and walked with its wings,
its head was behind and its tail was before, its eyes were in its
breast and its breast was on its forehead--and as for the rest, no
mortal could describe it.

Petru shuddered in every limb, and crossed himself twice, then he

plucked up courage and began to fight as he had already fought once,
and also as he had never yet fought before. The day passed and Petru's
strength failed. Evening came, and Petru's eyes began to grow dim.
When midnight arrived he felt that he was no longer on horseback. He
himself did not know how and when he had reached the earth, but he
was on foot. When night was yielding to day Petru could not keep up,
but sank on his knees.

"Stand up, gather your strength once more!" cried the bay, seeing that
his master was losing his vigor.

Petru wiped away the perspiration with his shirt-sleeve, strained

every nerve, and once more stood erect.

"Now strike the Welwa on the mouth with the bridle?" said the bay.

Petru did as he was bid. The Welwa neighed so loudly that Petru
thought he should be deafened, then, though so tired that it was
scarcely able to move, rushed upon the hero. The fight was now not
long. Petru managed to throw the bridle over this Welwa's head, too.

When broad day came, the hero was riding on the fourth horse. "May you
have a beautiful wife, for you have delivered me from enchantment!"
said the Welwa.

They rode on, and when night was shrouding the day, they reached the
borders of the Gold Forest.

While pursuing their way Petru began to get tired, and, in order to
have something to do, examined the beautiful wreaths. "What shall I do
with the wreaths?" he said to himself. "One is enough for me. I'll
keep the handsomest." So he threw down the copper one, then the silver
one, and reserved only the gold garland.

"Stop," said the bay horse. "Don't throw the wreaths away. Dismount
and pick them up, they may yet be useful to you."
Petru did as he was told and rode on. Toward evening, when the sun was
only a hand's breadth above the horizon and the little flies were
beginning to swarm, our rider reached the edge of the forest. Before
him stretched a wide moor, on which as far as the eye could wander
nothing was visible. The horses stopped.

"What is it?" asked Petru.

"We may fare badly here," replied the bay.

"Why should we fare badly?"

"We are now entering the domain of Holy Wednesday. So long as we ride
through it, we shall experience nothing but cold, cold, cold. Fires
are kept burning all along the roadside, and I'm afraid you will go
and warm yourself."

"Why shouldn't I warm myself?"

"You'll fare badly if you do," said the bay anxiously.

"Forward," said Petru fearlessly, "I will be cold, too, if necessary."

The further Petru entered Holy Wednesday's kingdom the more he felt
that it was no pleasant region. At every step the air grew colder and
frostier, there was so much cold and ice that it froze even the marrow
in one's bones. But Petru was no coward, he proved as brave in
enduring hardship as he had been in battle. Along the roadside one
fire after another was burning, and beside these fires were gathered
groups of people who called to him in the sweetest, most enticing
words. Petru's very breath froze, yet he did not yield, but ordered
the bay to go on at a walk. How long our hero battled with the cold
and frost can not be told, for every body knows that Holy Wednesday's
kingdom is longer than one stone's throw or even two. The cold there
is not moderate, but bitter, so bitter that even the rocks are split
by the frost. That's the way it is in that country. But Petru had not
grown up without some hardships, so he only ground his teeth, though
he was so benumbed that he couldn't even wink.

They reached Holy Wednesday. Petru dismounted, flung the bridle over
the bay's head, and entered the house.

"Good morning, mother."

"Thank you, my frozen hero!"

Petru laughed, but made no answer.

"You have proved yourself a brave fellow," said Holy Wednesday,

patting him on the shoulder. "Now I'll give you the reward." She went
to an iron chest, opened it, and took out a little box. "See," she
said, "this casket has been destined from the earliest times for the
person who penetrated the realm of the cold. Take it and guard it
carefully, for it may be of great service to you. When you open it,
you will receive news from whatever place you desire and truthful
tidings from your native land."

Petru thanked her for her words and her gift, mounted his horse, and
rode on. After he was a good stone's throw away, he opened the magic
box. "What do you command?" asked something inside.

"Give me news of my father," replied Petru rather timidly.

"He is sitting in the council chamber with the elders of the kingdom."

"Is he prospering?"

"Not especially; he has troubles."

"Who is annoying him?" asked Petru, somewhat sharply.

"Your brothers, Costan and Florea," the voice in the box answered. "As
it seems to me, they are trying to wrest the scepter from him and the
old monarch says that they are not yet worthy of it."

"Forward, bay, we have no time to lose," cried Petru. Then, shutting

the box, he put it into his knapsack.

They hurried as ghosts flit when whirlwinds are blowing and vampires
hunting at midnight. How long they rode can not be told, but it was a
long, long time.

"Stop! Let me give you another piece of advice," said the bay after a
while.

"Well, tell me," said Petru.

"You have been tormented by the cold, now you'll have to encounter
heat such as you never felt before. Keep up your courage, and don't
let yourself be attracted to the cool places."

"Forward!" replied Petru. "Don't be anxious--if I didn't freeze, I

shan't melt."

Indeed! This heat was enough to melt the very marrow of one's bones, a
heat that exists nowhere except in the kingdom of Holy Thursday.[7]
The further they went the greater the heat became. Even the iron of
the horses' shoes began to melt, but Petru would not yield. The
perspiration ran down his body in streams, he wiped it away with his
sleeve, and rode swiftly on. As for the heat, intense as it became,
there was something else that tortured Petru more. Along the roadside,
always a good stone's throw apart, were cool valleys with cold springs
ready to quench the traveler's thirst. When Petru looked at them, he
felt as if his heart was shriveled and his tongue dried up with
thirst. Lilies, violets, and roses grew in the soft grass around the
springs, and on these beds of flowers reclined girls so beautiful that
heaven only knows how it would have been possible for them to be
lovelier. Petru would fain have shut his eyes in order not to see such
bewitching creatures any longer.

[Footnote 7: Joi--Thursday and Jupiter.]

"Come, hero, come to the cooling waters, let us amuse you," called the
enticing maidens.

Petru silently shook his head, he had lost the power of speech.

They rode on so for a long, long time. Suddenly they felt that the
heat was beginning to lessen, and on a distant hill-top a hut
appeared. This was the dwelling of Holy Thursday. Petru approached,
and when almost at the door Holy Thursday came out and welcomed him.
Petru expressed his thanks, as is customary among distinguished and
well-behaved people, and they entered into conversation as people who
have never seen each other are in the habit of doing. Petru brought
news of Holy Wednesday, related his adventures, and mentioned the
goal for which he had started, and then bade her farewell, for he
really had no time to lose. Who could tell how far he still had to go
to reach the Fairy Aurora?

"Wait a little while, until I can say a few words to you," said Holy
Thursday. "You are now about to enter the domain of Holy Friday;[8] go
to her and tell her that I wish her health and happiness. When you
return, come to me again, and I'll give you something that will be
useful to you."

[Footnote 8: Vineri means Friday as well as Venus.]

Petru thanked her and rode on.

He had scarcely ridden long enough to smoke a pipeful of tobacco, when

he entered a new country. Here it was neither hot nor cold, but like
the climate in spring when the lambs are being weaned. Petru began to
breathe easily, but he was on a desolate moor consisting of sand and
thistles.

"What can this be?" asked Petru, when he saw an object something like
a house, but a long, long distance off; just where his eyes beheld the
end of the dreary heath.

"That is Holy Friday's house," replied the bay; "if we ride on, we may
be able to reach it before dark."

And so it happened. Night was just closing in as the hero slowly

neared the distant house. On the moor was a throng of phantoms
flitting on Petru's right and left hand, before and behind him.

"Don't be afraid," said the bay. "Those are the Whirlwind's

daughters; they are dancing in the air, waiting for the moon eater."

So they reached Holy Friday's house. "Dismount and enter," said the
bay.

Petru was about to do what he had been told.

"Stop, don't be in such a hurry," the horse continued. "Let me first

tell you what you are to do. You can't go into Holy Friday's house so
unceremoniously; she is guarded by the Whirlwinds."

"What am I to do?"

"Take the copper wreath and go with it to the hill you see yonder.
When you reach the top, begin to call: 'Good Heavens, what beautiful
girls, what angels, what fairy-like creatures!' Then hold the garland
aloft, and say: 'If I only knew whether any body would take this
wreath from me--if I only knew! If I only knew!' and hurl the garland
away."
"Why should I do that?" asked Petru, as a man is in the habit of
questioning, when he wants to know the cause of his acts.

"Silence! Go and do it," replied the bay curtly, and Petru, without
further words, did as he was bid.

Scarcely had the hero flung the wreath aside, when the Whirlwinds
rushed upon it and tussled around it.

Petru now turned toward the house.

"Stop," cried the bay again, "I haven't yet told you every thing. Take
the silver wreath and knock at Holy Friday's window. When she asks
'Who is there?' say that you came on foot and have lost your way on
the moor. She will rebuff you. But you mustn't stir from the spot. Say
to her: 'I won't go away, for ever since I was a little child I have
always heard of Holy Friday (Venus) and--I didn't have steel shoes
made with calf-skin straps, did not travel nine years and nine months,
did not fight for this silver wreath I want to give her, did not do
and suffer all these things merely to turn back now that I have
reached her.' Act and speak as I have told you--what follows must be
your own care."

Petru made no reply, but went up to the house. As it was perfectly

dark, the hero did not see the dwelling, and was guided only by the
rays of light streaming through the window. When he reached the house
several dogs began to bark, because they knew some stranger was near.

"Who is fighting with the hounds? May his life be bitter," cried Holy
Friday angrily.

"It is I, Holy Friday!" said Petru, with laboring breath, like a man
who likes and yet is not quite satisfied with what he is doing. "I
have lost my way on the moor, and don't know where I can spend the
night." Here he stopped, not daring to say more.

"Where did you leave your horse?" asked Holy Friday rather sharply.

Petru reflected; he did not know whether he ought to tell a lie or

speak the truth, so he made no answer.

"Go, in God's name, my son, I have no room for you," said Holy Friday
retiring from the window.

Petru now repeated what the horse had told him to say. Scarcely had he
done so, when he saw Holy Friday open the window.

"Let me see the wreath, my son," she said sweetly, in a gentle tone.

Petru gave her the garland.

"Come into the house," said Holy Friday, "don't be afraid of the dogs,
they know what I want."

It was even so. The dogs began to wag their tails, and followed Petru
as they follow a master returning home from the fields at night. Petru
said "good evening" as he entered, laid his hat on the oven, and when
Holy Friday invited him to sit down took his place on a bench by the
stove. They now talked about everyday matters, the world, the
wickedness of mankind, and similar things, without any special reason
or purpose. It appeared from her talk that Holy Friday was very much
incensed against men; but Petru agreed with her in every thing--as is
proper for a person who is sitting at another's table.

Heavens, how old the aged dame looked! I don't know why young Petru
devoured her so with his eyes, that he might have given her the Evil
eye. Was he counting the wrinkles in her face? He would have needed to
be born seven times in succession, and each time live seven times as
long as an ordinary human life, to have leisure to number them all.
But Holy Friday's heart laughed with joy, when she saw Petru
completely absorbed in gazing at her.

"When the present state of things had no existence," Holy Friday

began, "before the world was made, I was born, and was so beautiful a
child that my parents created the earth, in order to have somebody to
admire my loveliness. By the time the world was made I had grown up
and, amid all the marveling at my beauty, the Evil eye fell upon me.
Since then every century a wrinkle has formed on my face. And now I am
old!" Holy Friday's grief and anger would allow her to say no more.

In the course of the conversation Holy Friday told Petru that her
father had once been a great and powerful emperor, and once, when a
quarrel broke out between him and the Fairy Aurora, who ruled the
adjoining country, he had been shamefully mocked at by his neighbor.
Then she began to say all sorts of things about the Fairy Aurora. What
was Petru to do? He listened in silence, now and then saying: "Yes,
yes, it is really too bad." What else could he do?

"But I will set you a task, if you are a brave champion and will
perform it," said Holy Friday, when both began to be sleepy. "At the
Fairy Aurora's is a spring--whoever drinks from it will bloom like the
rose and the violet. Bring me a jug of the water, and I shall know how
to show you my gratitude. It's a difficult task, heaven knows! The
Fairy Aurora's kingdom is guarded by all sorts of wild beasts and
terrible dragons. But I want to tell you something else, and give you
something too."

After Holy Friday had said this, she went to a chest bound with iron
on every corner and took out a tiny little flute.

"Look," she said to Petru, "an old man gave me this when I was young.
Whoever hears its notes falls asleep and sleeps till they are heard no
longer. Take the instrument, and play upon it so long as you remain
in the Fairy Aurora's kingdom. No one will harm you, for every
creature will be asleep."

Petru now told his hostess what he meant to do, and Holy Friday was
still more delighted. They did not talk much more. Why should they? it
was already long past midnight. Petru said "good night," thrust the
flute into its case, and went up to the garret to get some sleep. When
morning dawned, the hero was already awake and the morning-star had
hardly risen in the sky ere he was up. He took a large manger, filled
it with red-hot coals, and went out to feed his horses. After the bay
had eaten nine and each of the other horses three full cribs of fire,
Petru led them to the spring, watered them, and prepared to continue
his journey.

"Stop," Holy Friday called from the window. "I have a word more to
say. I want to give you a piece of advice."

Petru went to the window.

"Leave one horse here, and go on with only three. Ride slowly until
you have reached the Fairy Aurora's kingdom. Then dismount and enter
her country on foot. Then, when you return, come so that you will
leave all three steeds lying in the road and arrive here on foot."

"I will obey every word," said Petru, trying to go on.

"Don't be in a hurry, I haven't finished yet," Holy Friday continued.

"Don't look at the Fairy Aurora, for her eyes bewitch, her glances rob
a man of his reason. She is ugly, too ugly to be described. She has
owl's eyes, a fox's face, and cat's claws. Do you hear? Don't look at
her. And may the Lord bring you back to me safe and sound, my son
Petru."

Petru thanked her for her counsel and lingered no longer. Where should
he find time to gossip with old women? He left the bay horse in the
meadow and continued his journey.

Far, far away, where the sky meets the earth and the stars talk to the
flowers, appeared a bright rosy glow, almost like that of the sky in
early spring, only still more beautiful and wonderful. This was the
Fairy Aurora's palace. The whole space between was filled with flowery
meadows. Then, too, it was neither warm nor cold, neither light nor
dark, but midway between, just as it is on St. Peter's day when one
rises early in the morning to drive the cattle to pasture. Petru rode
through this beautiful region with a happy heart. How long he rode can
not be told in human language, for in that country night does not
follow day and day night; it was always early morning with soft, cool
breezes, a viewless sun, and a dim light--the reign of day and night
first began in Holy Friday's land. After a long journey, Petru saw
something white appear amid the rosy glow of the sky. The nearer he
approached the more distinctly he saw what was now before his eyes. It
was the fairy-palace. Petru gazed and gazed, then drew a long breath
like a man who says, "Oh, Lord, I thank thee!" But ah, how beautiful
this palace was! Lofty turrets stretching far above the clouds, walls
white as sea-shells, and brighter than the sun at noon-day, a roof of
silver--but what kind of silver? it did not even glitter in the
sun--and the windows were all spun from air and set in frames of dull
gold. Over all these things the merry sunbeams played, as the wind
plays with the shadows of the branches in the spring, when it is so
indolent that it scarcely stirs.

Petru could not stay long, for he was in a hurry; so he dismounted,

let the horses graze on the dewy grass, took his flute, as Holy Friday
had directed, and saying, "God be with me!" commenced his tremendous
task. He had scarcely walked three stones' throws when he saw a giant,
lulled to sleep by the sweet notes of the flute. This was one of the
guardians of the Fairy Aurora's palace. As he lay there on his back
Petru began to measure him by paces. I won't exaggerate, but he was so
big that when Petru had walked from his feet to his head he heaved a
sigh, he did not exactly know whether from fatigue or fear. It would
have been no wonder if he was astounded. The rising moon is not so
large as the giant's eye. And this eye was not even like other
people's, but in the middle of the giant's forehead. Such was the eye!
What could the rest have been! Petru was a brave hero, but he heartily
thanked God, the flute, and Holy Friday, that he had not got into a
fight with this monster of a man, and softly continued his way. The
prince had walked about as far as a man usually goes before he feels
inclined to sit down in the shade, when he encountered still more
terrible foes. Dragons, each with seven heads, were stretched out in
the sun sound asleep, some on his right hand, others on the left. How
these dragons looked I can not describe: nowadays every body knows
that dragons are not things to be trifled with or laughed at. Petru
hurried swiftly past them, but I really don't know whether it was from
haste or fear. And it would have been no wonder if he was afraid! A
dragon is a dragon!

The prince now reached a river. But let nobody suppose it was an
ordinary stream; milk flowed instead of water, not over sand and
gravel, but over gems and pearls, and it ran neither slowly nor
quickly, but both slowly and quickly at the same time, like the days
of happy mortals. This was the river that flowed around the palace
without ever stopping or moving. On the bank, each one leap from the
other, lions were sleeping. And such lions! They had golden hair, and
teeth and claws tipped with iron. These were the guardians of the
other bank of the river, where there was a beautiful garden, as
beautiful as gardens can only be in the Fairy Aurora's realm. On the
shore grew the fairest flowers and upon these blossoms fairies, each
more beautiful and bewitching than the others, slept sweetly side by
side. Petru did not even dare to glance that way. The prince now asked
himself how he was to get across the stream. It was broad and deep and
had only one bridge, and this bridge, too, was unlike any other in the
world. On each bank was a bridge-head, each guarded by four sleeping
lions! But as to the bridge--no human soul could cross it. One saw it
with the eyes, but felt nothing but empty air if he tried to set foot
on it. Who knows of what material it was made! Perhaps a little cloud.

Enough, Petru remained on the river bank. Cross? That he could not do.
Swim over it? That was not to be thought of! What should he do? Well,
we needn't worry about Petru, he isn't easily frightened. He turned
and went back to the giant. "We'll run the risk," he thought, "we'll
talk to each other. Wake up, my brave fellow," he shouted, pulling the
monster by the sleeve of his coat. When the giant awoke he stretched
out his hand toward Petru--just as we do when we try to catch a fly.
Petru blew upon the flute, and the giant fell back to the ground. So
Petru waked him and put him to sleep again, three times in
succession,--that is, he waked him three times and made him go to
sleep three times. When this was to be done for the fourth time, Petru
unfastened his cravat, tied the giant's two little fingers together
with it, then drew his sword, and, tapping the monster on the breast,
cried, "Wake up, my brave fellow!"

When the giant saw what a sorry jest had been played upon him, he said
to Petru: "Hark ye, this is no fair fight! Fight honestly, if you are
a hero!"

"Wait a while, I want to talk with you first," said Petru. "Swear that
you will carry me over the river, then I'll release you for a fair
fight."

The giant took the oath, and Petru let him rise. When he was fairly
awake he rushed upon the prince to crush him at a single blow. But he
had met his match. Petru was more than a day old, and he, too, dashed
boldly on the foe. They fought for three days and three nights; the
giant seized Petru and hurled him on the ground so that he drove him
into the earth up to his knees, but Petru buried the giant to his
waist; then the giant thrust him into the ground to his breast, and
finally Petru forced the giant down to his neck. When the giant found
himself cornered in this way he cried out in terror, "Let me go, let
me go, I own myself conquered!"

"Will you carry me over the river?" asked Petru.

"I will!" he replied from the hole in the ground.

"What shall I do to you if you break your promise?"

"Kill me; do whatever you choose with me, only let me live now!"

"Be it so!" said Petru, then taking the giant's left hand he tied it
to his right foot, stuffed a handkerchief into his mouth so that he
could not cry out, bandaged his eyes to prevent him from seeing, and
led him to the river.

When they reached the stream the giant put one foot on the opposite
bank, took Petru on the palm of his hand and set him carefully on the
further shore.

"That's right!" said Petru; then he blew on his flute and the giant
sank down on the river bank.

When the fairies, who were bathing in the milky waves of the river,
heard the sound of Petru's flute they felt sleepy, came out, and fell
asleep on the blossoms along the shore, where Petru found them when he
got down from the palm of the giant's hand. He did not venture to
linger long with them. They were beautiful, heaven knows! What must
the Fairy Aurora herself be? Or was she the ugliest among the fair
ones? The prince did not stop to ask himself many questions, but set
off to see.

When he entered the garden, he began to wonder again. Much as he had

seen and experienced, he had never beheld any thing so beautiful. The
trees all had golden branches, the waters of the fountains were
clearer than dew, the wind blew with a musical sound, and the flowers
whispered sweet, loving words. Petru wondered still more when he found
that there was not a single unfolded blossom in the garden, nothing
but buds. It seemed as if the world had stood still here, and it was
always spring. Yet when did the flowers bloom, if they had not yet had
time to open? And, if they did not bloom, why was it? This question,
and many another one, Petru asked himself on his way to the palace. No
one barred his progress, no one interfered with his thoughts, every
body was asleep; the nymphs beside the fountains, the birds on the
boughs, the deer in the thickets, and the butterflies on the flowers,
all were sunk in dreams by the music of the flute. Nay, even the wind
no longer played with the leaves, the sunbeams no longer drank the
dewdrops from the grass, and the river had ceased to flow. Petru alone
was awake, awake with his thoughts, and his wonder at these thoughts.
He reached the court-yard of the palace. Around it stretched a thick,
beautiful grass-plot--a grass plot that swayed like the wind. Before
him was the gate--a gate made entirely of flowers and other beautiful
things. Below and beside the gate were more flowers, each one more
beautiful than the other, so that Petru fancied he was treading upon
clouds as he passed over them. On the right and left slept fairies,
who should have guarded the entrance of the court-yard. Petru looked
around him in every direction, said once more, "God be with me!" and
entered the palace.

What Petru saw I can not describe; surely every body knows that the
palace of the Fairy Aurora can be no ordinary place. Around it were
petrified fairies, trees with golden leaves, and flowers made of
pearls and gems, columns wrought of sunbeams, steps as soft and
lustrous as the couches of princesses, and a sweet, soothing
atmosphere. Such was the court-yard of the Fairy Aurora's palace, and
it could have been no different. Why should it? Petru went up the
steps and entered the palace. The first twelve rooms were hung with
linen, the next twelve with silk; then came twelve decked with silver
and twelve with gold. Petru passed swiftly through the whole
forty-eight, and in the forth-ninth apartment, which was the most
magnificent of all, he found the Fairy Aurora. The chamber was large,
broad, and high, like one of the finest churches. The walls were
covered with all sorts of silk and beautiful things, and on the floor,
where one sets one's foot, was something, I don't know exactly what,
but something as glittering as a mirror and as soft as cushions,
besides many other beautiful things, such as a Fairy Aurora must have.
Where should there be lovely things, if not in her palace! As has been
said, Petru fairly held his breath when he saw himself in the midst of
so much beauty. In the center of this church, or whatever it was,
Petru saw the famous fountain on whose account he had taken so long a
journey, a fountain like any other, with nothing extraordinary about
it. One couldn't help wondering that the Fairy Aurora allowed it to be
in her room. It had staves such as were used in ancient times, but
they had evidently been allowed to remain for some special purpose.

And now I will tell a wonderful thing. Beside the fountain lay the
Fairy Aurora herself--the real Fairy Aurora! The couch was made of
gold and heaven knows what else, but it was a beautiful one, and on it
slept the Fairy Aurora, resting on silken cushions filled with spring
breezes. Of course she was not beautiful. Why should she be? Had not
Holy Friday said that she was a combination of hideous things? Why
should we delay in our words? Perhaps Holy Friday was right! It might
be so. Enough--when Petru looked at her as she slept there on her
couch, he held his breath and no longer played on the magic flute--he
was petrified by this wonder of wonders. No, she was beautiful, far,
far more beautiful than one would expect the Fairy Aurora must be!
I'll say no more.

On the right and left of the couch slept twelve of the prettiest
fairies in the kingdom, who had evidently been overtaken by slumber
while waiting on their queen. Petru was so absorbed in gazing at the
Fairy Aurora that he did not notice them till, no longer hearing the
flute, they stirred in their sleep. Petru, too, trembled, and began to
play again. The whole palace was once more sunk in slumber, and the
prince advanced three paces.

Between the couch and the fountain was a table on which were a tender
white loaf, kneaded with roe's milk, and a goblet of red wine, sweet
as a morning dream. This was the bread of strength and the wine of
youth. Petru looked once at the bread, once at the wine, and once at
the Fairy Aurora, then with three steps more reached the couch, the
table, and the fountain. When he stood beside the couch he fairly lost
his senses--he really could not control himself, and stooping bit the
Fairy Aurora. She opened her eyes, and looked at the prince with a
glance which made him lose his senses still more. He played upon his
flute that she might fall asleep again, placed the golden wreath on
her brow, took a piece of bread from the table, drank a sip of the
wine of youth, then bit the fairy again, ate another mouthful of
bread, and drank more wine. This he did three times in succession.
Thrice he bit the Fairy Aurora, thrice he ate of the bread, and thrice
he tasted the wine. Then he filled the jug with water from the
fountain and vanished like a piece of good news.

When the hero entered the garden he found an entirely new world. The
flowers were flowers, the buds had opened, the fountains played
faster, the sunbeams danced more cheerily on the palace walls, and the
fairies' faces looked more joyous. All this was due to the three
bites.

Petru went away by the same road that he came, amid the fairies and
flowers, on the palm of the giant's hand, past lions, dragons, and
other monsters. Then, seated in his saddle, he cast one glance back
and saw that the whole world behind him was in motion. Hi! But they
had somebody before them worth chasing. Not like the wind, not like
thought, not like longing, not like a curse, but even faster than
happiness vanishes, Petru hurried on his way. The pursuers were left
behind, and the prince reached Holy Friday on foot. Holy Friday knew
that he was coming by the neighing of the bay horse, which had felt
its master's approach three days off, so she came to meet him,
bringing some white bread and red wine.

"Welcome back, prince!"

"Good morning, thank you kindly, Holy Friday."

Petru then handed her the jug of water from the Fairy Aurora's
fountain, and his hostess thanked him most warmly. They exchanged a
few words about the prince's journey, the Fairy Aurora's palace, and
the beauty of this sister of the Sun--then Petru saddled the bay, for
he really had no time to lose. Holy Friday listened sometimes
joyously, sometimes bitterly, sometimes merrily, sometimes angrily,
but when she saw that Petru was surely going, to carry home his
portion of the water from the fairy fountain, she wished him health
and happiness.

Petru did not stop till he reached Holy Thursday. Here he dismounted
and entered as had been agreed, but did not stay long, merely greeted
her, talked a little while, and then said farewell.

"Stop, let me tell you something else before you go on," said Holy
Thursday anxiously. "Take care of your life; enter into conversation
with no one, don't ride too fast, don't let go of the water, believe
no promises, and fly from lips that speak sweet words! Go as you came,
the way is long, the world is wicked, and you have something very
valuable in your hand, so listen to me. I give you this handkerchief,
it is made neither of gold, silver, silk, nor pearls, but striped
linen; take good care of it, it is enchanted. Whoever carries it no
thunderbolt can strike, no lance stab, no sword slay, and no bullet
pierce."

Such were Holy Thursday's words. Petru took the handkerchief and
listened to her counsel; then dashed off on the bay, hurrying as fairy
princes do hurry, when seized by homesickness. Petru did not dismount
at Holy Wednesday's, but said, "How do you do," from his horse's back
and rode on. Just at the right time he remembered his enchanted box,
and, wishing to know what was going on in the world, drew it out of
its case. He had barely pulled it out and not wholly opened it, when
the voice inside said:

"The Fairy Aurora is angry because you took the water away. Holy
Friday is angry because she has broken her jug, your brothers Florea
and Costan are angry because you have wrested the empire from them."

Petru began to laugh when he heard of so much anger. He did not

exactly know what else to ask. "How did Holy Friday break the jug?" he
said at last.

"She began to dance with joy, and fell down with it."

"How have I wrested the empire from my brothers?"

The box now began to relate how Florea and Costan, as the emperor was
now old and blind in both eyes, had gone to him and begged him to
divide his kingdom between them. The emperor had replied that no one
should rule the land except he who brought water from the Fairy
Aurora's fountain. "As the brothers understood his meaning they went
to old Birscha, who told them that you had been there, accomplished
the feat, and set out on your way home. Your brothers consulted
together and are now on their way to meet you, kill you, take the
water from you, and reign over the country."

"You lie, you accursed box," cried Petru furiously, when he heard all
this, and dashed the casket upon the ground so that it broke into
seventy-seven pieces. He had not ridden much further, ere he saw the
clouds of his own country, felt his native breezes, and beheld here
and there, in the distance, one of the mountain peaks on the frontiers
of his home. Petru stopped, that he might see more distinctly what it
seemed to him that he only fancied he perceived.

He was just going to cross the bridge on the borders of the empire,
when he thought he heard a distant sound, as though some one were
calling him, and even shouting his name: "Ho! Petru!" He wanted to
halt.

"Forward, forward," cried the bay. "You'll fare badly if you stop."

"No, no, stop! Let us see who and what it is, and what is wanted. Let
me look the world in the face!" So saying, Petru turned the bay's
bridle.

Oh, Petru, Petru! Who told you to stop? Wouldn't it be better for you
to remember what Holy Thursday said to you? Wouldn't it be better for
you to heed the bay's counsel? That's the way of the world, you can do
nothing to change it!

When he turned, he saw his brother Florea and his brother Costan. They
were both there, and approached Petru. Forward, Petru, hurry on! Or
did not Holy Thursday tell you that you must enter into conversation
with no one? Or do you no longer remember the tidings Holy Wednesday's
box brought you? The brothers drew near with fair words and honey on
their lips. What did Holy Thursday say? Petru, Petru, have you
forgotten?
When Petru saw his dear brothers, he leaped from the bay's back and
rushed into their arms. Dear me! how could he help it? How long it was
since he had seen a human face or heard one word of human speech! The
conversation flowed as it flows among brothers. Petru was gay and
happy; Florea and Costan were full of sweet words, there was honey on
their lips. Only the bay was sad and hung his head mournfully. After
the brothers had talked a long time about the old emperor, the
country, and Petru's journey, Florea began to frown.

"Brother Petru, this is a wicked world!--wouldn't it be better for you

to give us the water to carry? People will come to meet you, but
nobody will know any thing about us, whence we come, where we are
going, or what we have."

"Yes, indeed," said Costan, "Florea speaks sensibly."

Petru shook his head once or twice, and then told his brothers about
his charmed handkerchief. They now perceived that there was only one
way to kill the hero, so Florea began to talk to Petru over Costan's
shoulders. About three stones'-throws off was a well of clear, cold
water.

"Aren't you thirsty, Costan?" asked Florea, winking at Costan.

"Yes," replied Costan, understanding what Florea meant. "Come, Petru,

let us quench our thirst, and then may God help us on our way. We'll
follow you to protect you from annoyance and danger."

Don't go, Petru, don't go, or you'll fare badly! The bay horse neighed
but once. Ah, but the hero did not understand. What happened then!
What should happen? Nothing!--

The well was broad and deep.

The two brothers went home with the water, as if they had brought it
from the Fairy Aurora.

The bay neighed again, so fiercely and mournfully that even the woods
shook with fear, then rushed to the well and stood there paralyzed by
grief.

This was the story of Petru, the brave, the heroic prince. It seems as
if he were destined to arrive at an evil hour.

A banquet was held at the emperor's court, and all sorts of splendid
ceremonies were arranged. All through the land went the news that the
monarch's sons, Florea and Costan, had brought the water from the
Fairy Aurora. The emperor washed his eyes with the water and saw as
never mortal man had seen before. In the royal chamber behind the
hearth stood a cask, and in the stave of this cask he saw a worm--the
emperor could see so well that he looked through the wood. After
dividing the empire between his two brave sons, he retired to his
large private estates to spend his old age in peace. So ended the
story of the water from the Fairy Aurora's fountain. The country
celebrated the event for three days and three nights, then the people
went to work again as if nothing had happened.

After Petru had left the couch, the palace, and the court-yard, and
the sound of his flute could no longer be heard, the Fairy Aurora
recovered her consciousness, opened her eyes, raised her head, and
looked around her in every direction as if searching for something,
though she herself did not exactly know what.

"What was that?" she asked, half awake, half-dreaming--"Who?"

It seemed to her as if she had seen something in a vision,--no, in

reality,--something sweet and pleasant. A creature like a human being,
but with a more commanding glance, something unlike any thing she had
ever beheld before.

"Don't you know what it was? Did you see it too! Or, have you, too,
been asleep, been dreaming?"

Such were the questions the Fairy Aurora asked her attendant fays and
herself. She felt as if she had had a different soul ever since she
saw this wonder. But no one answered her; every one was dumb with
amazement.

The Fairy Aurora noticed the wreath: "What a beautiful garland! Who
gathered the flowers for it, who twined them into a coronal, and who
brought the wreath here and laid it on my couch?"

And the Fairy Aurora became sad.

She saw the bread on the table. Three mouthfuls were missing, one on
the right side, one on the left and one out of the middle. It was the
same with the wine of youth; three sips were missing, one from the
top, one from the bottom, and one from the middle.

Somebody must have been there. The Fairy Aurora grew still more
sorrowful; it seemed to her as if she missed something, yet she did
not know what or where.

The water in the fountain was turbid. Water! Somebody has taken water
away from here! And the Fairy Aurora was wrathful. How had any one
been able to enter unperceived? Where were all the sharp-eyed guards?
The giants, the dragons, the iron-shod lions, the fairies, the
flowers, and the sun--what had they all been doing? Nobody had
watched! Had nobody been at his post? The Fairy Aurora now fell into a
perfect rage. "Lions! Dragons! Giants! set forth, pursue, catch, seize
and bring him back." Such were the orders of the Fairy Aurora in the
fury of her wrath. The command was issued and set her whole realm in
commotion, but Petru had fled so swiftly that not even the sunbeams
could overtake him. All returned sorrowfully; all brought sad tidings.
Petru had crossed the frontiers of the kingdom, had gone where the
Fairy Aurora's guards possessed no power.

The fairy queen now forgot her anger in her grief, and sent forth the
Sun to make seven days into one, to search, gaze, and bring tidings.
During this seven-fold long day the Fairy Aurora did nothing but watch
the course of the Sun; she gazed and gazed till the tears began to
stream from her eyes, I don't know whether from looking so long or
from her great sorrow and yearning.

Lo and behold! On the seventh day the Sun came home,--red, tired, and
sad. More bad news. Alas! Petru was where the sunbeams could not
penetrate.
When the Fairy Aurora saw that this last trial had also been vain, she
gave strict orders throughout her whole country that the fairies
should no longer smile, the flowers no longer send forth fragrance,
the breezes no longer blow, the springs no more pour forth clear
waters, nor the sunbeams shine. Then she commanded that the black veil
of darkness should be let down between the world and her empire, a
veil so thick that only a single sunbeam should pierce it, to convey
the tidings that the sun would not move through the sky until the
person who had taken the water from the fountain should come. And this
news went through the darkened world. The people agreed that the great
light had been solely for the emperor's eye-sight. Nobody in the world
saw except the emperor, nobody perceived the annoyances of the
darkness except the emperor, and nobody was more unhappy than the
emperor. So he advised and commanded his sons, Florea and Costan, to
set out and free the world from darkness.

Whoever lies once, will lie a second time; Florea mounted his horse
and rode by the way Petru had smoothed to the Fairy Aurora's kingdom.
When he had nearly reached her court, the fairy felt that some
stranger was approaching.

"Is any body coming?" she asked, rather sharply.

"Some one is coming," replied the dragons who mounted guard at the
bridge.

"How is he coming? Over or under the bridge?"

The bridge was what we know. Florea passed under it.

"The hero is passing under the bridge!" replied the dragons, somewhat
amused.

"See to him, or the light will become black to you," said the fairy,
receiving Florea at his entrance. Florea was thrilled by the sight of
so much beauty.

"Welcome, my hero! Did you steal the water?"

"Yes, you are right, I took it."

"Did you drink the wine?"

Florea remained silent.

"Did you eat the bread?"

"No," said Florea.

"Did you bite me?"

Florea was silent.

"Then may you lose your sight! I'll teach you to tell another
falsehood!" said the fairy, angrily, giving Florea two cuffs, one on
the right ear and the other on the left, till every thing grew as
dark before his eyes as mortal sin. Two dragons led the blind prince
out of the palace, and the matter was settled.
Costan now set out to follow his brother's example. He set out for the
Fairy Aurora's palace, reached it, and fared just as Florea had
done--he, too, left it a blind man.

There was now not a single ray of light in the whole earth. The world
was deprived of light on account of one emperor's eyes.

After the Fairy Aurora had found that she could not recover Petru, she
summoned every one in her whole domain; the fairies, the flowers, in
short, all her subjects. Even the sun himself was obliged to come down
from the sky, unharness the horses from his chariot, lead them to the
stable, and go to the Fairy Aurora's palace. When all were thus
assembled, the beautiful queen gave them no further commands, but in
her grief and suffering bade farewell to all her subjects, thanked
them for their love and confidence, and sent them out into the world,
that each one might act according to his own ideas, keeping only two
lions, two large and two small dragons, and two giants, that she might
have somebody to guard the bridge. She sent all the fairies into the
garden, telling them not to come back to the court till she was happy
once more, then gave orders that the flowers should henceforth cease
to smell so sweet that every human being would carry them away, the
winds wail so piteously that no mortal could help weeping to hear
them, the springs send forth bitter waters, and the sun daily cast
seven times seven cold rays into the world. After saying all these
things, she went to the great wheel on which the threads of human life
are wound, stopped it, so that it could no longer turn, and human
existence became changeless. Then the Fairy Aurora hid herself from
the world in the darkest and dreariest corner of her whole palace.

The big and little dragons and the giants went out into the wide world
and hid themselves for very shame in the most secluded caves and
deserts, so that they could no longer be seen by any human eye; the
lions shook the gold from their manes, the iron from their teeth and
paws, and became furious with rage; the fairies concealed themselves
in the garden; the flowers, springs, and winds obeyed the Fairy
Aurora's will; and the cold rays of the sun, lacking both warmth and
light, can still be seen in the sky on summer nights. Human life was
at a stand, time ceased to move. Two lions, two big and two little
dragons, and two giants mounted guard at the bridge. How long the
Fairy Aurora's kingdom remained in this state is not known and can not
be told. Much time passed without moving.

Holy Friday, too, at last noticed that the Fairy Aurora was angry; the
scanty sunbeams, and the whirlwinds which shook the whole world, had
brought her the tidings. She was half angry, half pleased,--angry
because she could no longer see around her, and pleased because her
brave, handsome prince had escaped and her beautiful neighbor was
sorrowful. She was provoked, too, because her jug with the wonderful
water was broken. But when Holy Friday saw that the darkness did not
lessen, the light did not return, and even the very last sunbeam
vanished from the earth, she realized that the Fairy Aurora was not
jesting, and she ordered the whirlwinds to set out together and remove
the great veil on the frontiers of the empire, that light might enter
the world. The winds departed, each one more furious, more fierce,
more terrible than the other--as whirlwinds usually are. It seemed as
if they were taking the world away with them, and meant to tarry on it
no longer. They reached the veil and dashed against it. Oh, how strong
they were! But the veil did not stir. The whirlwinds blew against it
again and again, three times in succession, then they gave up the
attempt. They saw that the veil was firmer than the earth itself.
After lingering a few moments they returned, wearied and covered with
disgrace, and once more circled around the earth in their wild rage.
You can imagine what happened to every thing that came in their way.
Nothing good at any rate. Alas! alas!

The whirlwinds returned to Holy Friday and told her about the veil.
Holy Friday was now not only half-angry, but wholly enraged, so she
sent the whirlwinds to the emperor's court to tell Petru he must
intercede with the Fairy Aurora and promise to do whatever she asked,
that light might return to the world. The whirlwinds set out
again--this time somewhat more slowly and peacefully, as people depart
when engaged on a good errand to a friendly person. They reached the
palace. Petru was not there. The whirlwinds began to act somewhat
more willfully. Petru had perished on the way. The whirlwinds circled
around the palace from the left, then from the right, then from the
center, turned it, twisted it, raised it, and hurled it, till there
was nothing left of it. Then they returned to Holy Friday's hut with
the news of Petru's death.

"Go into the world, every one of you, move every thing that can be
moved, and find Petru. Bring him to me dead or alive!" said Holy
Friday, after she had heard the sad tidings.

For three days and three nights the whirlwinds did not stop blowing.
Thrice they uprooted trees, drove the rivers from their beds,
dispersed the clouds by beating them against the rocks, swept the
bottom of the sea and destroyed the surface of the earth. It was all
in vain. They came back to the house, each one more tired, angry and
mortified than the other.

Only one still lingered: the Spring wind, the soft, lazy, warm Spring
wind. What had become of him? They all knew that he could not have
accomplished much. Who knows? Weary as he was, he had perhaps lain
down somewhere in the shade. Nobody troubled his head any more about
him. Suddenly, after a short time, when all were racking their brains
to discover Petru, the leaves began to stir gently.

Holy Friday felt the soft air, and went out. "What news do you bring?"
she asked the favorite of all the winds.

"Sad, very sad, yet good,"--whispered the young wind. "After I grew
tired of so much searching, destroying, and pulling, I reached an
empty well, and, being rid of my brothers, thought I would rest a
while before setting off for home."

"And you found Petru at the bottom of the well?" cried Holy Friday,
joyfully.

"Yes, and the bay by his side."

"May your speech be sweet, your breezes soft, and may you ever bring
good tidings!" said Holy Friday; then she commanded him to hasten to
Holy Thursday and tell her she must be ready with the gold crucible,
for Petru was in a sad case:--from there the Spring wind was to rush
to Holy Wednesday and tell her she must come to the well with the
water of life. "Do you understand?" said Holy Friday. "And go as fast
as you can," and they all set off together.
They reached the deserted well. There was nothing left of Petru except
bones and ashes. Holy Wednesday took the bones and fitted them
together--not a single one was missing. Holy Friday ordered the
whirlwinds to search the bottom of the well, turn up all the dust, and
collect Petru's ashes. This was done. Holy Thursday made a fire,
gathered the dew from the flowers into the gold crucible, and set it
on the flames. When the water began to boil, Holy Wednesday repeated
three spells, looked once to the east, once to the west, once to the
north, and once to the south, and threw the herb of life into the
boiling water. Holy Friday did the same with Petru's ashes. Holy
Thursday counted one, two, three, and took the crucible off the fire.
Petru's ashes and the herb of life were made into a fragrant salve.
The Spring wind blew upon it once and stiffened it, then Petru's
bones were smeared with it seven times from head to foot, seven times
from foot to head, seven times across one way, and seven times across
the other, and, when this was done, up sprang the hero, a hundred
thousand times handsomer, braver, and prouder than before.

"Jump on the horse!" said Holy Friday.

As soon as the bay felt his master on his back, he began to neigh and
stamp. The animal was more spirited than ever.

"Where shall we go?" the horse asked gayly.

"Home," replied Petru.

"How shall we ride?"

"Like a curse."

Petru expressed his thanks for the service done him, and set off; he
rode and rode as fleetly as a curse flies, till he came to the
emperor's court.

Nothing was left of the palace except the ground where it had stood.
No trace of any human being who could have uttered a word or given any
tidings was to be found. At last old Birscha came out of a ruined
cellar. Petru learned what had happened and its cause, turned his bay,
and went back even more swiftly than he had come. He did not even stop
to take breath until he reached the Fairy Aurora's kingdom. The time
that had passed since every thing had been in the condition the queen
had commanded, can not be told in words. It must have been a long
period.

When Petru reached the bridge the sun had only three bright rays,
seven warm, and nine cold ones left; all the others had gradually been
lost.

The Fairy Aurora felt that some remarkable person must be coming, for
it seemed just as it had done when she woke from the dream that had
made her so sad. She was longing for something, she knew not what,
just as she had then.

"Who is coming?" she asked in a low tone.

"Hold firmly, master," said the bay.

Petru struck in the spurs, drew the bridle, and felt nothing until he
was on the other side of the bridge.

"The hero is coming! _Over_ the bridge!" cried the guards, waving
their hats in the air.

The Fairy Aurora did not stir nor speak.

Petru suddenly rushed up to her, clasped her in his arms, and kissed
her--just as fairy princes always kiss bewitching fairies.

The lovely fairy queen felt as she had never felt before. She said
nothing more, asked no more questions, but made a sign to have the bay
led into the stables of the sun, and entered the palace with Petru.

The fairies began to smile merrily, the flowers to smell sweetly, the
springs to pour forth clear waters, the winds to blow cheerily, the
wheel of life whirled faster than a top, the black veil fell, and the
radiant sun rose high in the heavens, higher than it had ever done
before. And in the world there was a light like the sun's, so that for
nine years, nine months, and nine days it was so terribly bright that
nothing could be seen.

Petru rode home, brought back his old father and mother, had a wedding
so magnificent that tidings of it spread through ninety-nine
countries, and became emperor of both kingdoms.

His brothers, Florea and Costan, had their sight restored so that they
might witness Petru's happiness.

This, dear children, was the story of handsome Prince Petru and the
Fairy Aurora, queen of the Land of the Sun.

Petru lived and reigned in peace and health, and who knows whether, by
God's help, he may not be reigning still.

[THE END.]

* * * * *

BY THE

_QUEEN OF ROUMANIA_.

PILGRIM SORROW

A CYCLE OF TALES. TRANSLATED BY HELEN ZIMMERN. SQUARE 16MO. $1.50.

"Like a string of amber beads, each one exquisite by itself,

but seen in perfection when connected with its fellows. They
imprison nymphs of the wood, and naiads of the stream, and
all the sweet and tender graces of nature which she reveals
only to her devoted lovers."--_Pittsburgh Times_.

"The heart experiences of a princess and queen who is also a

true and noble woman."--_Cincinnati Commercial Gazette_.

"The charming tales are full of beautiful thought and

 sentiment, and scarcely lack the metrical form to be true
poetry."--_Providence Journal_.

"Wholly attractive and interesting--beautifully

printed."--_Boston Gazette_.

* * * * *

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Title: King Arthur's Knights

The Tales Re-told for Boys & Girls

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KING ARTHUR'S KNIGHTS:

The Tales Re-Told for Boys & Girls

by

HENRY GILBERT.

With Illustrations in Color by Walter Crane

Thomas Nelson and Sons

New York, Edinburgh, London
Toronto, And Paris

In thold� day�s of the King Arthour,

Of which that Britons speken great honour,
All was this land fulfilled of faery.

_The Canterbury Tales._

Printed in the United States of America

PREFACE

This book is an attempt to tell some of the stories of King Arthur and
his Knights in a way which will be interesting to every boy and girl
who loves adventures.

Although tales of these old British heroes have been published before
in a form intended for young people, it is believed that they have
never been related quite in the same spirit nor from the same point of
view; and it is hoped that the book will fill a place hitherto vacant
in the hearts of all boys and girls.

No doubt many of you, my young readers, have at some time or another

taken down the _Morte D'Arthur_ from your father's bookshelves and read
a few pages of it here and there. But I doubt if any of you have ever
gone very far in the volume. You found generally, I think, that it was
written in a puzzling, old-fashioned language, that though it spoke of
many interesting things, and seemed that it ought to be well worth
reading, yet somehow it was tedious and dry.

In the tales as I have retold them for you, I hope you will not find
any of these faults. Besides writing them in simple language, I have
chosen only those episodes which I know would appeal to you. I have
added or altered here and there, for in places it struck me that there
was just wanting a word or two to make you feel the magic that was
everywhere abroad in those days. It seemed to me that some mysterious
adventure might easily be waiting in the ruined and deserted Roman town
on the desolate moor, or even just round the mossy trunk of the next
oak in the forest-drive, through which the knight was riding; or that
any fair lady or questing dog which he might meet could turn out to be
a wizard seeking to work woe upon him. Nevertheless, I was always sure
that in those bright days when the world was young, whatever evil power
might get the mastery for a little while, the knight's courage,
humility, and faith would win through every peril at the end.

In this book, besides reading of wonderful adventures and brave

fighting, you will learn just what sort of man a perfect knight was
required to be in the chivalrous times when men wore armour and rode on
errantry. The duties of a 'good and faithful knight' were quite simple,
but they were often very hard to perform. They were--to protect the
distressed, to speak the truth, to keep his word to all, to be
courteous and gentle to women, to defend right against might, and to do
or say nothing that should sully the fair name of Christian knighthood.

Although, therefore, these stories of King Arthur and his men treat of
knights and their ladies, of magical trolls and wonder-working wizards,
and it might seem for that reason that they can have little or nothing
in common with life of the present day, it will be seen that the spirit
in which they are told conveys something which every boy can learn.

Indeed, the great and simple lesson of chivalry which the tales of King
Arthur teach is, in a few words, to merit 'the fine old name of
gentleman.'

The history of King Arthur and his Knights is contained in two books,
one being the _Morte D'Arthur_, written by Sir Thomas Malory, the other
being the _Mabinogion_, a collection of old Welsh stories, first
translated by Lady Charlotte Guest in 1838. I have selected thirteen
tales from the number which these two books contain; but there are many
more, equally as interesting, which remain.

Little is known about Sir Thomas Malory, who lived in the fifteenth
century. We only learn that he was a Welshman, a man of heroic mind
who, as an old writer relates, 'from his youth, greatly shone in the
gifts of mind and body.' Though much busied with cares of state, his
favourite recreation was said to be the reading of history, and in this
pursuit 'he made selections from various authors concerning the valour
and the victories of the most renowned King Arthur of the Britons.' We
know, further, that these selections or tales were translated mostly
from poems about Arthur written by old French poets in the eleventh and
twelfth centuries, and that Sir Thomas Malory finished his translation
in the ninth year of King Edward the Fourth (1469). This, of course,
was before printing was introduced into England, but no doubt many
written copies were made of the book, so as to enable the stories to be
read to the lords and ladies and other rich people who would desire to
hear about the flower of kings and chivalry, the great King Arthur.
When, in 1477, Caxton set up his printing press at Westminster, the
_Morte D'Arthur_ was one of the books which then saw the light of day.

The _Mabinogion_, which contains other tales about King Arthur, is a

collection of old Welsh romances. Though our earliest collection of
them is to be found in a manuscript written in the thirteenth or
fourteenth century, some of them are probably as old as the time when
Welshmen clothed themselves in the skins of the beaver and the bear,
and used stone for their tools and weapons.

It may be that, when you get older, you will go back to the two books I
have mentioned, and you will find them so fascinating that you will be
impatient of any other book which pretends to tell you the same tales.
But until that time arrives, I hope you will find the stories as I have
told them quite interesting and exciting.

HENRY GILBERT.

_June_ 1911.

CONTENTS

CHAP. PAGE

I. HOW ARTHUR WAS MADE KING AND WON HIS KINGDOM 1

II. SIR BALIN AND THE STROKE DOLOROUS 32

III. HOW LANCELOT WAS MADE A KNIGHT. THE FOUR WITCH QUEENS,
AND THE ADVENTURES AT THE CHAPEL PERILOUS 52

IV. THE KNIGHT OF THE KITCHEN 72

V. HOW SIR TRISTRAM KEPT HIS WORD 101

VI. THE DEEDS OF SIR GERAINT 131

VII. HOW SIR PERCEVAL WAS TAUGHT CHIVALRY, AND ENDED THE
EVIL WROUGHT BY SIR BALIN'S DOLOROUS STROKE 164

VIII. HOW SIR OWEN WON THE EARLDOM OF THE FOUNTAIN 194

IX. OF SIR LANCELOT AND THE FAIR MAID OF ASTOLAT 229

X. HOW THE THREE GOOD KNIGHTS ACHIEVED THE HOLY GRAAL 250

XI. OF THE PLOTS OF SIR MORDRED; AND HOW SIR LANCELOT

SAVED THE QUEEN 278

XII. OF SIR GAWAINE'S HATRED, AND THE WAR WITH SIR LANCELOT 307
XIII. OF THE REBELLION OF MORDRED AND THE DEATH OF KING ARTHUR 333

KING ARTHUR'S KNIGHTS

HOW ARTHUR WAS MADE KING AND WON HIS KINGDOM

In the hall of his Roman palace at London, King Uther, Pendragon of the
Island of Britain, lay dying. He had been long sick with a wasting
disease, and forced to lie in his bed, gnawing his beard with wrath at
his weakness, while the pagan Saxons ravened up and down the fair broad
lands, leaving in their tracks the smoking ruin of broken towns and
desolated villages, where mothers lay dead beside their children on the
hearths, fair churches stood pillaged and desecrated, and priests and
nuns wandered in the wilds.

At length, when the pagans, bold and insolent, had ventured near
London, the king had been able to bear his shame and anguish no longer.
He had put himself, in a litter, at the head of his army, and meeting
the fierce, brave pagans at Verulam (now called St. Albans) he had, in
a battle day-long and stubborn, forced them at length to fly with heavy
slaughter.

That was three days ago, and since then he had lain in his bed as still
as if he were dead; and beside him sat the wise wizard Merlin, white
with great age, and in his eyes the calmness of deep learning.

It was the third night when the king suddenly awoke from his stupor and
clutched the hand of Merlin.

'I have dreamed!' he said in a low shaken voice. 'I have seen two
dragons fighting--one white, the other red. First the white dragon got
the mastery, and clawed with iron talons the red one's crest, and drove
him hither and thither into holes and crannies of the rocks. And then
the red one took heart, and with a fury that was marvellous to see, he
drove and tore the white dragon full terribly, and anon the white one
crawled away sore wounded. And the red dragon walked up and down in the
place of his triumph, and grew proud, and fought smaller red dragons
and conquered. Thus for a long time he stayed, and was secure and
boastful. Then I saw the white dragon return with a rage that was very
terrible, and the red dragon fought with him; but his pride had
softened him, so he drew off. Then other red dragons came upon him in
his wounds and beat him sore, which seeing, the white dragon dashed
upon them all--and I awoke. Merlin, tell me what this may mean, for my
mind is sore distraught with the vision.'

Then Merlin looked at the trembling king, wasted with disease, and in
his wise heart was great pity.

'It means, lord,' he said in slow grave tones, 'that thy people shall
conquer--that a red dragon shall rise from thy kin, who shall drive out
the loathsome pagan and shall conquer far and wide, and his fame shall
go into all lands and for all time.'

'I thank thee, Merlin, for thy comfort,' sighed the wearied king. 'I
have feared me these last years that the pagan will at the last drive
my people into the western sea, and that the name of Christ shall die
out of this fair land, and the foul pagan possess it. But thy words
give me great heart.'

'Nay, sir,' said Merlin, 'take comfort. Great power will come to this
people in a near time, and they shall conquer all their enemies.'

Anon the king slept, and lay thus for three further days, neither
speaking nor moving. Many great lords and barons came craving to speak
with Merlin, asking if the king were not better. But, looking into
their crafty eyes, and seeing there the pride and ambitions of their
hearts, Merlin knew that they wished the king were already dead; for
all thought that King Uther had no son to take the kingdom after him,
and each great baron, strong in men, plotted to win the overlordship
when the king should be gone.

'If he dieth and sayeth not which he shall name to succeed him,' some
asked, 'say, Merlin, what's to be done?'

'I shall tell you,' said Merlin. 'Come ye all into this chamber
to-morrow's morn, and, if God so wills, I will make the king speak.'

Next morn, therefore, came all the great barons and lords into the high
hall of the palace, and many were the proud and haughty glances passing
among them. There was King Lot of Orkney, small and slim, with his dark
narrow face and crafty eyes under pent eyebrows; King Uriens of Reged,
tall and well-seeming, with grim eyes war-wise, fresh from the long
harrying of the fleeing pagans; King Mark of Tintagel, burly of form,
crafty and mean of look; King Nentres of Garlot, ruddy of face,
blusterous of manner, who tried to hide cunning under a guise of
honesty; and many others, as Duke Cambenet of Loidis, King Brandegoris
of Stranggore, King Morkant of Strathclyde, King Clariance of
Northumberland, King Kador of Cornwall, and King Idres of Silura.

Now, when all these were assembled about the bed of Uther, Merlin went
to the side of the sleeping king, and looked long and earnestly upon
his closed eyes. Anon he passed his hands above the face of the king,
and Uther instantly awoke, and looked about him as if startled.

'Lord,' said Merlin, 'God's hand is drawing you to Him, and these your
lords desire you to name your successor ere you pass from life. Is it
not your desire that your son Arthur shall take the kingdom after you,
with your blessing?'

Those who craned towards the bed started and looked darkly at Merlin
and then at each other; for none had heard of the son whom the wizard
named Arthur. Then in the deep silence the dying king raised his hand
in the sign of blessing, and in a hollow whisper said:

'Such is my desire. With God's blessing I wish my son Arthur to take

this kingdom after me, and all that love me must follow him.'

His eyes closed, a shiver passed down the tall frame as it lay beneath
the clothes, and with a sigh the soul of Uther sped.
In a few days the king was buried in all solemnity with the dead of his
kindred in the Roman temple that had been made a church, where now
stands St. Paul's. Thereafter men waited and wondered, for the land was
without a king, and none knew who was rightfully heir to the throne.

As the days went by, men gathered in groups in the market-place of

London, whispering the rumours that mysteriously began to fly from
mouth to mouth,--how King Lot of Orkney and Lothian was gathering his
knights and men-at-arms; and King Uriens and Duke Cambenet of Loidis
had got together a great host, although the remnant of the pagans had
fled the country. The faces of the citizens went gloomy as they thought
of the griefs of civil war, of the terrors of the sack of cities, the
ruin of homes, the death of dear ones, and the loss of riches.
Nevertheless, some were already wagering which of the great lords would
conquer the others, and take to himself the crown of Britain and the
title of Pendragon.

As it neared the feast of Christmas, men heard that the Archbishop of

London, who was then chief ruler of the Church, had sent his letters to
each and all the great nobles, bidding them come to a great council to
be holden at the church of St. Paul at Christmas.

When men heard that this was done by the advice of Merlin, faces
lightened and looked more joyful.

'Now shall things go right,' said they, 'for the old, old Merlin hath
the deepest wisdom of all the earth.'

On Christmas Eve the city throbbed with the clank of arms and the tramp
of the great retinues of princes, kings and powerful lords who had come
at the archbishop's summons, and by day and night the narrow ways were
crowded with armed men. Long ere the dawn of Christmas Day, the lords
and the common people betook themselves along the wide road which led
across to the church, which then stood in a wide space amid fields, and
all knelt therein to mass.

While it was yet dark a great strange cry rang out in the churchyard.
Some ran forth, and there by the wall behind the high altar they saw a
vast stone, four-square, that had not been there before, and in the
middle thereof was stuck a great wedge of steel, and sticking therefrom
by the point was a rich sword. On the blade were written words in
Latin, which a clerk read forth, which said, 'Whoso pulleth this sword
out of this stone and wedge of steel is rightwise born King of all
Britain.'

The clerk ran into the church and told the archbishop, and men were all
amazed and would have gone instantly to see this marvel, but the
archbishop bade them stay.

'Finish your prayers to God,' he said, 'for no man may touch this
strange thing till high mass be done.'

When mass was finished, all poured forth from the church and thronged
about the stone, and marvelled at the words on the sword. First King
Lot, with a light laugh, took hold of the handle and essayed to pull
out the point of the sword, but he could not, and his face went hot and
angry. Then King Nentres of Garlot took his place with a jest, but
though he heaved at the sword with all his burly strength, till it
seemed like to snap, he could not move it, and so let go at last with
an angry oath. All the others essayed in like manner, but by none was
it moved a jot, and all stood about discomfited, looking with black
looks at one another and the stone.

'He that is rightwise born ruler of Britain is not here,' said the
archbishop at length, 'but doubt not he shall come in God's good time.
Meanwhile, let a tent be raised over the stone, and do ye lords appoint
ten of your number to watch over it, and we will essay the sword again
after New Year's Day.'

So that the kings and lords should be kept together, the archbishop
appointed a great tournament to be held on New Year's Day on the waste
land north of the city, which men now call Smithfield.

Now when the day was come, a certain lord, Sir Ector de Morven, who had
great lands about the isle of Thorney, rode towards the jousts with his
son, Sir Kay, and young Arthur, who was Sir Kay's foster-brother. When
they had got nearly to the place, suddenly Sir Kay bethought him that
he had left his sword at home.

'Do you ride back, young Arthur,' he said, 'and fetch me my sword, for
if I do not have it I may not fight.'

Willingly Arthur turned his horse and rode back swiftly. But when he
had arrived at the house, he found it shut up and none was within, for
all had gone to the jousts. Then was he a little wroth, and rode back
wondering how he should obtain a sword for his foster-brother.

Suddenly, as he saw the tower of St. Paul's church through the trees,
he bethought him of the sword in the stone, about which many men had
spoken in his hearing.

'I will ride thither,' said he, 'and see if I may get that sword for my
brother, for he shall not be without a sword this day.'

When he came to the churchyard, he tied his horse to the stile, and
went through the grave-mounds to the tent wherein was the sword. He
found the place unwatched, and the flashing sword was sticking by the
point in the stone.

Lightly he grasped the handle of the sword with one hand, and it came
forth straightway!

Then, glad that his brother should not be without a sword, he swiftly
gat upon his horse and rode on, and delivered the sword to Sir Kay, and
thought no more of aught but the splendid knights and richly garbed
lords that were at the jousts.

But Sir Kay looked at the sword, and the writing, and knew it was the
sword of the stone, and marvelled how young Arthur had possessed
himself thereof; and being of a covetous and sour mind he thought how
he might make advantage for himself. He went to his father, Sir Ector,
and said:

'Lo, father, this is the sword of the stone, and surely am I rightful
king.'

Sir Ector knew the sword and marvelled, but his look was stern as he
gazed into the crafty eyes of his son.

'Come ye with me,' he said, and all three rode to the church, and alit
from their horses and went in.

Sir Ector strode up the aisle to the altar, and turning to his son,
said sternly:

'Now, swear on God's book and the holy relics how thou didst get this
sword.'

Sir Kay's heart went weak, and he stammered out the truth.

'How gat you this sword?' asked Sir Ector of Arthur.

'Sir, I will tell you,' said Arthur, and so told him all as it had
happened.

Sir Ector marvelled what this should mean; for Arthur had been given to
him to nourish and rear as a week-old child by Merlin, but the wizard
had only told him that the babe was a son of a dead lady, whose lord
had been slain by the pagans.

Then Sir Ector went to the stone and bade Arthur put back the sword
into the wedge of steel, which the young man did easily.

Thereupon Sir Ector strove with all his strength to draw the sword
forth again, but though he pulled till he sweated, he could not stir
the sword.

'Now you essay it,' he said to his son. But naught that Sir Kay could
do availed.

'Now do you try,' he bade Arthur.

Arthur lightly grasped the handle with one hand, and the sword came out
without hindrance.

Therewith Sir Ector sank to his knees, and Sir Kay also. And they bared
their heads.

'Alas,' said Arthur, 'my own dear father and brother, why kneel ye so
to me?'

'Nay, nay, my lord Arthur, it is not so,' said Sir Ector, 'for I was
never your father. I wot well ye are of higher blood than I weened. For
Merlin delivered you to me while yet ye were a babe.'

The tears came into Arthur's eyes when he knew that Sir Ector was not
his father, for the young man had loved him as if he were of his own
blood.

'Sir,' said Ector unto Arthur, 'will ye be my good and kind lord when
ye are king?'

'Ah, if this be true as ye say,' cried Arthur, 'ye shall desire of me

whatsoever ye may, and I shall give it you. For both you and my good
lady and dear mother your wife have kept and loved me as your own.'
'Sir,' said Sir Ector, 'I crave a boon of you, that while you live,
your foster-brother, Sir Kay, shall be high seneschal of all your
lands.'

'That shall be done, and never man shall have that office but him,
while he and I live,' replied Arthur.

Then hastily Sir Ector rode to the archbishop, and told him how and by
whom the sword had been achieved from the stone. Thereupon the
archbishop let call a great meeting on Twelfth Day of all the kings and
barons.

So on the day appointed, all men gathered in the churchyard of St.

Paul's, and the tent was removed from about the stone. From day dawn to
the evening the kings and princes and lords strove each in his turn to
draw the sword from the stone. But none of them availed to move it.

While they stood about, dark of look, gnawing their lips with rage and
disappointment, the archbishop turned privily to Sir Ector and bade him
bring Arthur.

The young man came, quietly clad in a tunic of brown samite, of medium
height, with curly hair above a fair face of noble, though mild mien.
As he came among the richly clad nobles, they looked haughtily at him,
and wondered who he was and why he came, for as yet none had been told
that the sword had been drawn by him.

The archbishop, tall, white-haired and reverend, called Arthur to him

and said in grave tones:

'My son, I have heard a strange tale of thee, and whether it be true or
false, God shall decide. Now, therefore, do ye take hold upon this
sword and essay to draw it from the stone.'

The proud barons, some with looks amazed and others with sneering
laughter, pressed about the young man as he stepped towards the stone.
Arthur took the handle of the sword with his right hand, and the sword
seemed to fall into his grasp.

Thereat arose great cries of rage, and angry looks flashed forth, and
many a hand went to dagger haft.

'Ho, archbishop!' cried King Lot, fiercely striding towards the tall
ecclesiastic, 'what wizard's brat are you foisting upon us here to draw
the sword by magic?'

''Tis a trick!' cried Nentres of Garlot, his bluff manner falling from
him, and all the savage anger gleaming from his eyes. 'A trick that
shall not blind men such as we!'

'Who is this beggar's boy that is put forth to shame us kings and
nobles?' said King Mark, and his hand sought his dagger as he
disappeared among the crowd and wormed his way towards where stood
young Arthur. But Sir Ector and Sir Kay, seeing the threatening looks
of all, had quickly ranged themselves beside young Arthur, and with
them went Sir Bedevere, Sir Baudwin and Sir Ulfius, three noble lords
who had loved King Uther well.

'Peace, lords!' said the old archbishop, calmly meeting the raging
looks about him. 'Ye know what words are about the sword, and this
youth hath drawn the sword. I know naught of tricks or wizardry, but I
think high Heaven hath chosen this way of showing who shall be lord of
this land, and I think this young man is rightful King of us all.'

''Tis some base-born churl's son that the wizard Merlin would foist
upon us!' cried the barons. 'We will have none of him!'

'A shame and dishonour it is, so to try to overrule us, kings and lords
of high lineage, with an unknown youth,' cried others.

'We will have the sword put back and set a watch over it,' cried King
Uriens, 'and we will meet here again at Candlemas, and essay the sword.
And at that time, my lord archbishop, thou shalt do the proper rites to
exorcise all evil powers, and then we will try the sword once more.'

So was it agreed by all, and ten knights watched day and night about
the stone and the sword.

But it befell at Candlemas as it had befallen at Twelfth Day, that for

all their strength and might, none of the kings or barons could draw
forth the sword; but into the hand of the unknown Arthur the weapon
seemed to fall.

Whereat they were all sore aggrieved and rageful, and resolved that
they would have yet another trial at Easter. It befell at the feast of
Easter as it had befallen before, and this time the kings and lords for
angry spite would have fallen upon Arthur and slain him, but the
archbishop threatened them with the most dreadful ban of Holy Church.
They forbore, therefore, and went aside, and declared that it was their
will to essay the sword again at the high feast of Pentecost.

By Merlin's advice the young Arthur went never about, unless the five
friends of Uther were with him, that is to say, Sir Ector and his son
Sir Kay, Sir Bedevere, Sir Baudwin and Sir Ulfius. And though at divers
times men were found skulking or hiding in the horse-stall, the dark
wood by the hall, or the bend in the lane, in places where Arthur might
pass, no harm came to him by reason of the loving watch of those noble
knights.

Again at the feast of Pentecost men gathered in the churchyard of St.

Paul's, and the press of people was such that no man had ever seen the
like. Once more the kings and princes and great barons, to the number
of forty-nine, came forward, and each in turn pulled and drew at the
sword in the stone until the sweat stood on their brows. Nevertheless,
though the sword point was but the width of a palm in the stone, not
the mightiest of them could move it by the breadth of a hair.

King Mark of Tintagel was the last of them who had to stand back at
length, baffled and raging inwardly. Many were the evil looks that
would have slain Arthur as he stood among his friends.

Then a cry came from among the common people, and so strong was it that
the nobles looked as if they hated to hear it.

'Let Arthur draw the sword!' was the call from a thousand throats.

The venerable archbishop came and took Arthur by the hand, and led him
towards the sword. Again the young man held the rich pommel with his
single hand, and that which none of the forty-nine great men could do,
he did as easily as if he but plucked a flower.

A fierce cry leaped from among the thousands of the common people.

'Arthur shall be our King!' they cried. 'Arthur is our King! We will no
longer deny him!'

Many of the princes and barons cried out with the commons that this was
their will also; but eleven of the most powerful and ambitious showed
by their arrogant and angry gestures that they refused to own Arthur as
their lord.

For a long time the uproar raged, the cries of the common folk becoming
fiercer and more menacing against the counter cries of the eleven kings
and their adherents.

At length from among the people there came the governor of London, who,
in his rich robes of office, leaped upon the stone where but lately the
sword had been.

'My lords, I speak the will of the commons,' he cried, and at his voice
all were silent. 'We have taken counsel together, and we will have
Arthur for our King. We will put him no more in delay, for we all see
that it is God's will that he shall be our King, and who that holdeth
against him, we will slay.'

With that he got down from the stone, kneeled before Arthur, put the
keys of the city in his hands, and rendered homage unto him. The great
multitude kneeled likewise, bowing their bare heads, and cried him
mercy because they had denied him so long.

Because they feared the great multitude, the eleven kings kneeled with
them, but in their hearts was rage and rebellion.

Then Arthur took the sword between his hands and, going into the
church, he laid it on the high altar, and the archbishop blessed him.
Then, since Arthur was as yet unknighted, King Kador of Cornwall, who
was brother of King Uther, made him a knight.

Standing up in the sight of all the people, lords and commons, Arthur
laid his left hand upon the holy relics; then, lifting up his right
hand, he swore that he would be a true king, to stand forth as their
ruler in justice and mercy, to keep them from oppression, to redress
their wrongs, and to establish right throughout the length and breadth
of his dominions.

Men went forth from the church in great joy, for now they had a king
they loved, and they felt that the land was safe from civil strife and
the griefs of war.

When Arthur in his palace at London had received the homage of all the
lords and princes from the lands south of Humber, he appointed his
officers. Sir Kay he made seneschal or steward, and Sir Baudwin was
made constable, and Sir Ulfius he named chamberlain of his court. By
the counsel of Merlin he made Sir Bedevere Warden of the Northern
Marches, for the lands of the eleven kings lay mostly in the country
north of Trent, and though those princes had yielded lip service to
Arthur, Merlin knew that in their hearts they nurtured the seeds of
conspiracy.

King Arthur made a progress through all his territories, staying at the
halls of those who did service for the lands they held of him, and he
commanded all those who had suffered evil or wrong to come to him, and
many came. The king's wrath when he heard a tale of women and orphans
wronged or robbed or evilly treated by proud or powerful lords and
knights, was terrible to see. Many were the pale captives he released
from their deep dungeons, many were the tears he wiped away, and hard
and heavy was his punishment of evil lords who thought their power
would for ever shield them from penalty for their cruelties and
oppression.

When this was done, he caused a proclamation to be uttered, that he

would hold his coronation at the city of Caerleon-upon-Usk, at the
feast of Hallow-mass then following; and he commanded all his loyal
subjects to attend. When the time came, all the countryside on the
marches of Wales was filled with the trains of noblemen and their
knights and servants gathering towards the city.

As Arthur looked from the window of the palace which the Romans had
builded, and which looked far and wide over the crowded roads, word was
brought to him that six of the kings who had resented his kingship had
come to the city. At this Arthur was glad, for he was full gentle and
kindly, and would liefer be friendly with a man than his enemy.

Thinking that these kings and knights had come for love of him, and to
do him worship at his feast, King Arthur sent them many and rich
presents. But his messengers returned, saying that the kings and
knights had received them with insults, and had refused to take the
gifts of a beardless boy who had come, they said, of low blood.

Whereat the king's eyes flashed grimly, but at that time he said no
word.

In the joustings and knightly games that were part of the festival of
the coronation, the six kings ever ranged themselves against King
Arthur and his knights, and did him all the despite they could achieve.
At that time they deemed themselves not strong enough to hurt the king,
and therefore did no open act of revolt.

Now it happened, when the feasting was over and many of the kings and
lords had departed home again, that Arthur stood in the door of his
hall that looked into the street, and with his three best nobles, Sir
Kay, Sir Bedevere and Sir Baudwin, he watched the rich cavalcades of
his lords pass out of the town. Suddenly, as he stood there, a little
page-boy, fair of face but for the pitiful sorrow and gauntness upon
it, dashed from the throng of a lord's retinue which was passing and
threw himself along the ground, his hands clutching the feet of the
king.

'O King Arthur, save me!' the lad cried, spent of breath, 'or this evil
lord will slay me as he hath slain my mother and my brothers.'

From the throng a tall black knight, leaping from his horse, strode
towards the boy, and would have torn his hands from their hold upon the
king's feet.

'Back, sir knight!' said the king. 'I will hear more of this. Who are
you?'

The knight laughed insolently.

'I? Oh, I am one that the last king knew well to his sorrow. I am
Turquine, brother to Sir Caradoc of the Dolorous Tower.'

'What is this boy to you?'

'He is Owen, the caitiff son of a brave father, who gave him to my care
to train in knightly ways. But 'tis a puling fool, more fitting for the
bowers of ladies.'

'Nay, king, he lies!' said the lad who kneeled before the king. 'I am
his nephew. His hand slew my dear father treacherously, and he hath
starved my mother to her death. For our lands are rich while his are
poor, and my father warned me of him ere he died. This man hath kept me
prisoner, used me evilly, starving me and wealing me with cruel blows
daily. I think he hath my death in his heart.'

'I can speak of this thing,' said a knight, who came forth from the
throng. 'I am Sir Miles of Bandon. I know this lad speaks truth, for
his father was mine own dear cousin. This Sir Turquine is a felon
knight.'

The brow of the king went dark. He looked from the cruel insolent face
of the black knight to the wan beseeching face of the lad.

'Hark ye!' said Arthur to Turquine, and his voice was terrible, for all
that it was very quiet, 'ye shall answer to me and my justice for any
evil you have done this young boy or his people. When I send for thee,
come at once, or it will be worse for thee. The boy stays with me. Now
begone!'

The big knight looked with hatred and surprise in his eyes, and for a
while said naught. Then, with an insolent laugh, he turned and vaulted
on his horse.

'I may come when thou dost not expect me, sir king!' he said, mocking,
and shot an evil look at the young page.

Thenceforward the young page Owen stayed in the court, doing his
services deftly and quietly, with an eye ever on the king to do his
bidding. One night, when a storm raged and the town lay dark and quiet,
King Arthur sat in his hall. Sir Kay and Sir Bedevere told tales, or
the king's bard sang songs to amuse him, while about them moved young
Owen, noiseless of step, quick of eye, and as restless as an unquiet
spirit.

Anon the lad would pass through the arras, creep to the great outer
door, and look at the porter in his room beside it. Then he would stand
at the wicket and listen to the rare footsteps pass down the road, and
when the rising wind keened and shrilled through the crannies, he would
glance about him with quick looks as if in fear of an enemy.

Once he went to Falk, the king's porter, and said:

''Tis a stormy night, Sir Falk. I doubt few are about the streets of
Caerleon on such a night.'
'Few indeed,' said Falk.

'Yet methought but now I heard the rattle of a bridle in the distance,
as if a steed stood in armour.'

'I heard naught,' said Falk. ''Twould be but the grinding of a chain
beside a horseblock.'

Young Owen went away, and sat where the king and his knights listened
to the marvellous tales of the wise Gildas, who told of most terrible
witches and warlocks in the wizard woods of Brittany.

Again the lad approached the door and listened; then going to the
porter he said:

'This drenching storm will tear the last poor leaves from the forest
trees, I ween, Sir Falk.'

'Of a truth,' said the porter, ''tis overlate for leaves. They be stuck
in the mire of the rides long ere this.'

'They could not be blown so far in this gushing storm,' said the page,
'and therefore I have deceived myself. But I thought I heard the rustle
of leaves on the stones before the door but now.'

'It could not be,' said the porter; 'it was doubtless the gouts of
water from the roof of the hall thou didst hear.'

Owen went away, but in a little while returned, and softly opened the
wicket panel in the door a little way, and looked forth into the
roaring darkness of rain and wind.

'Think you, Sir Falk,' he said, going to the porter, 'that the witches
from the woods of Denn do send their baleful fires on such a night as
this to lead poor houseless wretches into the marsh below the wall?'

The porter laughed.

'Thou'rt over-full of fancies to-night, young sir,' he said. 'Have no

fear of witches. We're all safe and sound here till the blessed
daylight comes, and none need stir out till then.'

'Methought I saw a flash in the dark but now,' said Owen, 'as if 'twas
the gleam of a sword or a wandering marsh fire.'

'Not a doubt 'twas but a lightning flash,' returned the porter. 'Now go
ye, for I hear the king moving towards bed. Sleep soundly, lad; no need
to fear this night.'

In a little while the palace was sunk in darkness, and in silence save
for the smothered cries of sleepers in their dreams. Outside, the rain
still sobbed at the eaves, and the wind beat at the narrow casements.
Time passed, and for all his weariness young Owen could not sleep.

His spirit had been heavy all the day, and vague and dreadful fears had
haunted him. Something told him that the life of the beloved king, who
had taken him from the foul and cruel power of Sir Turquine, was
threatened. He rose in the dark from his pallet of straw in the hall
where lay the other pages, and stole softly out. He would make his way
to the king's door, and, wrapped in his cloak, would lie before it.

He felt his way softly along the corridor in the deep darkness.
Suddenly he stopped. Something alive was near him in the dark. Even as
he turned, a hand seized him by the throat, and a hateful voice which
he knew growled in his ear:

'Lead us to the king's room, or this shall sink in thy heart!'

He knew at once that all his fears of the day and the night had been
true. He had indeed heard the stealthy footsteps before the door of the
hall, and had seen the dull gleam of a sword in the hand of one of
those who lay in wait to murder the king.

'Speak!' said the voice again. 'Is the king's room backward or
forward?'

'I will not tell thee!' he gasped, and heard a low mocking laugh.

''Tis thee, my caitiff boy!' sneered Sir Turquine, for he it was. 'Then
this for thee!'

With the words he thrust his dagger into the body of the struggling
boy, who swooned and dropped to the floor.

In a few moments Owen stirred, for his struggles had caused his enemy's
dagger to swerve, and though weak from loss of blood, the young page
knew that he must act at once to save his hero from the murderous
knives.

He heard the stealthy footsteps of the murderers going backwards to the

hall, and, filled with joy, he pressed forward. His head was dizzy, he
felt as if every moment he must sink in a swoon; but at length he
reached the door, turned the handle and fell in.

'The king!' he cried. 'Save the king! Turquine has broken in and seeks
his life.'

At his shrill cry there was the rush of men and torches along the
corridors and into the room. Sir Bedevere was at the head of them, and
in a moment he, with twenty half-dressed knights behind him, was
scattering through the palace seeking the murderers, while the king
ordered his leech or doctor to attend instantly to Owen's wound.

This was soon found not to be severe, and the lad was laid at the foot
of the king's bed, glad and proud to hear the king's words of praise.

Then Sir Bedevere entered, saying that the murderers had fled as soon
as they found they were discovered.

'But, my lord king,' he said, 'this is no murderous attempt by one

insolent lord. It means, my king, that thou wilt have to fight for thy
kingdom. It is civil war!'

'What mean you, Sir Bedevere?'

'Sir Turquine is but one of them, my king,' replied Bedevere. 'He is

but the tool of the six kings who have put such great despite upon you.
For with them also in this midnight murder-raid I saw King Nentres of
Garlot and Duke Cambenet.'

Suddenly, as he spoke, the tall grey form of Merlin took shape before
them, for so great and marvellous was the power of this wizard, that he
could come and go unseen, except when he willed that men should see
him.

'Sir,' said Merlin, 'ye owe your life to this brave lad here, and he
shall be a passing good man when he shall have attained his full
strength, and he doth deserve your high and gracious favour.'

'That shall he have,' said the king, and smiled at young Owen, and the
smile made the lad forget all the burning of his wound for very pride
and gladness.

'And now,' said Merlin, 'if ye will gather your men I will lead you to
the hold of those murderous kings by a secret way, and ye should give
them such a sudden blow as will discomfit them.'

In a little while all was ready, and then, silently, with muffled arms,
the men of Arthur were marching forth down the narrow dark lanes of the
town to where the place was ruinous with old houses left forsaken by
their Roman masters when they had gone from Britain fifty years before.

Merlin led them to a great squat tower which stood beside the wall,
wherein a single light gleamed at a high window. Causing some to
surround this place, Merlin led others to a broken door, and there they
entered in. Then was there a sudden uproar and fierce fighting in the
rooms and up the narrow stairs.

In the darkness King Lot, with a hundred knights, burst out through a
rear door, and thought to escape; but King Arthur with his knights
waylaid them, and slew on the right and on the left, doing such deeds
that all took pride in his bravery and might of arms. Fiercely did King
Lot press forward, and to his aid came Sir Caradoc, who set upon King
Arthur in the rear.

Arthur drew from his side the sword he had so marvellously taken from
the stone, and in the darkness it flashed as if it were thirty torches,
and it dazzled his enemies' eyes, so that they gave way.

By this time the common people of Caerleon had heard the great outcry
and the clang of swords on armour. Learning of the jeopardy of their
beloved king from midnight murderers, they ran to the tower, and with
clubs and staves and bills they slew many of the men of the evil kings,
putting the rest to flight. But the six kings were still unharmed, and
with the remnant of their knights fled and departed in the darkness.

A few days later King Arthur journeyed back to London, and on an

evening when, in the twilight, he stood upon the roof of the palace
overlooking the broad Thames, he was aware of a shadow beside him where
no shadow had been before. Before he could cross himself against the
evil powers of wizardry and glamour, the steel-blue eyes of Merlin
looked out from the cloud, and the magician's voice spoke to him as if
from a great distance.

'I stand beneath the shaggy brows of the Hill of Tanyshane,' said the
voice, 'and I look down into the courtyard of the castle of King Lot.
There I see the gathering of men, the flash of torches on their
hauberks, the glitter of helms, and the blue gleams of swords. I have
passed through these northern lands, from the windswept ways of Alclwyd
to the quaking marshes of the Humber. Eleven castles have I seen, and
each is filled with the clang of beating iron, the glow of smiths'
fires and the hissing of new-tempered steel. Call thy council, and
abide my return, for now you must fight for your kingdom, O king, and
for your very life.'

The voice ceased, and the shadow and the vivid eyes it half concealed
died away with it.

Into the council-chamber three days later, while men waited for they
knew not what, Merlin entered.

'What news do you bring, Merlin?' they cried.

'Of civil war!' he said. 'I warn you all that the six kings ye gave a
check to at Caerleon have taken to themselves four others and a mighty
duke. They will to thrust Arthur, whom they call base-born, out of his
life. Mark you, they are passing strong and as good fighting men as any
alive--pity it is that great Uriens is with them, the wisest and
noblest fighter of them all!--and unless Arthur have more men of arms
and chivalry with him than he can get within this realm, he will be
overcome!'

'Oh, but we be big enough!' cried some.

'That ye are not!' said Merlin. 'Which of ye have single-handed beaten

back the pagan hordes from your lands? Which of ye can match King Lot
for subtlety and craft, or the great Uriens of Reged for wisdom in
war?'

'What is to do, then? Tell us your counsel,' said they all.

'This is my advice,' replied the wizard. 'Ye must send an embassy to

King Ban of Brittany and King Bors of Gaul, promising to aid them when
King Claudas, their common enemy, shall fight them again, if they will
come and aid our king in this his fight for life and kingdom.'

In a few weeks this was done. King Ban of Brittany and his brother,
King Bors, crossed into Britain with five thousand good knights, sworn
to aid Arthur in this great conflict.

With King Ban came his son, young Lancelot, who was later to make more
fame and more dole than any knight of Arthur's court.

On a day in early spring, the hosts of Arthur and his two allies were
encamped in Sherwood Forest, and the fore-riders or scouts, which
Merlin had sent out, came hastening in to say that the host of the
eleven kings was but a few miles to the north of Trent water. By secret
ways, throughout that night, Merlin led the army of Arthur until they
came near where the enemy lay. Then did he order an ambush to be made
by some part of their men, with King Ban and King Bors, by hiding in a
hollow filled with trees.

In the morning, when either host saw the other, the northern host was
well comforted, for they thought King Arthur's force was but small.
With the pealing of trumpets and the shouts of the knights, King Arthur
ordered his men to advance, and in their midst was the great silken
banner with the fierce red dragon ramping in its folds. This had been
blessed by the Archbishop of London at a solemn service held before the
host left London.

All day the battle raged. Knight hurled and hurtled against knight,
bowmen shot their short Welsh arrows, and men-at-arms thrust and maimed
and slashed with the great billhooks and spears.

King Arthur, with his bodyguard of four--Sir Kay, Sir Baudwin, Sir
Ulfius, and Sir Bedevere--did feats of arms that it was marvel to see.
Often the eleven kings did essay to give deadly strokes upon the king,
but the press of fighting kept some of them from him, and others
withdrew sore wounded from the attack upon him and his faithful four.

Once the five held strong medley against six of the rebel kings, and
these were King Lot, King Nentres, King Brandegoris, King Idres, King
Uriens, and King Agwisance; and so fiercely did they attack them that
three drew off sore wounded, whilst King Lot, King Uriens and King
Nentres were unhorsed, and all but slain by the men-at-arms.

At length it appeared to Arthur that his host was yielding before the
weight of numbers of the enemy, and then he bethought him of a
strategy. He took counsel of his nobles, and they approved; he sent a
trusty messenger to the Kings Ban and Bors, who still lay in ambush;
and then, commanding his trumpets to sound, he ordered a retreat.

As had been agreed on, the knights on Arthur's side made their retreat
in a confusion that seemed full of fear; and the enemy, joyfully
shouting their cries of triumph, pursued them headlong.

King Lot's host, led onward thus unthinking, were sure of victory. But
their cries of triumph were short and quickly turned to woe; for when
they had passed the place of ambush, they heard cries of terror in
their rear, and turning, they found a great host pouring forth from the
hollow combe, thick as angry bees from a hive.

Then, indeed, taken in the rear and in the front, there was little hope
of victory, and King Lot's men fought for dear life.

Seeing King Bors, where he hewed terribly in the press of battle, King
Lot, who knew him well, cried out:

'Ah, Mary, now defend us from death and from horrible maims, for I see
well we be in fear of quick death! Yonder is King Bors, one of the most
worshipful and best knights in the world; and there is his twin
brother, King Ban, as terrible as he. How came they and their host into
Britain, and we not know it, alas?'

'By the arts of that wizard Merlin, I doubt not,' said King Uriens.
'And I doubt not we shall all be sped. Look you, Lot,' he went on,
'whoever that Arthur may be, I'll swear by my head he is not of
low-born breeding, but a very man and a marvellous fighter.'

'If you lose heart now, why, go and swear fealty to him!' sneered King
Lot.

'Keep your sneers,' said Uriens sternly. 'I'll pay the price of
rebellion to my last breath, as I have vowed.'

By now the great mass of King Lot's host was either slain or run away,
and the evening drew on; but the eleven kings, wounded, spent, and full
of anguish at defeat, drew together with a few hundred of their
knights, and vowed to die fighting. When they looked to see where they
stood, they found that Arthur had penned them upon a little bluff of
land that ended steeply over a deep river, and that no way was open for
them to escape from the death of swords, unless they chose to leap on
the rocks below the cliff.

'See!' said Uriens, with a laugh, 'while we fought like wild boars, and
thought of nothing but the killing, this base-born king kept his wits
and moved us like pawns on a chessboard, we all unwitting. First, he
drew us into ambush, and now he thrusts us into a chasm. We war-wise
fighters, grown grey in battle, checkmated by a boy!'

Nevertheless, though wearied, full of dread and shame, and looking

death in the eyes, the little band of men withdrew backwards, waiting
until Arthur should command his lines of glittering knights to dash
upon the remnant of the rebel kings.

'The proud evil men!' said Arthur in anger, looking upon them. 'Though
they know death is upon them, they will not crave mercy of me, a
base-born king, as they name me!'

'Ah, sir king,' said King Ban, 'blame them not, for they do as brave
men ought to do, and they are the best fighting men and the knights of
most prowess that ever I saw. And if they were belonging unto you,
there would be no king under heaven to compare with you for power and
fame and majesty.'

'I cannot love them,' said Arthur sadly, 'for they would destroy me.'

'Now, this is my counsel,' said King Lot to his ten fellows, as he

looked over the field strewn with the dead: 'that we stand together in
a circle and swear to die together--we and our few knights. We have
aimed at a kingdom and a crown, and we have failed. But we will die
like kings and warriors. When they press upon us at the last, let no
one of us break away. If any see another dress him to flee or to yield,
let him slay him. How say ye?'

'It is good!' said they all.

Then, for all their aching wounds, they mended their broken harness
hurriedly, and righted their shields, took new spears from the hands of
their squires, and set them upright on their thighs, and thus, with the
low red light of the westering sun behind them, they stood still and
grim, like a clump of tall leafless trees.

Arthur gave the order to advance, and his knights leaped forward over
the heap of the slain. But just then Sir Kay came to the king, bringing
a knight from the north who had just been captured, bearing messages to
the eleven kings, and Arthur asked him who he was and why he came.

'Sir king,' said the man, 'I am Sir Eliot of the March Tower, and I
have ill tidings for my master, King Uriens, and his friends, but it
seems my news is no worse than their fate. If my great lord is to die,
I would lief die with him. Therefore, lord, despatch me now, or let me
go stand beside my lord in the last rally.'

'What is thy news?' asked King Arthur.

'It is that the pagans, the savage Saxons, have landed in three places
beyond Humber, and all the lands of my lord and his ten fellows shall
suffer fire and sword again.'

'But if I slay your master and his fellow-rebels, whose lands are those
the pagans overrun?'

'Yours, lord, of a truth, if you can dash the pagans from them.'

'If I and my host have swept these rebel kings from before me, think
you I cannot sweep the Saxons from the land?'

'I trow you could, sir king, for on my way hither I have heard of the
marvellous deeds this day of yourself and your knights. But, lord, I
see the press of knights about my dear lord. Ah, that I might strike a
blow for him before I die!'

'Thou shalt strike a-many yet,' said Arthur, and Sir Eliot marvelled.

Arthur commanded his trumpets to blow the retreat, and the knights,
wondering and half unbelieving, withdrew them from about the eleven
kings.

Then, surrounded by his chief lords, Arthur rode to the group of

wearied kings, who, with dented and broken harness, from which the
blood oozed in many places, still kept their seats with undaunted mien.

At King Arthur's command Sir Eliot told his news to King Uriens.

'Now this I have to say to ye,' said Arthur, lifting his vizor and
showing a stern countenance. 'Ye are in my hands, to slay or spare as I
choose. But ye have fought like brave men, and I would that, for your
prowess, ye were my friends rather than mine enemies. Now this I have
to offer ye. Swear here and now to be my lieges, as ye were to King
Uther before me, and I will aid thee to thrust the pagans from your
land, and thenceforth we will aid and cherish each other as true
subjects and true lords should do. But if ye refuse, then your folly be
on your own heads, for then I take your lives and your lands both.'

With that King Uriens threw down his sword and put up his vizor, and
turning to the others, said:

'Fellow-rebels, we should be mad to refuse gifts so kingly and kindly

offered. We have tried a throw with this young king, and we have been
worsted. Better now to own ourselves lesser men than this wise lad
here, and try to live in peace with him henceforth.'

The other kings agreed, but King Lot, mean and revengeful, and the
Kings Nentres and Brandegoris, suspicious that, as had been too often
with themselves, fair words had covered foul intent, held back a
little, until the others swore to leave them to the penalty of their
folly. Whereupon they all knelt down upon the stricken field, and each
put his hands between the hands of King Arthur, and swore upon the
honour of their knighthood to be his true and faithful men while they
lived.
As they rose from rendering their homage, Merlin came riding on a great
black horse.

'Ye have done wisely well, my king,' he said. 'For by this kingly deed
you shall rivet the hearts of the good men among these former rebels
closer to your own than with rivets of steel. Thus well and wisely have
ye won your kingdom and the fealty of these brave men.'

'Now,' he went on to the eleven kings, 'ye doubted whether Arthur was
of noble birth, and rightful king. Know ye that he is the son of the
noble King Uther, who by my counsel hid him away on his birth. Ye will
remember how Gorlois, Duke of Cornwall, hated Uther for taking Igraine
for wife, whom Gorlois had captured and sworn to wed for her beauty and
her wealth. And how all the turbulent lords did cling to Gorlois, and
how for years King Uther had much ado to keep those rebels from
dismembering the kingdom. Gorlois had vowed to slay by poison or
treachery any son of Uther's, and so I took young Arthur into safe
keeping. None knew of him until King Uther named him as his rightful
heir upon his deathbed in the presence of you all. So, therefore, ye do
well to give your homage to this your king, for Arthur is the son right
worshipful of the great Pendragon, and the lovely lady, Igraine of
Lyonesse.'

All that stood by marvelled, and most of the eleven kings were glad
that they had a king so noble in birth and doing as Arthur, the son of
Uther Pendragon.

II

SIR BALIN AND THE STROKE DOLOROUS

It happened that on a day King Arthur, wandering from his court, had
fought and vanquished a valiant knight, but he himself had been sore
wounded. Merlin, coming to his aid, had taken him to a hermit's cave,
and there with many marvellous salves had searched his wounds, so that
in three days the king was whole again.

Riding forth together, Merlin led the king deeper and deeper into a
wild and desolate country where he had never been before, and where
there were no pathways. Arthur looked to and fro over the waste, but
saw no sign of man or beast, and no bird flitted or piped. Great gaunt
stones stood upright on the hillsides, solitary or in long lines as if
they marched, or else they leaned together as if conspiring; while
great heaps or cairns of stone rose here and there from the
lichen-covered and rocky soil, in which the grass grew weakly in small
crevices.

The mists now rose and drifted before them as they rode, the light was
low and sallow, and the wind began to whisper shrilly among the great
stones, and in the crannies of the cairns.

The king crossed himself, and looked at the white, old, and wrinkled
face of Merlin; but the wizard seemed sunk in thought. Then Arthur
bethought him that, in case some fiend-shape or wizard-knight should
assail him in that desolate waste, he could not defend himself,
inasmuch as his sword--the sword he had drawn from the stone--had
snapped when he fought the knight, and he had no other weapon with him.

'Merlin,' he said, 'this is a place of ancient death and terror, and if

aught should assail us of evil, I have no sword.'

'For that reason I bring thee here,' replied Merlin, and would not
utter another word.

Then, through the mists, which writhed and twisted as if they were fell
shapes that would tear down the passing riders, Arthur became aware
that their way was leading downwards, and soon the smell of water rose
up to him.

He heard the beat and suck of waves upon a shore, and in a little while
the mists cleared as if at a word, and there before him Arthur saw a
lonely lake or sea, hedged round with salt-rimed reeds and sedges, and
stretching out its waters, dull and leaden-hued, to so great a distance
that his eye could see no end.

'What is this place?' he asked of Merlin.

'It is the Lake of the Endless Waters,' said the wizard.

'Why bring ye me to this desolate lake in the wilderness?'

'You shall visit it once more--ere you die!' replied Merlin. 'But look
you there in the midmost of the lake.'

Looking to where the wizard pointed, Arthur saw a great hand, clothed
in white samite, stretched above the lapsing waves, and in its grasp
was a long two-handed sword in a rich scabbard.

With that they saw a barge riding over the water, and it came without
oars or any sail, and in the prow sat a woman, tall and comely, with a
face lovely but sad. A frontlet of gold and pearls was bound about her
rich red hair, and her robes, of green samite, fell about her as if
they were reeds of the shore.

'What lady is that?' said the king.

'It is the Lady of the Lake,' said Merlin, 'and she comes to you. Now,
therefore, speak fair to her, and ask that she will give you that
sword.'

Then the barge rasped among the reeds where Arthur sat on his horse,
and the lady said:

'Greeting to you, O king!'

'Greeting, fair damsel!' replied Arthur. 'What sword is that which the
arm holdeth above the water? I would it were mine, for I have none.'

'Sir king,' said the lady, 'that sword is mine; but if ye will give me
a gift when I ask it of you, and will swear an oath to give me back the
sword when ye shall be dying, then shall ye have it.'

'By my faith, I will give ye the gift when ye shall desire, and when I
am dying I will truly give back the sword.'

'Then do you step into this barge and row yourself unto the hand and
take from it the sword. And know ye that the name of that sword is
Excalibur, and while you keep the scabbard by your side, ye shall lose
no blood, be ye never so sore wounded.'

So King Arthur and Merlin alighted, tied their horses to two stunted
trees, and went into the barge. The king turned to look to where the
tall green lady had stood but a moment before, and marvelled to see
that she had vanished.

When they came to the sword which the hand held, King Arthur saw that
the water where the hand rose forth was all troubled, and he could see
naught. He took the sword by the handle, and the great fingers of the
hand opened and then sank. So they came afterwards to the land, and
rode on their way to Camelot, and reached it after many days.

When King Arthur entered his hall, and had been welcomed by his
knights, the seneschal brought forth a messenger, who had come from
King Rience of North Wales, and the man with insolent looks uttered
this message:

'My lord, King Rience, hath but now discomfited and overwhelmed seven
kings, and each hath done him homage, and given him for a sign of their
subjection their beard clean cut from their chins. And my lord hath
caused a rich mantle to be hemmed with these kings' beards, and there
yet lacketh one place. Wherefore my lord hath sent me to demand that ye
give him homage and send him thy beard also. Or else he will enter thy
lands, and burn and slay and lay waste, and will not cease until he
hath thy head as well as thy beard.'

'Now this is the most shameful message that any man sent to a king!'
said Arthur, 'and thy king shall rue his villainous words.' Then he
laughed a little grimly. 'Thou seest, fellow, that my beard is full
young yet to make a hem. So take this message back to thy master. If he
will have it, he must wait until I grow older; but yet he shall not
wait long before he sees me, and then shall he lose his head, by the
faith of my body, unless he do homage to me.'

So the messenger departed, and King Arthur set about the ordering of
his army to invade the land of Rience.

Later, on a day when the king sat in council with his barons and
knights, there came a damsel into the hall, richly beseen and of a fair
countenance. She knelt at the feet of the king, and said humbly:

'O king, I crave a boon of ye, and by your promise ye shall grant it
me.'

'Who are ye, damsel?' asked the king.

'My lord, my lady mother hath sent me, and she is the Lady of the
Lake.'

'I remember me,' said Arthur, 'and thou shalt have thy boon.'

Whereat the damsel rose and let her mantle fall, that was richly
furred, and then they saw that she was girded about the waist with a
great sword.

Marvelling, the king asked, 'Damsel, for what cause are ye girded with
that sword?'

'My lord,' said the damsel, in distress and sadness, 'this sword that I
am girded withal, doth me great sorrow and remembrance. For it was the
sword of him I loved most tenderly in all the world, and he hath been
slain by falsest treachery by a foul knight, Sir Garlon, and nevermore
shall I be joyful. But I would that my dear love be avenged by his own
good sword, which my lady mother hath endowed with great enchantment.
And the knight of thine that shall draw this sword shall be he who
shall avenge my dead love. But he must be a clean knight, a good man of
his hands and of his deeds, and without guile or treachery. If I may
find such a knight, he shall deliver me of this sword, out of the
scabbard, and with it do vengeance for me.'

'This is a great marvel,' said King Arthur, 'and while I presume not to
be such a knight as thou sayest, yet for ensample to my knights will I
essay to draw the sword.'

Therewith the king took the scabbard and drew at the sword with all his
strength, but in no wise could he make it come forth.

'Sir,' said the damsel, 'ye need not draw half so hard, for lightly
shall it come into the hands of him who shall draw it.'

Then the king bade all his knights to attempt this feat, and all tried
their best, but it was of no avail.

'Alas!' said the damsel in great sadness. 'And shall my dear love go
unavenged, because there is no knight here who shall achieve this
sword?'

She turned away through the crowd of knights who stood abashed about
her, and went towards the door.

It happened that there was a poor knight in the court of King Arthur,
who had been a prisoner for a year and a day, by reason of his having
slain a kinsman of the king's. His name was Sir Balin the Hardy, and he
was a good man of his hands, though needy. He had been but lately
released from durance, and was standing privily in the hall and saw the
adventure of the damsel with the sword. Whereat his heart rose, both to
do the deed for the sorrowing maid and because of her beauty and
sadness. Yet, being poor and meanly arrayed, he pushed not forward in
the press.

But as the damsel went towards the door, she passed him, and he said:

'Damsel, I pray you of your courtesy to suffer me as well to essay as

these knights, for though I be poorly clothed, my heart seemeth fully
assured that I may draw the sword, and thy sorrow moveth me.'

The damsel lifted her large sad eyes to him, and she saw he was goodly
of form and noble of look, and her heart was stirred.

'Though ye be poor, worthiness and manhood are not in a man's rich

raiment, and therefore,' she said with a sorrowful smile, 'do you essay
the sword also, good knight, and God speed you.'
Balin took the sword by the scabbard, and drew it out easily, and when
he looked upon the sword it pleased him well.

Then had the king and barons great marvel, but some of the knights had
great spite against Balin.

'Truly,' said the damsel, 'this is a passing good knight, and the best
man of ye all, and many marvels shall he achieve. But now, gentle and
courteous knight,' she said, 'give me the sword again.'

'Nay, this sword will I keep,' said Balin.

'Ye are not wise,' said the maiden sorrowfully. 'My lady mother sent
the sword to find which was the knight the most worthy to rid the world
of an evil knight that doeth his foul treacheries and murders by
wizardry, but if ye keep the sword it shall work great bane on you and
on one you love most in this world.'

'I shall take the adventure God shall ordain for me,' said Balin, 'be
it good or ill.'

The damsel looked sadly into his eyes and wept.

'I am passing heavy for your sake,' she said. 'I repent that I have
brought this to you, for I see you lying wounded unto death, and I
shall not be near to comfort you.'

With that the damsel departed in great sorrow.

Anon Balin sent for his horse and armour, and took his leave of King
Arthur, who was almost wroth that he should depart upon a quest that
promised but misfortune. He would have him stay with him in his court,
but Balin would not, and so departed.

For many days, by lonely ways and through forest drives, Sir Balin
fared, seeking for the felon knight Sir Garlon, but nowhere could he
get word of him. At length one night, as he made his way to a hermitage
by the edge of a thick wood, he saw the arms of his younger brother,
Sir Balan, hung upon a thorn before the holy man's door. Just then Sir
Balan came out and saw him, and when he looked on Balin's shield, which
had two crossed swords, he recognised his brother's device, and ran to
him, and they met and kissed each other, and that night they were happy
together, for it had been long since that they had parted; and each
told the other his adventures.

'It seemeth, then, that this King Arthur is a right worshipful lord,'
said Balan, when his brother had told him the adventure of the damsel
and the sword, 'but I doubt me he will not withstand King Rience and
his host. Already that king hath come into this land and is harrying
and burning.'

'That were great pity,' said Balin, 'and I would that I could do some
deed to stay the power of Rience, who is evil-minded and of an arrogant
nature. I would put my life in any danger to win the love of the great
Arthur, and to punish King Rience for his shameful message.'

'Let us go then to-morrow,' said Balan, 'and try our prowess. King
Rience lieth at the siege of the castle Terabil, within ten leagues of
this place.'

'I will well,' said Balin, 'and if we slay King Rience, his people will
go astray and King Arthur shall easily make them yield.'

Next morning early they rode away through the gay woods, drenched with
dew, which sparkled where the sunlight lit upon it. Long and lonely was
the way, until towards the evening they met with a poor old man on
foot, ragged, lame, and dirty, and bearing a great burden. It was in a
narrow ride of the forest, and there was but room for one person to
pass, and though the brothers were making great speed, since they
doubted they had lost their way, they would not ride down the poor man,
as many knights would do.

But Balin, with a cheery call, said: 'Old man, give me thy pack, and do
thou climb up and sit behind me. For it is late and lonely that such
poor old bones as thine should be abroad.'

The old man, either from fear of the two great knights in their black
armour, or from suspicion, mumbled out a few words and refused the
offer, while yet he would not budge from the narrow path.

'Well, then, tell us thy name, old man,' said Balin, laughing at his
obstinacy.

'At this time I will not tell you,' croaked the old fellow, stumbling
under his pack.

'I doubt that great pack hath many rich things that never owned thee
master,' said Balan with a laugh.

'It is full evil seen,' said Balin, 'that thou art a true honest man,
when thou wilt not tell thy name.'

'Be that as it may,' snarled the old man, 'but I know your name, my
lordlings, and why you ride this way.'

'By the faith of my body, but ye are some wizard if ye know that,' said
Balan mockingly.

'And who may we be?' asked Balin. 'And whither do we ride?'

'Ye are brothers, my Lords Balin and Balan,' answered the old man. 'And
ye ride to pull King Rience's beard. But that ye shall not do, unless
ye take my counsel.'

'Ah!' cried Balin, 'I know thee, Merlin! We would fain be ruled by thy
counsel, old magician.'

So it came about, with Merlin's aid, that Balin and Balan came upon
King Rience that night with but a small band of his knights, and with a
sudden attack out of the dark wood the two brothers seized the king and
slew many of his men that tried to save him. And when they had ridden
some way towards Camelot with the king, wounded and bound, between
them, Merlin vanished from beside them.

Then they rode to Camelot at the dawning, and delivered Rience to the
porter at the gate, to be led to King Arthur when he should sit in
hall, and the two knights rode away. So, by the capture of King Rience,
his host was put to naught, and the king paid his homage to King
Arthur, and swore on the sacred relics of the Abbey of Camelot to be
his true man while he should live.

At that time Balin could not meet with the felon knight, Sir Garlon,
who wrought evil by wizardry, and he and his brother went their
different ways seeking adventure. Sir Balin returned to King Arthur and
became one of his most valiant knights.

It happened on a day that King Arthur journeyed with his knights from
Camelot to London, and he lay in his pavilion in the heat of the day.
As he rested he heard the noise of a horse, and looking out of the flap
of his tent, he saw a strange knight passing, making great complaint
and sorrowing, and with him was a damsel.

'Abide, fair sir,' said Arthur, 'and tell me wherefore you are
troubled.'

'Ye may little amend it,' answered the knight, and passed on.

Later came Sir Balin and saluted the king, who told him of the strange
knight sorrowing as he rode, and the king bade him follow and bring
back the knight to him, 'for,' said he, 'the sorrows of that knight
were so piercing that I would fain know his grief.'

Sir Balin took horse and lance and rode many miles through the forest,
and by evening he came upon the knight and the lady.

'Sir knight,' said Balin, 'ye must come with me unto my lord, King
Arthur, for to tell him the cause of your sorrow.'

'That will I not,' answered the knight, 'for it would do me none

avail.'

'Sir, make ready,' replied Balin, 'for ye must needs go with me, or
else I will fight with you and take you by force.'

'No heart have I to fight, for all joy of life is dead with me,' said
the knight, 'but I am on a fierce quest, and ye must be my warrant if I
go with you that I be not kept from my quest.'

'I will gladly warrant you,' said Balin, and together with the lady
they turned back.

'I fear not to tell you my sorrow,' said the knight as they rode. 'I
but lately returned from fighting the pagans in the north, and when I
came to my father's hall, men told me that the lady that I loved most
tenderly had been robbed away by a villain knight. And as I sorrowed
and went forth to seek the knight to slay him, lo, there I saw my lady,
who had escaped unscathed from his evil hold. And much joy we made of
each other, for we loved each other tenderly. But even as we kissed,
there came an arrow through the air and pierced my dear lady to the
heart, so that she fell dead in my arms. And there was none to see who
shot the arrow, but men said it was the felon knight who had taken my
lady, and he had killed her by black magic. So now with this damsel, my
dear sister, who was her friend, do I go through the world seeking the
invisible knight. And when I find him, with God's help I will surely
slay him.'
The good knight Balin was much moved by the sad story.

'Ah!' said he, 'it is the same fell knight whose death I seek by this
good sword. And we will fare together, you and I, and take his evil
life when God leads us to him.'

Even as Sir Balin spoke, out of a dark glade by their side came a lance
hurtling, as if held in rest by an invisible rider, and while they
turned their heads at the sound of its hissing through the air, it
pierced the side of the sorrowing knight and stood deep in the wound.

'Alas!' cried the knight, falling from his horse, 'I am slain by the
traitorous and wizard knight. His punishment is not for me, sir knight,
but I charge you, seek him out and slay him for my sake, and for the
sake of my dead lady.'

'That will I do,' said Balin, sorrowing, 'and thereof I make a vow to
you and this damsel by my knighthood.'

When Balin had told all to his lord, King Arthur, the king made the
knight to be buried in a rich tomb, and on it engraved his sad story,
together with his name, Sir Herlew, and that of his lady love,
Gwenellen.

Balin and the damsel rode forward the next day and for many days, and
ever the lady bore the truncheon of the spear with her by which Sir
Herlew had been slain.

Then on a day they lodged at the house of a rich knight named Sir
Gwydion, an old grey gentleman, of a sad aspect. When night came, Sir
Balin lay sleeping in the hall beside the fire, and suddenly he awoke
at the sound of one sorrowing quietly near him. He rose up and went to
the pallet and saw it was his host, and he asked him why he mourned in
the dark.

'I will tell you,' said the old sad knight, 'and the telling will
comfort me. I was but late at a jousting, and there I jousted with a
knight that is brother to good King Pellam. And a full evil kinsman is
this knight of so good a king. I smote the evil man from his horse
twice, and he was full of rage that I, an old man, should overcome him.
Therefore by treachery he assailed my son, a young and untried knight,
and slew him. And I cannot avenge my dear son, for the evil man goeth
invisible. But I pray that I may meet him in a little while.'

'Is not his name Garlon?' asked Balin.

'Ye say right,' said Sir Gwydion.

'Ah, I know him,' replied Balin, 'and I had rather meet with him than
have all the gold of this realm.'

'That shall we both do,' said his host. 'For King Pellam, his brother,
king of the land of Holy Hallows, hath made a cry in all this country,
of a great feast that shall be in twenty days, and that evil knight,
your enemy and mine, shall we see there.'

On the morrow they rode all three towards the town of King Pellam, and
when they came within the country of Holy Hallows, Sir Balin saw how
fair and happy was the land and its joyful people. Their meadows were
rich with grass, the cattle were thriving and sleek, the trees were
loaded with fruit and the cornfields full with rich ripe corn.

'Why doth it seem,' asked Balin, 'that this country is the fairest and
happiest that ever I saw?'

'It is for this,' said Sir Gwydion, 'that in the Castle of Holy
Hallows, whither we wend, King Pellam hath some holy relics of a
passing marvellous power, and while he keepeth these his land is rich
and happy, and plagues cannot enter it nor murrain, nor can pestilence
waste the people.'

When they reached the castle they found a great throng of lords and
ladies, and because Sir Gwydion had no lady with him he could not sit
at the feast. But Balin was well received and brought to a chamber, and
they unarmed him. The squires brought him a festal robe to his
pleasure, but he would not suffer them to take his sword.

'Nay,' said he, 'it is my vow that never shall I and my sword be
parted, and that vow will I keep or depart as I came.'

So they suffered him to wear it under his robe, and he was set in the
hall with his lady beside him. Anon, when the meal was ended and the
mead horns were set, Sir Balin asked his neighbour whether there was a
knight at that court named Garlon.

'Yonder he goeth,' said the knight; 'he with that dark face and
piercing eye. He is the most marvellous knight that is now living, and
though King Pellam loveth him dearly, because he is his brother, yet he
suffers bitterly the evil magic of Sir Garlon. For that knight rideth
invisible, and slays so that none may know how they get their death.'

Sir Balin's heart rose at these words, and he trembled with his great
anger.

'Ah, well,' said the good knight. 'And that is he?'

He considered long within himself what he should do.

'If I slay him here in this crowded hall,' he said, 'I shall surely not
escape, and if I leave him now, peradventure I shall never meet with
him again, and much evil will he do if he be let to live.'

He could not remove his eyes from Sir Garlon where he walked between
the tables, proudly talking and laughing with those he knew, and making
soft speeches to ladies, though many showed fear of him, and crossed
their fingers while he spoke to them, to fend off the evil of his eyes.
Very soon Sir Garlon noticed the fixed, stern look of Sir Balin, and
came across to him and flicked his gauntlet across his face.

'This shall make thee remember me when next thou seest me, knight,' he
said. 'But thou hadst better do what thou camest for, and fill thyself
with mead.'

'Thou sayest sooth,' said Balin, and clutched the sword under his robe.
'Too long hast thou done evil and despite, and now will I do that for
which I came.'

Rising, he drew his sword fiercely and swiftly, and cleaved the head of
Garlon to the shoulders.

'Give me the truncheon wherewith he slew thy brother!' said Balin to

the damsel beside him.

From beneath her robe the lady brought forth the broken truncheon, and
striding to the slain man, Sir Balin thrust it fiercely into his body.

'Now,' cried he aloud, 'with this lance thou didst treacherously slay a
good knight, and for that and all thy other cruel murders have I slain
thee.'

With that arose a great outcry, and men ran from the tables towards Sir
Balin to slay him, and the foremost of them was King Pellam, who rushed
towards him, crying:

'Thou hast slain my brother when he bore no sword, and thou shalt
surely die.'

'Well,' said Balin, 'come and do it thyself.'

'I shall do it,' said Pellam, 'and no man shall touch thee but me, for
the love of my brother.'

Pellam snatched an axe from the hands of one standing by, and smote
eagerly at Balin; but Balin put his sword between his head and the
stroke, and the sword was struck from his hand.

Then, weaponless, Balin dashed through the circle of guests towards a

door, looking for a weapon while he ran, but none could he find. King
Pellam followed closely behind him, and so they ran from chamber to
chamber, and up the narrow stair within the wall, until at the last
Balin found that he was near the top of the tower, and thought that now
he must surely be slain, for no weapon had he found.

Suddenly he came upon a door, and bursting it open he found himself in

a large room marvellously bright and richly dight, and with a bed
arrayed with cloth of gold, and one old and white and reverend lying
therein. And by the side of the bed was a table of virgin gold on
pillars of pure silver, and on it stood a spear, strangely wrought.

Balin seized the spear, and turned upon King Pellam, who stood still in
the doorway with terror in his eyes. But, marking naught of this, Balin
thrust at him with the spear, and struck it in his side, and King
Pellam with a great cry fell to the ground.

With that stroke the walls of the castle drove together and fell in
ruins to the ground, and a great cry of lamentation beat to and fro
from far and near, and Balin lay under the stones as one dead.

After three days Merlin came and drew out Balin from the ruins, and
nourished and healed him. He also recovered his sword and got him a
good horse, for his own was slain. Then he bade him ride out of that
country without delay.

'And never more shall you have ease,' said Merlin. 'For by the stroke
of that spear with intent to slay King Pellam thou hast done such a
dolorous deed that not for many years shall its evil cease to work.'
'What have I done?' said Balin.

'Thou wouldst have slain a man with the very spear that Longius the
Roman thrust into the side of our Lord Jesus when He suffered on the
Rood; and by that thou hast defiled it, and caused such ill that never
shall its tale be ended until a stainless knight shall come, one of
those who shall achieve the Holy Graal.'

'It repents me,' said Balin heavily, 'but the adventure was forced upon
me.'

As he rode through the land, he saw how it seemed that a dire

pestilence had swept over it; for where he had seen the golden corn
waving in miles of smiling fields, he saw it now blackened along the
ground; the trees were stripped of their leaves and fruit, the cattle
lay dead in the meads, and the fish rotted in the streams, while in the
villages lay the people dead or dying in shattered or roofless
cottages.

As he passed, those that were alive cursed him, and called down upon
him the wrath of Heaven.

'See, see,' they cried, 'thou murderous knight, how the evil stroke
thou gavest to King Pellam by that hallowed spear hath destroyed this
happy land! Go! thou foul knight, and may the vengeance strike thee
soon!'

Balin went on, heavy of mind, for he knew not why he had been caused to
do this evil.

For many days he passed through the saddened land, and he felt that in
a little while death would meet him.

Then suddenly one day he came upon a castle in a wood, and he heard a
horn blow, as it had been at the death of a beast.

'Here,' said Balin, 'shall I meet my death-wound, for that blast was
blown for me.'

As he came on the green before the castle, many ladies and knights met
him and welcomed him with fair semblance, and gave him good cheer.

'Now,' said the lady of the castle, when he had eaten, 'ye must do a
joust for me with a knight hereby who hath won from me a fair island in
a stream, and he hath overcome every knight that hath essayed to win it
back for me.'

'Well, as you claim it for your good cheer,' said Balin, 'I will e'en
joust, though both I and my horse are spent with travelling, and my
heart is heavy. Nevertheless, show me the place.'

'But, sir,' said a knight, 'thou shouldst change thy shield for a
bigger. For the strange knight is a strong one and a hardy.'

Balin cared not, and so took the shield with a device upon it that was
not his own. Then he and his horse were led to a great barge, and so
they were poled across the wide stream to an island.

When Balin had landed and mounted his horse, he rode a little way
towards a stout tower, and from it a knight issued, his armour all in
red, and the trappings of his horse of the same colour. They couched
their lances and came marvellously fast together, and smote each other
in the midmost of their shields; and the shock of their spears was so
great that it bore down both horses and men, and for a little while the
knights were dazed.

The stranger rose up first, for Balin was much bruised and wearied; and
the red knight drew his sword and came towards Balin, who thereupon got
upon his feet, and they fought most fiercely together. So they fought
till their breaths failed.

Many were the bouts they fought, and they rested oftentimes, and then
to battle again, so that in a little while the grass of the sward where
they struggled was red with the blood of their wounds.

But the more wearied they were the fiercer they fought to vanquish each
the other, so that their hauberks were in tatters, their helms were
broken, and their shields were rived and cracked. At the last the red
knight could not lift his shield for weakness, and then he went back a
little and fell down.

Balin also sank to the ground, faint with his wounds, and as he lay he
cried out:

'What knight art thou? for ere now I never found a knight that matched
me.'

The other answered him faintly:

'My name is Balan, brother to the good knight Balin!'

'Alas!' said Balin, 'that ever I should see the day!' And therewith he
fell back in a swoon.

Then Balan crawled on all fours, feet and hands, and put off the helm
of his brother, and might hardly know him by his face, so hewn and
stained it was. Balan wept and kissed his face, and with that Balin
awoke.

'O Balan, my brother, thou hast slain me and I thee!'

'Alas!' said Balan, 'but I knew thee not, my brother. Hadst thou had
thine own shield, I would have known thy device of the two swords.'

'Ah, 'twas part of the evil hap that hath followed me,' cried Balin. 'I
know not why.'

Then they both swooned, and the lady of the castle came and would have
had them taken to a chamber. But Balan awoke and said:

'Let be! let be! No leech can mend us. And I would not live more, for I
have slain my dear brother and he me!'

Balin woke up therewith, and put his hand forth, and his brother
clasped it in his, very eagerly.

'Little brother,' said Balin, 'I cannot come to thee--kiss me!' When
they had kissed, they swooned again, and in a little while Balin died,
but Balan did not pass until midnight.

'Alas! alas!' cried the lady, weeping for very pity, 'that ever this
should be. Two brothers that have played together about their mother's
knees to slay each other unwittingly!'

On the morrow came Merlin, and made them be buried richly in the green
place where they had fought, and on their tomb he caused to be written
in letters of gold, deep and thick, these words: 'Here lie Sir Balin
and his brother Sir Balan, who, unwittingly, did most pitifully slay
each other: and this Sir Balin was, moreover, he that smote the
dolorous stroke. Whereof the end is not yet.'

III

HOW LANCELOT WAS MADE A KNIGHT. THE FOUR WITCH QUEENS, AND THE
ADVENTURES AT THE CHAPEL PERILOUS

When King Arthur was arrived at the age of twenty-five, his knights and
barons counselled that he should take a queen, and his choice fell upon
Gwenevere, the daughter of King Leodegrance, of the land of Cameliard.
This damsel was the most beautiful and the most gracious in all the
realm of Britain.

When the marriage was arranged between her father and Merlin, King
Leodegrance said that, for her dowry, instead of broad lands, of which
King Arthur had many, he would give to Arthur the Table Round, which
Uther Pendragon had in friendship given to him many years before. For,
as King Arthur was already famous for his prowess and nobleness and his
love of knightly men and brave deeds, Leodegrance knew that this would
be a gift beloved of Arthur.

With the table were to go the knights who were its company. It seated
one hundred and fifty when it was complete, but many had been slain,
and now they numbered but a hundred.

When King Arthur heard from Merlin of the coming of Gwenevere, with the
hundred knights bearing the Round Table with them, he was very glad,
'for,' said he, 'their noble company pleaseth me more than great
riches.' He charged Merlin to go and espy through all the land of
Britain for another fifty knights, so that the tale of the noble
company of the Round Table should be complete.

Now, it chanced that while Arthur sat in the hall of his palace at
London, waiting for Gwenevere to come to him, and for Merlin to return
from his quest, King Ban, who had aided him in his fierce battle
against the eleven kings, sent his young son Lancelot to Arthur's
court, to learn knightly deeds and noble prowess.

None knew who he was but Arthur, who kept the matter secret. Many had
smiled at the huge limbs of Lancelot, until his great strength had
caused them to respect him; and being but a young man he had not yet
got all the courtly bearing and noble manners for which in later time
he was famous throughout all Christendom. So that many knights and
ladies smiled sourly upon him, but others saw that he would shortly
prove a fine man of his hands, full courteous and gentle, and of a
noble nature and great presence.

At the court was also young Gawaine, son of King Lot, and nephew of the
king. Both Lancelot and Gawaine were as yet not knighted, but together
they tilted at each other in the lists beyond the walls, and spent
their days in sword-play and all knightly exercises. Lancelot was the
stronger and the better fighter; and though Gawaine never overcame him,
yet did they twain love each other passing well.

Now Gawaine went to the king one day, and asked of him a gift, and King
Arthur said he would grant it.

'Sir,' said Gawaine, while Lancelot stood a little way off, fondling
the hounds that licked at his hand, 'I ask that ye will make me knight
the same day that ye shall wed fair Gwenevere.'

'I will do it with a good will,' said the king. 'And Lancelot,' he
said, calling to the young man, 'have ye no boon to ask of me?'

'Not at this time, sir,' replied Lancelot, 'but in a little while I

may.'

Into the hall next day, as the king sat at dinner, came an old woman,
bent and feeble, but with reverend white hair and gentle face, and she
kneeled at the king's feet.

'What is it, dame?' said Arthur. 'What is't you crave?'

'Justice, lord king,' she said in a weak voice, while the tears gushed
from her eyes. 'Or else I die beside the gate where you do give the
justice that all men praise.'

'Who hath done evil to you?' said the king.

'Sir Caradoc of the Dolorous Tower in the Marsh,' replied the old
woman. 'I and my son, lord, did build a little hut of wattle on a
little plot which we banked from the marsh, near the great wall of the
rich baron, deeming it safe to rest within the shadow of the strong
lord, and though his hard rule was hateful to those whom he oppressed,
we were so humble that we thought he would not notice us. And meagrely
we reared our living from the ground, and sold our poor herbs to Sir
Caradoc his steward, or to the people in the villages in the marsh
about us. But soon the Lord Caradoc desired the land on which our
little hut was standing, to make his lands the broader. He tore our
poor home down, and scattered all, and thrust us out to wander in the
marshes; and when my poor son pleaded with the lord, he had him
whipped, and he was brought and cast half dead at my feet as I waited
outside the hall. Now if thou givest us not justice, we shall surely
die.'

'Doth any know Sir Caradoc?' asked the king of his knights.

'Yea, sir,' said one, 'and he is a great man of his hands, fierce and
bold, of strong family, and his brother is Sir Turquine of Camber, who
tried to slay thee at Caerleon, and was with the eleven kings in
battle. Sir Caradoc liveth in a strong tower beyond the marshes to the
south of the river, and he slayeth all that desire to pass them, unless
they pay him all he demands.'
'What!' said the king with fierce anger, 'within a few miles of this my
justice-seat doth such tyranny rule unchecked, and ye tell me naught of
it? Are ye then more fearful of this marsh robber than of me your
king?'

The knights hung their heads abashed, and were silent.

Then Lancelot came and stood before the king.

'Let me, sir king, go and summon this tyrant to your presence,' he
said, 'so that this poor dame may have justice, and that ye may punish
him for his oppression.'

'I fear me, Lancelot, thou art over young for so fierce a knight,' said
Arthur.

'I shall but bear thy words, sir,' said Lancelot, and he will not harm
thy messenger.'

'Take two stout men-at-arms with you, then,' said Arthur, 'and say to
this Sir Caradoc that if he come not back with thee to answer unto me,
I will come and take his life and burn his evil tower to the ground.'

Many of the younger men that had despite against Lancelot for his
greater prowess at the sword and the lance thought that now, indeed,
they would be ridded of him, for they deemed Sir Caradoc would slay
him.

Two days later came young Lancelot back with his two men-at-arms, and
with them, bound upon a great horse, was a full fierce and raging
knight, red of face, large of body, his clothes all tossed and torn,
and his mouth full of dire threatenings against Lancelot. Men made way
for them marvelling, and together Lancelot and his captive rode up the
hall to the king.

'Here, lord, is Sir Caradoc of the Dolorous Tower in the Marsh,' said
Lancelot. 'He would not come when I gave him your message, so I bided
my time until he was sunk in wine, and was sleeping alone, and I have
brought him secretly from his hold. Now, lord king, I think Sir Caradoc
would joust with me, if you will give me knighthood.'

'Joust with thee, thou smooth-faced boy!' cried Sir Caradoc, straining
at his bonds. 'I will spit thee on my lance if I may get at thee, and
when thou art slain I will fight with this little king of thine--and
his death shall wipe out this insult thou hast put upon me!'

At his rage and fierce bearing men marvelled and many were afeared,
seeing that Sir Caradoc was great in lands and kinsmen, and big of his
body.

'Thou art full young, Lancelot,' said Arthur, 'to joust with so strong
a knight. Let an older man have ado with him.'

'Sir king,' cried Lancelot eagerly, 'I claim the first battle with this
strong tyrant. He is my captive, and I claim it.'

'Have it as ye will,' said Arthur, 'and God speed you. But I misdoubt
me much 'twill end in your sorrow.'
'Ay, and thine too, thou gentle lady's knight!' sneered Sir Caradoc.

'Peace, man, peace,' said the king sternly. 'I think God will fight in
this battle, for I have inquired far, and the tale of thy evil deeds is
over-full.'

Therewith King Arthur made young Lancelot knight, and men eagerly
rushed away to the tilting-ground to see the battle between the virgin
knight, Sir Lancelot, and the old robber knight, Sir Caradoc. And when
Sir Caradoc was released and armed, he laughed and shook his lance, so
sure was he of revenge right speedily.

Then they hurtled together most fiercely, and young Sir Lancelot was
thrust from his horse by Sir Caradoc. Quickly he rose from the ground,
and dressed his shield and drew his sword, and cried, 'Alight, Sir
Caradoc, for I will fight thee on foot.' But Sir Caradoc, being
traitorous, rode at Sir Lancelot with his spear, as if he would pin him
to the earth, and the young knight had much ado to avoid him. All the
knights cried out upon Sir Caradoc for a foul knight, and for shame he
threw down his lance and alighted, and rushed at Sir Lancelot full
fiercely, in order to slay him instantly.

But that was not easily to be done, for however wise Sir Caradoc was in
sword-play, he was mad with wrath, and therefore thought of naught but
to slay his enemy instantly. He raged like a wild boar, and gave Sir
Lancelot many evil strokes, yet never did he beat down the young
knight's guard. Soon men perceived that Sir Caradoc's great fierceness
was causing him to make blind strokes, and then Sir Lancelot seemed the
more wary. Suddenly they saw the young knight leap forward, and beat so
heavily upon the other's helm that it cracked. Sir Caradoc strove to
guard himself, but Sir Lancelot was so wroth, and so mighty of his
blows, that he could not. At last Sir Lancelot beat him to his knees,
and then thrust him grovelling to the ground. Sir Lancelot bade him
yield, but he would not, and still sought to thrust at the other. Then
the young knight struck at him between the neck and the head and slew
him.

Both the knights and the common people shouted with joy, and acclaimed
Sir Lancelot as a noble and mighty knight. But the young man was full
modest, and withdrew from the press. King Arthur gave unto him the
Dolorous Tower and the lands which had belonged to Sir Caradoc, and
Lancelot caused the old dame and her son to be given a fair piece of
land and a hut, and many other wrongs and evil customs that had been
done by Sir Caradoc, Sir Lancelot caused to be righted.

The kinsmen of Sir Caradoc went apart and conspired to have Sir
Lancelot slain, but for a long time they could not come at him.

Then, when the queen came unto King Arthur, there was great feasting
and joustings and merry games, and Sir Lancelot, for his knightly
prowess in the lists, and for his gentle courtesy and noble manners to
all, both poor and rich, high and low, was sought by many, and for some
time rested himself in knightly games and play.

Then, on a day in June, when a sudden wind from a lattice blew upon his
face as he laughed and jested with ladies and knights in silks and rich
garments, he bethought him of the fair green woods and the wide lands
through which lonely roads were winding. And departing from the hall
forthwith, he bade his horse and arms be brought to him, and rode into
a deep forest, and thought to prove himself in strange adventures.

Thus faring, he rode for two days and met with naught. On the third day
the weather was hot about noon, and Sir Lancelot had great list to
sleep. He espied a great apple-tree full of white blossoms, and a fair
shadow was beneath it, and he alighted and tied his horse unto a thorn,
and laid his helmet under his head and slept.

While he thus lay, there rode by him on white mules four ladies of
great estate, with four knights about them, who bore a canopy of green
silk on four spears, so that the high sun should not touch the faces of
the ladies. Then, as they rode by, they heard a war-horse grimly neigh,
and looking aside, they were aware of Sir Lancelot all armed, and
asleep under the apple-tree.

The ladies came nigh him, and of them there was Queen Morgan le Fay,
who was wife of King Lot, and an evil witch; the Queen of Northgales, a
haughty lady; the Lady of the Out-Isles; and the Lady of the Marshes.
And when the Lady of the Marshes saw the knight she cried:

'Now this is as good hap as ever could be, for this is he that slew my
brother, Sir Caradoc of the Dolorous Tower; and for revenge of that, I
would have this knight taken to my tower and torture him before I slay
him.'

'That is well said,' said Morgan le Fay, 'for he bids fair to be one of
the most strong knights of Arthur, whom I hate. This man, Sir Lancelot
du Lake, is the favourite of all the ladies at that court, who hate me.
So will I lay an enchantment on him, so that he shall sleep.'

Then the evil queen laid her hands over the face of Sir Lancelot, and
said strange words that none could understand, and then he was laid
across the crupper of one of the knights' horses, and he did not wake.

When in the twilight Sir Lancelot awoke, he found himself on a straw

pallet in a strange room, and he leaped up and went to a narrow
arrow-slit in the wall and looked out. Before him for a great distance
was a black watery land, with the sun sinking far away on the very
edge, and the pools of the marsh were as if they were of blood.

Then he beat at the door and called, but none responded, and for wrath
he could have dashed the door down, but it was too stout, and he had no
weapon; for his arms had been taken from him.

When it was dark, suddenly it seemed to Sir Lancelot that the room
smelled foul, as if he had been carried into the midst of the quaking
marsh, and was sunk deep in the slime and weeds of a pool. Then,
through the arrow-slit, he saw many strange lights come, dim and blue
like the wild lights that dance and flit over the lonely marshes by
night; but that which made him marvel was that these lights were two
together, as if they were the eyes of evil things. And they came up to
him with a breath that was cold and dank, and they seemed to peer into
his face, but he could see naught of their bodies. The hair upon his
head rose, and his skin went cold. They pressed all about him, and to
defend himself he struck at the eyes, but his blows beat only the air.
Then suddenly Sir Lancelot felt sharp pains, as if small keen knives
had been thrust into his flesh at many places. The stabs increased in
number and in pain, and Sir Lancelot beat about himself and ran to and
fro in the narrow chamber to escape the evil eyes and the stabs, but it
was in vain, and thus all night in much misery he suffered. When for
sheer weariness he lay down and tried to close his eyes, the evil
things would not let him, but ever they tore at him and stabbed him. He
was in anguish of mind more than he could bear, and for all his thought
he could not think of any way to fight against the evil powers which
followed and tortured him wherever he ran.

But at dawn they fled, and then the door of the room opened, and a
damsel appeared, and in her hands was a manchet of sour bread, and a
beaker of water from the ditch of the moat. The damsel was evilly clad
in rags, and seemed like a scullion-maid.

'These,' she said, 'my mistresses bid me say shall be your food until
you die.'

'Damsel,' said Lancelot, 'tell me who hath brought me here and used me
so evilly.'

'It is Queen Morgan le Fay,' said the damsel, 'and the three witch
queens, the Queen of Northgales, the Queen of the Out-Isles, and the
Lady of the Marshes.'

'I doubt not, then, that they would slay me?' said Lancelot. 'But why
hate they me?'

'It is for this,' went on the damsel, 'that you did slay Sir Caradoc,
the brother of the Lady of the Marshes.'

'Alas, then,' said Sir Lancelot, 'there is no pity for me, and none of
my dear friends shall learn of my shameful death.'

'And so that you should suffer much ere you are slain,' went on the
damsel, 'they sent in the night the Coranians, the marsh fiends, to
torture you. Thus will they do until you die, unless, sir knight, you
are a knight with a stout heart, and a good fighter, and will do me
justice. If you will be ruled by me, and will give me a promise, I will
aid you.'

'Damsel, that will I grant you,' said Lancelot, 'for this would be an
evil death for a knight. And full of terror hath been this night, from
the foul things which have beset me.'

'I may not stay further now,' said the maid, 'lest they think I tarry
over-long. But by evening I will come again.'

The day passed and twilight came, and Sir Lancelot was adread for fear
of the night. But anon the damsel came secretly to him and said:

'Now must you promise me this, that you will release my father, whom
Sir Turquine, Sir Caradoc's brother, hath kept in his foul dungeons
since I was but a little child. And all his lands did Sir Turquine rob
from him, and me he gave as a kitchen slut to Morgan le Fay, and evilly
have I been treated who am a good knight's daughter. Now, will ye
promise to free my father?'

'That will I, my poor damsel,' said Lancelot, 'and I will, God aiding
me, slay this Sir Turquine as I slew Sir Caradoc his brother.'
So at the dead of night the damsel opened his door, and with the keys
that she had stolen, she opened twelve other locks that stood between
them and the postern door. Then she brought him to his armour, which
she had hidden in a bush, and she led forth his horse, and he mounted
with much joy, and took the maid with him, and she showed him the way
to a convent of white nuns, and there they had good cheer.

Then, on the morrow, she led him to a thick forest with many hills
therein, and anon they came to a fair ford, and over the ford there
grew a tree, and on it there hung many good shields, each with the
device of some knight thereon, and Sir Lancelot was astounded to see
the shields of many of King Arthur's knights hung there. And on a bole
of the tree there was a bason of copper.

'Now,' said the damsel, 'I have brought you here where is Sir Turquine,
the mightiest knight that ever was found, as men say, and was never
overmatched by any. And in his dungeons are many poor knights, and my
dear father, Sir Darrel. Now strike the bason with the butt of your
spear.'

Sir Lancelot beat such strokes that the bason burst asunder, and then
he was aware of a great knight riding on a black horse. 'This is he,'
said the damsel, 'and now God aid you!'

'What needst thou, sir knight?' cried the other.

'To try my strength on thee,' cried Lancelot, 'for thou hast done great
despite and shame unto many good knights of the Round Table.'

'Art thou of that caitiff crew of ladies' knights?' sneered Sir

Turquine. 'Then I defy thee.'

'Thou hast said enough,' replied Lancelot.

They put their spears in their rests, and came like the wind against
each other, and either smote other in the middle of their shields, so
that both their horses' girths broke. Then, lightly avoiding their
beasts, they came at each other with great fierceness, and so fared for
two hours, feinting and striking, and so heavy were their blows that
each bled from many wounds as they stood. At last, for sheer
breathlessness, each leaned upon his sword.

'Now, fellow,' said Sir Turquine haughtily, 'answer me these questions

I shall put to thee.'

'Say on,' said Sir Lancelot.

'Thou art,' went on Sir Turquine, 'the biggest man that ever I met
with, and like one knight that I hate above all others, and I would
liefer be thy friend than thy foe. Now, therefore, I will give up to
thee my captive knights if thou wilt tell me thy name, and if thou art
not the knight I hate most.'

'Willingly,' said Sir Lancelot. 'But what knight hatest thou above all
other? And why?'

'It is Sir Lancelot du Lake,' cried the knight, 'for he slew my brother
Sir Caradoc of the Dolorous Tower in the Marsh, who was one of the best
knights living. And ever I have sought this Lancelot, and slain and
maimed many good knights and imprisoned others in the quest. To slay
that fellow I have made a vow, and him I would meet above all others.'

'Ha!' laughed Sir Lancelot, 'and I am the first thou hast met whose
love thou wouldst liefer have than my hatred? Well, I will have thee to
wit that I am he ye seek, Sir Lancelot du Lake, and thy brother was an
evil knight and an oppressor.'

'What sayest thou?' cried Sir Turquine. 'Thou art he I seek? Then,
Lancelot, thou art unto me most welcome as ever was any knight, for we
shall never part till the one of us be dead.'

Then they ran at each other like two wild boars, lashing and dashing
with their swords and shields, so that sometimes in their fury they
slipped together on the grass, which was wetted with blood, and fell
striking at each other. But at last Sir Turquine waxed faint and tried
to avoid Sir Lancelot's blows, and his shield sank low, for his arm was
very weary. Seeing this, Sir Lancelot leaped upon him fiercely, and got
him by the banner of his helmet, and thrust him on his knees, and slew
him at a stroke.

When he had rested a while, he went to the castle of Sir Turquine and
released all his prisoners, and was rejoiced to see the damsel find her
father alive. He caused the old knight to have his lands again, and
bade the others that they should betake themselves to the court of King
Arthur to be cheered and comforted, while their possessions, which Sir
Turquine had robbed of them, should be given back to them.

Then fared Sir Lancelot further afield, glad exceedingly that he had
escaped the foul plots of the four witch queens, and also that he had
vanquished the evil Sir Turquine.

Then he rode a great while in a deep and dark forest, and as he

followed the winding ways, suddenly he saw a black hound before him,
with its nose to the ground as if seeking a scent. He followed the
beast, and ever she looked behind her. Soon she left the forest, and
picked her way through a great marsh, and Sir Lancelot followed, until
in the wide distance he saw a little hill with trees upon it, and in
the midst a ruined manor.

The hound went towards the ruin and Sir Lancelot followed. The wall was
broken down in many places, and the path all overgrown and weedy, and
as he came to the courtyard before the house, he saw the fishponds
choked with weeds and the horseblock green with moss, and in the great
doorway grew charnel and hellebore, and the spiked hemlock waved and
spilt its seed in the wind. The windows hung by their hinges, and the
green moss crept down the wide wet cracks in the walls.

But the dog ran over the drawbridge into the house, and Sir Lancelot
gat from his horse and tethered it to the post beside the horseblock,
and so went across the bridge, which was full sodden and worm-eaten,
and bent beneath his weight.

Coming into a great hall, foul with many rotting leaves, he saw a table
in the midst thereof, and on it was a knight that was a seemly man, and
he lay as if he were dead, and the black hound licked his wound. And by
his side there was a lovely lady, who started up, weeping and wringing
her hands, and she said:
'O knight, too much evil have you brought to me!'

'Why say ye so?' said Sir Lancelot; 'I never did harm to this knight,
for hither did this hound lead me, and therefore, fair lady, be not
displeased with me, for grief is upon me for your sorrow and your
sadness.'

'Truly, sir,' said the lady, and she laid her face in her hands and
sobbed full sorely, so that Sir Lancelot was much stirred thereat, 'I
trow, as ye say it, that you are not the knight that hath near slain my
love and my husband. And never may he be healed of his deadly wound
except some good knight aid me. But he must be so bold and valiant a
man, that never, I think, may I find such a one in the little time I
have before my dear lord shall die!'

'Now on the honour of my knighthood,' replied Sir Lancelot, 'I do not

presume that I am such a one as you desire; but if I may aid you and
ease your sorrow, that would I do most willingly. What is it I should
do?'

'Oh, sir knight!' cried the lady, and her lovely eyes looked full
thankfully at Sir Lancelot, 'if ye would, it were the greatest deed you
have ever done, however bold a knight ye may be. For this my lord is
sore wounded by a knight whom he met in the forest this day, and by one
thing only may he be made whole. For there is a lady, a sorceress, that
dwelleth in a castle here beside, and she hath told me that my
husband's wounds may never be whole till I may find a knight that would
go at midnight into the Chapel Perilous beside the Mere, and that
therein he should find before the high altar a sword, and the shroud in
which the dead wizard-knight is lapped, and with that sword my
husband's wounds should be searched, and a piece of the shroud should
bind them.'

'This is a marvellous thing,' said Sir Lancelot, 'and I will essay it.
But what is your husband's name?'

'Sir,' she said, 'his name is Sir Meliot de Logres.'

'That me repenteth,' said Sir Lancelot, 'for he is a fellow of the

Round Table, and for him will I do all in my power.'

Going to the table, he looked upon the ashen face of the wounded man,
and it was Sir Meliot, even as the lady said.

'Now, sir,' said the lady, when Sir Lancelot had mounted his horse, 'do
ye follow that hard way across the marsh, and it will lead ye by
midnight to the Chapel Perilous, and may ye speed well.'

Right so, Sir Lancelot departed, and the sun was near its setting.

For some hours Sir Lancelot fared across the marsh, until it was deep
night, save for the stars; then he came upon a broad road, grass-grown
and banked high, where the night wind piped in the long grass. This he
knew was a road which the great Roman necromancers had wrought, and he
thought he had missed his way, for there was no other path.

As he stood marvelling, the figure of a man, tall and gaunt and but
half clad, came down the broad road towards him, and cried in a hollow
voice:
'For the love of charity, sir knight, give to a poor man who is
outcast.'

Sir Lancelot pitied the sunken eyes of the poor man, and gave him alms.

'God give thee comfort, poor soul,' said the knight, 'and get thee a
roof, for the night wind blows chill.'

'God bless thee, sir knight,' said the man, in awful tones, 'for
courtesy and pity such as thine are rare. Whither goest thou this
night?'

'I seek the Chapel Perilous,' said Sir Lancelot.

At which the shape threw back its head and cried out as if with great
sorrow.

'God fend thee, sir knight,' he said, 'and bring thee safe alive. What
thou gettest there, keep thou in thy hands until the dawn, or thy soul
shall suffer death.'

Then he vanished, and Sir Lancelot knew it had been a phantom.

Then as he crossed himself, he looked up, and through some thin and
withered trees a little way off upon a slope he saw the shimmer of
light, as if a chapel was lit up. He went towards it, and he saw a high
wall that was broken down in many places, and an old grey chapel
beyond, and the windows were shimmering with a ghostly light. As he
came through the trees he saw they were all dead, with neither leaf nor
twig upon them, their roots were crooked out of the ground as if they
would throw his horse, and their limbs were stretched as if they
strained to clutch him.

Coming to the gate in the wall, his horse trembled and plunged, and
would go no further; whereat Sir Lancelot alighted, and tied it to a
thorn-tree, and went through the gate. By the ghostly light that came
from the windows of the ruined chapel he saw that under the eaves were
hung fair shields, with rich devices, and all were turned upside down.
Many of them were those of knights he had known or heard of, long since
dead or lost. When he had made a few steps on the grass-grown pathway
towards the door, of a sudden he saw, coming from the church, thirty
tall knights, each a foot higher than he, each in black armour, and
each with sword uplifted, as they rushed towards him.

Their feet and their armour made no sound as they pressed forwards, and
a thin blue flame licked about each naked sword.

They came upon him, but Sir Lancelot, with a prayer to God, dressed his
shield and sword and stood firm, though his flesh quaked and his tongue
clave to the roof of his mouth. They mowed and gnashed at him, and
heaved their swords about him; then suddenly their vizors went up and
he looked into their faces. And at that he was sore adread, for he knew
they were dead men.

But he would not be overcome, and said in a loud voice:

'In the name of God, avaunt ye!'

He made a step forward, and they scattered before him, but followed
closely behind. Then he went into the chapel, where he saw no light but
a dim lamp burning upon the altar. It was an old, old chapel, with dust
upon its floor like a thick carpet, the walls and windows were holed
and broken, and the timber of the seats was rotten.

He went up to the high altar, and saw before it a trestle, and upon it
was a dead man, all covered with a cloth of silk. Sir Lancelot stooped
down, and with his sword cut a piece of that cloth away.

With that his blood seemed turned to water, and his feet seemed eager
to run towards the door, for with a mighty roar the earth shook beneath
him, and the walls of the chapel rocked. But he looked for the sword
which he must take, and saw it under the trestle, and picked it up and
went out of the chapel.

The ghosts of the knights pressed about him as he walked, and strove to
tear the sword from his grasp. But he would not suffer them to take it,
and when he reached the gate they could no further go, and so left him.

At the gate there came running up to him a fair damsel, crying to him:

'O brave knight, give me the sword and the cloth, that I may take them
at once to my mistress, the lady of Sir Meliot, for he is at the point
of death, and she is waiting in sorrow and tears beside him.'

But Sir Lancelot remembered the words of the phantom beggar, and made
reply:

'Fair damsel, I shall take them myself to the lady of Sir Meliot, for
these things I may not give to any until the dawning.'

The damsel would have torn the sword and the cloth full hastily from
his hands, but he was aware of her intent, and hindered her, and bade
her in the name of God to withdraw.

Whereat, with a great shriek, she vanished.

'Now,' said Sir Lancelot, 'may God, who has brought me through these
evil adventures, shield me from any further subtle crafts of these foul
things.'

Straightway he mounted his horse, and took his way towards the marsh,
so that he should give the sword and the cloth into the hands of the
lady of Sir Meliot, for the healing of her lord.

But at the dawn Merlin met him.

'Sir Lancelot,' said the old white wizard, 'ye have no need to go to
the ruined manor, except ye would have the proof of what I tell you.'

'And what is that?' asked Sir Lancelot.

'That all that hath befallen thee hath been done by evil magic,'
replied Merlin. 'The black dog that led thee to the manor was a fiend,
the fair lady that entreated ye was an evil witch, and she and the
damsel at the chapel were the same, and all was caused by the witch
queens who had you in their tower; and the likeness of the wounded
knight to Sir Meliot was formed by wizardry. They that craved your
death did hope that ye would fail at the terrors of the Chapel
Perilous, and that your soul would be lost as have the souls of those
evil or weak knights whose ghosts assailed ye. But by your courage and
great heart ye won through all.'

'This is a great marvel,' said Sir Lancelot, 'and I thank God that He
hath shielded me of His mercy.'

When Sir Lancelot was returned to Camelot, and Merlin had told King
Arthur of the knight's adventures, the king made him one of the knights
of the Round Table.

'Ye do well,' said Merlin privily unto the king, 'for he shall prove
the most man of worship that is in the world, and all your court and
all your Round Table shall be by him made more famous than by any
knight now living. Yet shall he not be one of those three that shall
achieve the Holy Graal.'

IV

THE KNIGHT OF THE KITCHEN

It was the feast of Pentecost, and King Arthur was holding his court of
the Round Table at the city of Kin-Kenadon, hard by the sea in Wales.
In the high hall the tables were set for dinner, and the floor was
freshly strewn with rushes, flowers and fennel, so that the place
smelled as sweet as a field. The cook and his scullions came to and fro
through the door of the kitchen with anxious faces, for they feared
lest the meats should be overdone, but as yet King Arthur would not sit
to dinner. For it was his custom never to go to meat on that day until
he had heard or seen some great marvel or adventure.

Sir Gawaine stood looking from a window in the bower where the king sat
with the queen, and suddenly he turned with a laugh, and said:

'Sir, go to your meat, for here, I think, cometh a strange adventure.'

And even as the king took his seat on the high dais in the hall, and
his knights sat at the Round Table, through the great door of the hall
came two men, well beseen and richly dressed, and, leaning on their
shoulders, was a tall, fair, young man, as goodly to strength and
breadth as ever was seen, with hands large and fair. But he was either
lazy or ill-conditioned, for he leaned upon his fellows as if he were
unable to stand upright. And the three of them marched through the
hall, speaking no word, and they came to the foot of the dais, while
men sat silent and marvelling. Then the young man raised himself
upright, and it was seen that he was a foot and a half taller than
those beside him.

'God bless you, O king!' said the young man, 'and all your fair
fellowship, and in especial the fellowship of the Round Table. I come
to crave of your kindness three gifts, and they are such as ye may
worshipfully and honourably grant unto me. And the first I will ask
now, and the others will I ask at the same day twelvemonths,
wheresoever ye hold your feast of Pentecost.'
'Ask,' said the king, 'and ye shall be granted your petition.'

'The first is this,' said he, 'that ye give me meat and drink and
lodging here for a year.'

'Willingly,' said the king, 'but what is your name and whence come you?
Ye have the bearing of good lineage.'

'That is as may be,' was the reply, 'but I may tell you naught, if it
please you, lord.'

Then King Arthur called Sir Kay, his steward, and bade him tend the
young man for a year as if he were a lord's son.

'There is no need that he should have such care,' sneered Sir Kay, who
was a man of a sour mind. 'I dare swear that he is but a villein born.
If he were of good blood he would have craved a horse and harness. And
since he hath no name I will dub him Beaumains, or Fair Hands, for see
how soft are his hands! And he shall live in the kitchen, and become as
fat as any pig!'

But Sir Lancelot and Sir Gawaine reproached Sir Kay for his mocking of
the young man, 'for,' said Sir Lancelot, 'I dare lay my head he hath
the making of a man of great worship.'

'That cannot be,' said Sir Kay; 'he has asked as his nature prompted
him. He will make naught but fat, for he desires only meat and drink.
On my life I would swear he is only some lazy fellow from an abbey,
where food hath failed, and so he has come hither for sustenance.'

So Kay sat down to his meat laughing, and Beaumains went to the door of
the hall, where the varlets and boys ate the leavings from the table;
but he fared badly there, for they jeered at him as Sir Kay had done.

Afterwards Sir Lancelot, of his great gentleness and courtesy, bade him
come to his chamber, to be better fed and clothed; and Sir Gawaine,
because of a liking he felt in his heart for the young man, proffered
him good meat and drink and a soft bed. But then, and at all other
times, Beaumains refused, and would do nothing but what Sir Kay
commanded.

Thus he lived in the kitchen, eating broken scraps, and lying at night
where the scullions lay, except that he was given the chilliest spot
furthest from the fire. But he did what he was bidden to do with a
cheerful air and was ever willing to work. And if there was any
jousting of knights or any other sights of prowess, these would he see
with the greatest delight. In any sports or trials of strength or skill
among the serving-men, he was ever foremost, and none could overcome
him in wrestling or at quarterstaff, nor could any throw the bar or
cast the stone so far as he could, no, not by two yards.

Whenever Sir Kay met him about the hall or the kitchen he would laugh
mockingly, and to those about him he would say, 'Well, how like you my
huge boy of the kitchen?'

But to such sneers, and to all the scorns and insults of the varlets of
the kitchen, Beaumains would answer naught, and was ever quiet and mild
whatever he endured. And to all was he ever gentle, both man and child,
and he never put forth his great strength in anger.

Thus a year passed, until again it was the feast of Pentecost, and at
that time the king held it at his chief city in Wales, Caerleon-upon-Usk.
And again the feast was royally prepared in the great hall of the
court, but the king would not give the signal to sit to meat until he
should have heard or seen some strange adventure.

But about noon a squire came to where the king waited, and said, 'Lord,
I am bidden to say ye may go to your meat, for there cometh a damsel
with some strange adventure.'

Quickly the king sat on the high seat, and the cooks brought in the
smoking collops of meat and the dishes of savoury stews. And as they
began to eat, there came a maiden of a plain sharp visage, who made her
way to the step of the dais, and there kneeling, cried:

'Succour and help I crave of you, O king!'

'For whom?' said the king, 'and for what reason?'

'Sir,' said the maiden, 'my lady sister is of great beauty and renown,
and is besieged in her castle by a tyrant-knight, who will not let her
go forth from her castle; and because it is said that here in your
court are the noblest knights in all the world, I come to you praying
for aid.'

'What is your lady sister's name?' asked the king, 'and where doth she
dwell, and tell me who is he that doth besiege her?'

'Sir king,' said the lady, 'I may not tell you my sister's name, but
she is of great beauty and of wide lands. And the tyrant-knight who
besieges her is the Red Knight of Reedlands.'

'I know him not,' replied the king.

'Sir,' cried Sir Gawaine from his seat, 'I know him well. He is one of
the perilous knights of the world, for he hath the strength of seven
men, and from him I once escaped barely with my life.'

'Fair lady,' said the king, 'I would help you willingly, but as ye will
not tell me your lady's name, none of my knights here shall go with you
with my consent.'

The damsel looked about the hall with a quick angry glance, and the
knights that sat there liked not her sour looks. Then from the crowd of
scullions and kitchen lads that hung about the serving-tables at the
side of the hall came Beaumains, his dress smirched, but his handsome
face lit up and his eyes burning with eagerness.

'Sir king!' he cried, holding up his hand, 'a boon I crave!'

As he came to the step of the dais the damsel shrank from him as if he
had been something foul.

'Say on,' replied the king to the young man.

'God thank you, my king,' went on Beaumains. 'I have been these twelve
months in your kitchen, and have had my full living, as ye did
graciously order, and now I ask for the two further gifts ye promised.'

'Ye have but to ask,' replied the king.

'Sir, they are these,' said Beaumains. 'First, that you will grant me
this adventure of the damsel.'

'I grant it you,' said King Arthur.

'Then, sir, this is the other,--that ye shall bid Sir Lancelot du Lake
to follow me, and to make me a knight when I shall desire him.'

'All this shall be done if Sir Lancelot think it well,' said the king.

But the lady was exceedingly wroth, and her eyes flashed with scorn as
she turned to the king:

'Shame on thee!' she cried; 'will you give me a kitchen scullion to aid
me?'

With that she hastened from the hall, mounted her horse and rode away.
Even as she went forth, a dwarf in the dress of a page entered the hall
leading a great horse richly caparisoned, and on the saddle was piled a
splendid suit of armour. And the dwarf went up to Beaumains and began
to arm him, while men asked each other whence came all this fine gear.

When he was dressed in armour, all the knights marvelled to see how
goodly a man he looked. Then Beaumains took leave of King Arthur and of
Sir Gawaine, and asked Sir Lancelot to follow him.

Many people went to the door of the hall to see Beaumains mount his
horse and ride after the damsel, and the way he sat his steed, with its
trappings of gold and purple, excited their admiration. But all
wondered to see that Beaumains had neither shield nor spear, and some
laughed and said, 'The ignorant churl! Doth he think the mere sight of
him on horseback will affright his enemies, that he carries neither
shield nor lance.'

Sir Kay sneered with them, and suddenly getting up from his seat he
cried:

'By my faith! I will go after my kitchen boy and see whether he will
still know me for his better!'

'Ye had better bide at home,' said Sir Lancelot, and Sir Gawaine
agreed.

But Sir Kay laughed them aside, and having swiftly put on his armour,
he took his spear and shield and rode after Beaumains. He caught up
with the youth just as the latter reached the side of the damsel, and
Sir Kay cried out, with a scornful laugh:

'What! Beaumains, do ye not know me?'

'Ay,' replied Beaumains, 'I know ye for the most ungentle knight in all
King Arthur's court, and therefore keep you off from me.'

'Ah, churl!' cried Sir Kay, 'thou needst a lesson from me. A beggar,
though he be on horseback, is still a beggar.'
With that he put his lance in rest and dashed towards Beaumains,
expecting an easy victory. But the young man, putting the lance aside
with his sword just as it was about to strike him, rushed upon Sir Kay,
and with a deft thrust struck him through a joint of his armour, so
that Sir Kay fell backwards off his horse to the ground. Swiftly
leaping down, Beaumains took possession of his opponent's spear and
shield, and commanded his dwarf to mount upon Sir Kay's horse.

Then, after remounting, Beaumains rejoined the damsel, who had seen all
that had taken place, but said nothing.

At that moment they saw Sir Lancelot coming towards him. He had seen
Sir Kay's discomfiture, and wondered at the mastery which Beaumains had
shown.

'Fair sir,' cried Beaumains, turning and drawing rein as Sir Lancelot
approached, 'I would joust with you, if ye will.'

'Have at you, then!' replied Sir Lancelot with a laugh, and with spears
in rest they set their horses at a great gallop. They came together so
fiercely that they were both thrust backwards from their saddles and
fell to the earth, half stunned and greatly bruised.

Sir Lancelot recovered first and ran to help Beaumains to his feet, and
then, with their shields before them, they continued the combat with
swords. For an hour they strove fiercely, thrusting, striking and
parrying like two great boars in a forest clearing. Sir Lancelot was
astonished to feel how great was the young man's strength, how swift
were his thrusts, and how powerful were his blows. He recognised that
Beaumains was a dangerous fighter, and that he himself would have much
to do to overcome him.

'Beaumains,' he cried at length, 'fight not so hard, lad. Our quarrel,

if we have aught, is surely not so great that we cannot leave off.'

'That is truth!' said Beaumains, laughing, as he dropped the point of

his weapon. 'But, Sir Lancelot, it doth me good to feel your wondrous
skill and the strength of your arm. Yet, my lord, I have not shown the
uttermost of mine.'

'By my faith, I believe ye,' cried Sir Lancelot, 'for I should have
much ado to keep myself from shameful defeat if you should really push
me to the utmost. Therefore I say that you need not fear any earthly
knight.'

'I thank you for your good words,' replied Beaumains. 'And do you think
I may hope at any time to become a proved knight?'

'Fight as you have fought with me, and I have no doubt of you.'

'Then, I pray you, my lord,' said Beaumains, 'give me the order of

knighthood.'

'Ere I do that, you must tell me your name and of what kin you were
born,' replied Sir Lancelot.

'If you will promise to tell no one, I will reveal it.'

Sir Lancelot gave his promise, and Beaumains, going closer, whispered
some words into Sir Lancelot's ear.

'Ah, sir,' said Sir Lancelot, taking the young man's hand in his, 'I am
glad I was not deceived. I knew you must come of great kin, and that
you had not come to King Arthur for meat or drink. Kneel now, and I
will make you knight.'

So Beaumains knelt before Sir Lancelot, who lightly touched him on the
shoulder with his sword, naming him knight.

Thereupon they parted with many kind words, and Beaumains made haste to
overtake the damsel, who had long since disappeared.

As for Sir Kay, he was lifted upon Sir Lancelot's shield and taken back
to the court, and there slowly he recovered of his wound. Men laughed
him to scorn for the beating he had received from his own 'kitchen
boy.'

'Lo,' said some, 'the proud knight went forth to cuff his own scullion,
and the scullion beat him sore and took his weapons for spoil.'

When Beaumains reached the side of the damsel, she pulled up her horse
and turned upon him with flashing eyes and angry looks.

'What doest thou here?' she cried. 'Away from me--thou smellest of the
kitchen, knave! Pah! thy clothes are foul with grease and tallow! Dost
thou think to ride with me?'

'Lady,' said Beaumains, and he spoke full gently, 'my clothes may be
smirched, but my arm, I trust, is as strong to defend you as any that
is wrapped in silk.'

'Out upon thee, saucy churl!' she cried. 'Thinkest thou I should allow
for that knight whom you thrust from his horse but now? Nay, not a whit
do I, for thou didst strike him foully and like a coward! I know thee
well, for Sir Kay named you. Beaumains you are, dainty of hands and of
eating, like a spoilt page. Get thee gone, thou turner of spits and
washer of greasy dishes!'

But for all that she raved, Beaumains would not reply in angry words,
though his heart burned within him.

'Damsel,' said he courteously, 'ye may say what ye will to me, but I
will not go from you whatever you say. I have given my promise to King
Arthur that I will achieve this adventure for you, and that will I do
or die in the trial of it.'

The girl laughed mockingly.

'_You_ will finish my adventure--_you_ will come to our aid!' she cried
in scorn. 'Fie on thee, thou upstart kitchen page! But if you will not
go from me, then come, fool, and I shall see thee quickly shamed. Thou
art proud with the too good living thou hadst in Arthur's kitchen, but
one I know whose face thou wilt not dare to look into, my knight of the
kitchen!'

So saying, she pushed on her horse, and thus in silence they went on
together.
In a little while they came to a dark wood, and suddenly as they rode,
a man with white scared face started from behind a bush and ran to the
side of Beaumains.

'Go not that way, sir knight,' he said, 'for there be six knaves who
have taken my lord and bound him, and now they will surely take you and
your lady unless you go back. I barely escaped with my life, and hid
when I heard you, thinking you were of their thievish company.'

'Take me to them!' cried Beaumains, and the poor squire, holding the
knight's stirrup-leather, ran with him. And surely, in a little while,
three knaves rushed forth before them in the green drive and bade
Beaumains stand. But grimly he dashed at them, before ever they could
recover. Two he cut down with his good sword as they stood, and the
third, trying to escape, was run between the shoulders.

Then turning, Beaumains saw in a glade near the drive where three other
knaves stood beside a knight bound to a tree. They dashed towards
Beaumains with spiked clubs uplifted. But the squire rushed at one,
tripped him up and despatched him; and the others suddenly decided to
turn and flee. Their resolution came too late, however, for Beaumains
cut them down as they ran.

The knight was quickly released by his squire, and came up to his
rescuer, and thanked him heartily for his speedy help.

'Come with me,' he said, 'you and your lady, to my castle, which is but
a little way hence, and I will fittingly requite thee for the saving of
my life.'

'Nay,' said Beaumains, 'I will have no reward. All I do henceforth is

but my duty, and I will take naught in payment. Moreover, I must follow
this lady.'

The knight went to the lady, and begged that she would accept his
hospitality, for the twilight was deepening and they were yet far from
a town. The damsel consented, but, on reaching the castle of the
knight, she would not permit Beaumains to sit at the same table with
her.

'Take the knave hence!' she cried haughtily. 'He is but a scullion from
King Arthur's kitchen, and is not fit to sit with a lady of rank. He is
more suited, sir knight, to dine with your turnspits.'

'Lady, I do not understand your words,' said the knight, 'for this
gentleman hath proved himself a man of knightly courage and courtesy
this day.'

'As for that,' said the lady, 'I count it naught. He took the rascals
unawares, and they had no heart. They were but sorrier knaves than he
is.'

'Well,' said the knight, 'since you mislike him so, he shall sit with
me, and you shall sit alone.'

So it was done, and while the lady sat eating her meal in chilly
silence at one table, Beaumains and the knight, his host, laughed and
talked merrily over their dinner at another.
Next morning, early, Beaumains and the lady were up and away while yet
the dew shone on the leaves. Soon they passed through a great forest
and approached a wide river. In a little while they rode down to where
a roughly paved way ran into the water, and, looking to the other bank,
Beaumains was aware of two knights on horseback, stationed as if to
hinder his passing the ford.

'Now, sir kitchen knight,' laughed the lady mockingly, 'what sayest
thou? Art thou a match for these two knights, or wilt thou not turn
back?'

'I would not turn if they were six,' replied Beaumains quietly.

With that he rushed, with spear at rest, into the ford, and one of the
waiting knights came swiftly against him. They met in the midst with so
great a shock that their spears were splintered. They then closed
fiercely with their swords, and hurtled about in the foaming, dashing
water, beating at each other. Suddenly Beaumains struck the other so
hard a stroke on his helm that he was stunned, and fell from his horse
into the stream, which whirled him away into the deeps, and there
drowned him.

Then Beaumains rode swiftly towards the other knight, who with his
lance dashed against him. But Beaumains parried the spear stroke, and
with one great heave of his sword, clove the other's helm in twain, so
that the knight fell like a stone.

'Alas!' cried the lady, as she came across the ford, 'that ever kitchen
knave should have the mishap to slay two such noble knights! Doubtless
thou thinkest thou hast done mightily, sir knight of the turnspit, but
I saw well how it all happened. The first knight's horse stumbled on
the stones of the ford, and the other thou didst stab from behind.
'Twas a shameful deed!'

'Damsel,' said Beaumains, quiet in words though hot of mind at her

words, 'ye may say what ye will. I only know that I fight fairly, as
God gives me strength. I reck not what ye say, so I win your lady
sister from her oppressor.'

'Thou knave of impudence!' cried the lady. 'Thee to speak of winning my

lady sister, high of rank and rich in wide lands as she is! But thou
shalt soon see knights that shall abate thy pride.'

'Whatever knights they be, I care not, so that I win good words from
you at last,' said Beaumains.

'Those thou shalt never have, thou churl,' replied the lady scornfully.
'For all that thou hast done has been by chance and misadventure, and
not by the prowess of thy hands. But if thou wilt follow me, why, then,
come, and I shall the more quickly be rid of thee, for of a surety thou
wilt soon be slain.'

Beaumains answered naught, and so they went on their way.

[Illustration: BEAUMAINS WINS THE FIGHT AT THE FORD]

Thus they fared until evensong, and then they came to a waste land,
where their way led through a narrow darkling valley. And at the head
thereof they entered upon a wide land, black and drear to the very
skies, and beside the way was a black hawthorn, and thereon hung a
black banner and a black shield, and by it, stuck upright, was a long
black spear, and beside it was a great black horse covered with silk,
and a black stone fast by it.

And upon the stone sat a knight in black armour, at sight of whom the
damsel cried:

'Now, my kitchen knight, 'tis not too late. Fly back through the
valley, or this knight will surely slay thee.'

'Nay, I will not,' said Beaumains, 'for I fear him not.'

The black knight came to the damsel and asked if she had brought this
knight from King Arthur's court to be her champion.

'Fie!' she said angrily, 'he is no knight. He is but a knave that was
fed for alms in the king's kitchen, and would follow me in spite of all
I say. And I would that you would rid me of him. To-day he slew two
noble knights at the passage of the water, and all by evil chance.'

'A strong knave, in truth,' answered the knight, 'and a saucy one. Then
this will I do. He shall leave me his horse and armour, for since he is
but a knave, my knightly hands may not harm him.'

'You speak lightly of my horse and armour,' said Beaumains, 'but I will
have you know that you get naught from me, and moreover I will pass
these lands with this lady in spite of you.'

'Thou knave!' cried the knight angrily, 'yield me this lady and thyself
without ado!'

'Let me see what thou canst do to take us,' replied Beaumains, and
laughed gaily.

At this the knight in a rage leaped upon his horse and they thundered
together. The black knight's spear broke, but Beaumains' lance pierced
him through the side and broke off short. Nevertheless, though badly
wounded, the black knight drew his sword and fought manfully, striking
Beaumains many mighty blows and bruising him sorely.

But suddenly his lifted sword fell from his hand, and turning in his
saddle, he dropped to the ground in a swoon, and shortly died.

And Beaumains, seeing that the black armour was better than his own,
armed himself in it with the aid of his dwarf squire, and rode after
the damsel.

But ever as before she railed at him, telling him he had conquered the
black knight by a cowardly blow; but Beaumains would answer her nothing
in anger.

Anon they came to the edge of a vast and dark forest, and from its
shadows came a knight in green armour, who cried to the damsel:

'Lady, is that my brother the Black Knight whom ye bring riding behind
ye?'
'Nay, sir knight, it is not your brother,' she replied. 'It is but a
kitchen knave who by treachery hath slain your noble brother, the
Knight of the Black Lands.'

'Thou traitor!' cried the green knight. 'Now shalt thou surely die, for
my brother, Sir Percard, was a most noble knight and a valiant. And to
think that he fell by the dirty hand of a knave is great shame.'

'I am no knave!' said Beaumains, 'but of lineage as high as thine,

maybe. And I slew your brother in knightly fashion.'

But the green knight stayed not to answer, and they hurtled together,
and clashed midway as if it were thunder. And Beaumains' stroke was so
mighty that both the green knight and his horse fell to the ground.

Swiftly the green knight rose to his feet, and then, Beaumains having
alighted, they rushed together with their swords, and stood a long time
hacking, thrusting and parrying. And each hurt the other sorely.

'Oh, my lord, the green knight,' cried the damsel, 'why do ye stand so
long fighting with that kitchen knave? A shame it is to see a proved
knight matched by a dirty scullion! Slay him for me and be done!'

Shamed by her words the green knight gave a fierce stroke and clove
Beaumains' shield in twain. Then Beaumains, smarting with this blow,
and in anger at the words of the lady, suddenly gave the green knight
so great a stroke that he fell upon his knees, and then was thrust
grovelling upon the earth.

Swiftly Beaumains cut the fastenings of his helm, and, tearing it off,
lifted his sword to strike off the other's head.

But the green knight prayed of his mercy and pleaded hard for his life.

'Thou shalt plead in vain,' said Beaumains, 'unless this lady shall beg
thy life of me.'

'Shame on thee, thou kitchen knave!' cried the lady, biting her lip
with anger. 'Thinkest thou I shall crave aught of thee, and be so
beholden to thee?'

'Then he shall die!' cried Beaumains.

'O lady, suffer me not to die!' cried the prostrate knight, 'when a
fair word from you will save my life. And you, sir knight, give me my
life, and I will yield myself and thirty knights to be your men and do
your commands while they live.'

'Now that is a grievous shame!' cried the lady, 'What, Sir Green
Knight, art such a coward as to crave thy life of a scullion knave, and
promise him thirty knights' service!'

'You and your thirty knights shall avail you naught,' said Beaumains
grimly, 'and since this lady will not beg thy life of me, why, now I
shall slay thee.'

With that he raised the sword, but the lady cried out:
'Put down, thou rascally knave, and slay him not, or thou shalt repent
it!'

'Lady,' said Beaumains, and bowed full gently, 'your command is to me a

pleasure, and at your desire I give him his life.'

Then the green knight did homage to Beaumains and gave up his sword.
Afterwards he took them to his castle near by, where they passed the
night.

Next morning the green knight, whose name was Sir Pertolope,
accompanied them some distance on their way, and at parting he told
Beaumains that he and his thirty knights would do service when and
where he might desire. Thereupon Beaumains told him that he must go and
yield himself and his knights to King Arthur, and this Sir Pertolope
promised faithfully to do.

And again, when they had gone some way and had reached a little town, a
knight challenged Beaumains, who, having fought with the stranger and
overpowered him, threatened to slay him unless the lady begged for his
life. This she did, after she had said many bitter and evil things, and
Beaumains commanded the knight to go, with threescore knights which
were in his service, and yield himself up to King Arthur.

Then Beaumains and the lady went on again, and the lady was full of
rage in that she had been compelled a second time to plead with him for
the life of a knight.

'Thou shalt get thy full wages to-day, sir kitchen knight,' said she,
'for in a little while there will meet us the most valiant knight in
the world, after King Arthur. Methinks thou wouldst do the better part
to flee, for the evil luck which thou hast had with the three knights
you have overcome will not avail thee upon this one.'

'Madam,' said Beaumains, 'ye know that ye are uncourteous so to

reproach me. I have done you great service these three days, but ever
ye call me coward and kitchen knave. Yet those who have come against
me, whom you said would beat me, are now either slain or have yielded
homage to me.'

'The greater shame,' said the lady, 'that so lowborn a churl as thou
art should have knights yield to thee who should have slain thee.'

Beaumains answered nothing more, but his heart was very heavy at the
thought that, do what he might, he could not win this lady to speak
fairly of him.

Towards noon, as they rode, they saw the white towers of a fair city,
and before its gates was a field newly mown, with many tents therein of
divers rich colours.

'Lo, there is the town of the man that shall cut thy comb, thou proud
varlet!' said the lady. 'A brave and proved knight is he, by name Sir
Persaunt of Mynnid. And he hath a following of five hundred knights and
men-at-arms.'

'A goodly lord, indeed,' replied Beaumains, 'and one I fain would see.'

The lady laughed mockingly.

'Thou shalt see him too soon to please thee, I doubt not,' she replied,
'for he is the lordliest knight that ever whipped a knave.'

'That may well be,' said Beaumains, 'and the more desire I have to see
him.'

'Thou fool!' cried the lady angrily. 'Thou hadst better turn and flee
while there is time.'

'Not a step will I,' replied he with a laugh. 'For, look you, if he be
so lordly a knight as you say, he will not set his five hundred knights
on me at once. But if he will send but one against me at a time, I will
do my best till my strength goes from me. No man, be he knave or
knight, can do more.'

At his quiet brave words the lady's heart smote her. She repented of
her evil tongue, when she thought how valiant and true this unknown man
had been on her behalf.

'Sir,' she said in a gentler voice, 'ye make me marvel. Thou hast
spoken boldly, and, by my faith, thou hast done boldly, and that makes
me wonder of what kin thou art. But as ye are so brave, and have done,
you and your horse, great travail these three days, I misdoubt that ye
will get hurt if ye go further. Therefore I bid you turn, or ever it be
too late.'

'Nay, I will not,' said Beaumains. 'It would be a great shame that now,
when we are but a few miles from your lady sister's oppressor, I should
turn back.'

'But, sir, I counsel ye to do so,' said the lady. 'For the strength of
Sir Persaunt, even if ye conquer him, is but little compared with the
great strength of the Red Knight who doth oppress my sister. And I am
sure you have little hope of overcoming him.'

'Nevertheless, lady, I will essay to conquer him,' said Beaumains, 'for

it is but my duty and my desire to rescue your lady sister as I have
resolved.'

'I marvel what manner of man ye be,' said the lady. 'It must be that ye
come of noble blood, for no woman could have spoken or treated you more
evilly than I have done. Yet ever you have courteously suffered all I
said.'

'Lady, it is but a man's duty to suffer a woman's wayward words,' said

Beaumains, 'and they have not been without service to me. For the more
ye angered me the more strength of wrath I put into my blows, and so
was enabled to overcome your enemies. And as to what I am and whence I
came, I could have had meat in other places than in King Arthur's
kitchen, but all that I have done was to try my friends. And whether I
be knave or gentleman, I have done you gentleman's service.'

'That is truth, Sir Beaumains,' said the lady, all soft and penitent
now, 'and I beg of you forgiveness for all my evil words.'

'I forgive ye with all my heart,' said Sir Beaumains, 'and I tell you,
lady, that now that you speak kindly to me, it gladdens me greatly, and
I feel that there is no knight living whom I could not strike down for
the sake of yourself and your lady sister.'

By this time Sir Persaunt had seen them, and had sent a squire to ask
Beaumains whether he came in peace or war.

'If he will not let us pass,' replied Beaumains, 'it shall be war.'

At that they saw Sir Persaunt array himself in his armour and mount his
horse, and now he came rushing across the field at utmost speed, his
lance in rest. Beaumains also made his horse leap forward swiftly, and
the two knights met with so great a force that both their lances
splintered in many pieces, and their horses fell dead upon the field.

But the two knights instantly disentangled themselves, and fought on

foot with shield and sword. So furiously did they hurl themselves at
each other that often they fell to the ground. For two hours the duel
raged, till their hauberks were tattered and their shields were hacked,
while both were sorely bruised and wounded.

At length Beaumains thrust Sir Persaunt in the side, and the latter's
attack became less eager. Finally Beaumains hit the other so great a
stroke that he fell headlong, and instantly Beaumains leaped astride of
him and unlashed his helm, as if about to slay him.

Then Sir Persaunt yielded him and pleaded for his life, and the lady,
who had stood watching the combat, ran forward, placed her hand on Sir
Beaumains' sword arm, and cried:

'Of your mercy, Sir Beaumains, yield him his life for my sake.'

'I do it willingly,' cried he, helping the knight to rise, 'for he hath
nobly fought and so deserves not to die.'

'Gramercy,' said Sir Persaunt, 'and now I know thou art the strong
knight who slew my brothers the Black Knight of the Thorn and the Green
Knight of the Wood. And now I will be your man, and five hundred
knights of mine shall do your service as and when you will.'

And that night they supped bounteously in Sir Persaunt's castle, and
the lady besought Beaumains to sit by her at the same table, and all
three made merry company.

In the morning, after they had heard mass and broken their fast,
Beaumains and the lady set out again, and Sir Persaunt went with them
to the drawbridge.

'Fair lady,' said he, 'where dost thou lead this valiant knight?'

'Sir,' said the lady, 'he is going to raise the siege which hath been
set by the tyrant knight of the Reed Lands.'

'Ah, then he goes to Castle Dangerous, and on the most perilous

adventure that any man could take. For they say the Red Knight hath the
strength of seven men. And he doth oppress one of the fairest and
sweetest ladies in the world. I think you are her sister, Dame Linet?'

'That is my name,' replied the lady, 'and my sister is Dame Lyones.'

'This Red Knight is the most dangerous knight in the world,' said Sir
Persaunt to Beaumains, 'and hath besieged that fair lady these two
years. Many times he might have forced her for terror to have married
him, but he keeps the siege in hopes that Sir Lancelot or even King
Arthur would come to rescue the lady. For he hateth all true knights,
but those two with most bitterness.'

So they parted from Sir Persaunt and rode onwards, and the lady spoke
now full friendly to Beaumains.

In a little while, when they had passed through a fair forest, they
came upon a plain, and in the distance was a high castle with many
tents about it, and men passing to and fro between them. And as they
rode under some withered trees by the edge of the forest, they saw,
hanging by their necks from the bare boughs, many goodly knights in
armour, with their shields and swords hung before them.

At this shameful sight Beaumains checked his horse and asked: 'What
means this?'

'Fair sir,' said Linet, 'abate not your cheer at this dreadful sight,
for ye have need now of all your courage, or else are we all shamed and
destroyed. These dead knights are those who have come against the Red
Knight trying to rescue my sister from his power. But the tyrant knight
hath overcome them, and slain them thus shamefully by hanging.'

'Now Heaven aid me,' said Beaumains, 'for this is a most shameful and
unknightly custom, and well doth that evil knight deserve death.'

'Nevertheless he is a knight of great prowess and force, though of evil

custom,' replied the lady, 'and no one hath ever borne him down in
battle.'

With that they came to a sycamore-tree which stood alone in the plain,
and on it was hung a great horn of elephant bone, with gold work
curiously wrought.

'Fair sir, ye must blow that horn if ye wish to do battle with the Red
Knight. But, sir,' went on the lady quickly, and caught at Beaumains'
arm that already had lifted the horn, 'be ye not overbold. It is now
the hour of prime, and it is said that the Red Knight's force
increaseth to the strength of seven men until it is noon. Wait,
therefore, until noon shall be past, and his strength shall diminish.'

'Nay, nay,' said Beaumains, 'speak not thus to me. I will assail him
however mighty he be, and either I will beat him or die with honour in
the field.'

Therewith he lifted the horn and blew so great a blast that instantly
knights came in a great press from the tents, and people looked out
from the walls and windows of the castle.

Then Beaumains saw a tall man come running from a tent, arming himself
as he came. Two barons set his spurs upon his heels and an earl buckled
his helm upon his head. He was all in red armour, from the plume which
waved upon his crest to the cloth which was upon his horse. And his
shield was all of red, with but a black heart in the centre thereof.

Then he waited for Beaumains in a little hollow before the castle, so

that all that were therein might see the combat.
'Now, fair sir,' said Linet, 'it behoves you to have great courage and
heart, for yonder is your deadliest enemy, and at yonder window is my
lady sister, Dame Lyones.'

Beaumains looked to where Linet was pointing, and saw at a window the
loveliest lady he had ever seen. And as he looked she smiled and bowed
to him, and he felt his heart burn with love for her.

'Truly,' he said, 'she is the fairest lady I have ever looked upon, and
she shall be my lady.'

'Cease thy looking at that lady,' called the Red Knight in a harsh and
angry voice. 'She is my lady, and soon shall she see thy foolish body
swinging from the tree for the ravens to pluck, as others hang there
afore thee.'

''Tis for that shameful sight and for the love of this lady that hates
you and your evil custom, that I am resolved to slay you, if God so
wills,' was the stern reply of Beaumains.

'A boastful rogue thou art,' cried the Red Knight, and laughed
scornfully. 'What is thy name, and whence come ye, Sir Black Knight?
For surely from your talk you must be one of those prating and soft
fools of the Round Table?'

'I will not tell thee my name,' said Beaumains. 'And as yet I am not of
the worshipful company of King Arthur's Round Table. But when I have
slain thee and rid the world of so shameful a knight, then shall I
crave the king to receive me into that high fellowship of noble and
courteous knights.'

'Make thee ready!' shouted the Red Knight in a furious voice. 'I will
talk no more with thee.'

With that they withdrew a little from each other, and then, spurring
their horses, and with lances in rest, they hurled themselves towards
each other. With so great a crash did they come together that both
their spears were broken into a hundred pieces, and their breastplates,
girths and cruppers burst, and the two knights fell to the ground half
stunned with the shock.

But in a little while they avoided their struggling horses, and leaping
towards each other with their swords, they cut and hacked each the
other so fiercely that great pieces of their shields and armour flew
off.

Thus they fought till it was past noon, and would not stop, till at
last they both lacked wind, and thus they stood swaying, staggering,
panting, yet feinting and striking with what strength they had. The Red
Knight was a cunning fighter, and Beaumains learned much from him,
though it was at the cost of many a gaping wound.

When it was evensong they rested by mutual accord, and seated on two
molehills near the fighting place, they had their helms taken off by
their pages and their worse wounds bound up. Then Beaumains lifted up
his eyes to the lady at the window, and saw how her looks were tender
with pity for him.
So heartened was he at the sight that he started up swiftly, and bade
the Red Knight make him ready to do battle once more to the uttermost.
Then they rushed fiercely at each other, and the fight raged more hotly
than ever. At length, by cunning, the Red Knight suddenly struck
Beaumains' sword from his hand, and before he could recover it, the Red
Knight had with a great buffet thrown him to the ground, and had fallen
upon him to keep him down.

Then cried the Lady Linet piteously:

'O Sir Beaumains! Sir Beaumains! where is your great heart? My lady
sister beholds you, and she sobs and weeps, for surely she feels the
evil Red Knight hath her almost in his power!'

At that, so great a rage possessed Beaumains, that with one great

effort he thrust the Red Knight from him, and, leaping up, he seized
his sword again, and so fiercely did he beat upon his enemy that the
Red Knight sank to his knees, and then was thrust grovelling to the
ground.

Beaumains leaped astride him, and cut the fastenings of his helm. Then
the Red Knight shrieked for mercy.

'Thou recreant and coward!' said Beaumains. 'Did not any of those
knights that thou hast hung cry to thee for mercy? What pity and what
mercy didst thou give them? And thou deservest none from me, nor from
any man!'

With that he slew him at a stroke, and the people in the castle cried
out with joy.

Their leader being dead, his following of earls, barons and knights
came and did homage to Beaumains, and he commanded that instantly they
should betake themselves to the court of King Arthur and yield them
into his hands.

Then for ten days the Lady Linet made Beaumains rest him in the Red
Knight's tent, while she tended his many sore wounds. But ever
Beaumains desired to go into the castle to see the lady he loved, but
his hurts forbade him.

On the eleventh day he would no longer be denied, but having armed

himself, all except his helm, which his page carried, he rode up to the
castle gate. But as he came thither he saw many armed men, who pulled
up the drawbridge before him, so that he should not enter.

Therewith he saw a knight at a window, who called to him.

'Fair sir, I am Sir Gringamor, brother to the Lady Lyones,' said the
knight. 'I will that ye enter not yet. We know that you have proved
yourself a bold and brave fighter, but we know not who you are.
Therefore, unless you tell me your name and kindred, I may not suffer
my sister to see you.'

'I know naught of thee, sir knight,' cried Beaumains sternly. 'My
business is with the lady, from whom I think I deserve a little
kindness, for I have bought her deliverance and her love with some of
the best blood in my body. Must I go away then, thinking she cares more
for a name and noble lineage than for brave deeds and devotion? Tell
me, Sir Gringamor, is this the will of the Lady Lyones?'

'Ye have but to tell us thy name and of thy lineage, brave man,' said
Sir Gringamor.

'Nay, that I will not!' said Beaumains, for his heart was hot with
shame and anger. 'If I were but a churl, I should reckon myself a
nobler man than the recreant knight from whom I have rescued you and
your sister. But since he was a knight, it seems ye would reckon him as
of greater honour than the brave churl that slew him for his evil
deeds.'

'Nay, nay, it is not so!' came a sweet voice crying in tears, and Sir
Beaumains saw the tender face of the Lady Lyones at the window where
Sir Gringamor had been. 'My brave knight, think not ill of me, for this
is none of my will, for I am mocked and my pleasure denied in my own
castle by this my over-careful brother. I love thee, sir knight,
whatsoever thou art, for I feel that thou art gentle and brave, and as
good a man as any lady might love. And I beg you go not far from me,
for I will have my will erelong, and I tell you now that I trust you,
and I shall be true to you, and unto my death I shall love you and no
other. And whenever I may come to you I will, in spite of this my
brother.'

Saying these words, the lady sobbed as if her heart would break, and
hiding her face in her hands she was led away by her women.

With that Beaumains' heart smote him, and he was resolved to reveal his
name and lineage for the sake of the dear lady who loved him. But even
as he thought this, he was aware of a party of knights coming towards
him from the plain, and soon he recognised that they were of the
company of King Arthur's Round Table.

And the foremost knight, who bore his helm in his hand, rode forward to
him, crying:

'O Gareth, Gareth, my brother, how hast thou deceived us all!'

Then did Sir Beaumains clasp the other's hand right warmly, for this
was his own brother, Sir Gaheris, sent from King Arthur to bring him
home.

When Sir Gringamor knew of the coming of these knights, quickly he bade
the drawbridge to be lowered, and in a little while the knights were
being welcomed in the hall.

'Sir Gringamor,' said Sir Gaheris, 'I find that I come at a lucky
chance for the happiness of my brother. Already the fame of his brave
deeds has reached King Arthur, for the knights he hath overcome have
put themselves in the mercy of the king.'

'Sir Knight of the Round Table,' said Sir Gringamor, 'tell me who is
this brave knight that will not say his name?'

'He is Sir Gareth, my brother, the youngest son of the King of Orkney,'
replied Sir Gaheris, 'and fit for the highest lady in the land. He hath
played this trick upon us all, to test us. We did not know him, for he
hath grown up to manhood while we have been long away from home. But
ever he hath had an adventurous and witty mind.'
'Sir, I thank you,' said Sir Gringamor, and taking Sir Gareth by the
hand he led him into the bower where sat the Lady Lyones, who sprang to
meet Sir Gareth. To her Sir Gringamor told all that he had heard, and
then left Sir Gareth to tell her more of himself.

And in a little while, at the court of King Arthur, they were married
with great feastings and joustings and with all things to make merry.
And Linet was wedded at the same time to Sir Gaheris. For though the
Lady Linet was sharp of tongue, she was of great and good heart, and
well beloved of all who knew her well.

HOW SIR TRISTRAM KEPT HIS WORD

In the days when King Arthur had established his kingdom, he was called
Emperor of Britain and its three islands. Nevertheless, there were
kings who were rulers in their own lands, but they held their
sovereignty of Arthur and had done homage to him and sworn fealty. In
Wales there were two kings, in the north were eleven kings, and these
he had conquered in a great battle by Sherwood Forest; in Cornwall were
two kings, and in Ireland three kings, but all gave service to the
great King Arthur.

That part of Cornwall which was called the lands of Tintagel formed the
kingdom of a prince named Mark, and he owed certain yearly tribute or
truage to King Anguish of South Ireland. It befell one day that King
Anguish sent a messenger, who came to King Mark as he sat in hall, and
said:

'Sir king, my master bids me say that the truage which you owe unto him
is unpaid for seven years past, and if it be not paid he will demand of
you double the sum.'

Now King Mark was a man of a mean and covetous mind, and he loved not
to give money. Therefore, to put off the payment for a little while, he
made answer thus:

'Tell your master that we will pay him no truage; and if your lord says
he will have it, let him send a trusty knight of his land that will
fight for his right, and we will find another to do battle with him.'

When King Anguish heard the message he was wondrous wroth, and called
into him the brother of his queen, Sir Marhaus, a good knight of
prowess nobly proved, and, besides, a knight of the Round Table. The
king craved of him to go and do battle for the truage due from Mark of
Cornwall.

'Sir,' said Sir Marhaus, 'I will gladly go and do battle for you on
this saucy king or his knight. I ween ye shall have your truage to the
last groat, for I fear not the best knight of the Round Table, unless
it be Sir Lancelot, and I doubt not King Mark hath no knight of such
worth and prowess as I.'
So in all haste Sir Marhaus set forth in a ship, and in a little while
cast anchor fast by the shore where, on two high cliffs, the castle of
Tintagel frowned upon the sea. When King Mark understood that so noble
a knight as Sir Marhaus had come to do battle for the truage, he was
full of sorrow, and wept as he looked upon the bags of gold in his
treasure-chest. He knew of no knight of his court that durst face Sir
Marhaus, and he feared much that he would have to part with his gold.

Daily Sir Marhaus sent a message up to the castle gate, demanding

payment of the truage, or that a knight should come forth to do battle
against him.

Then King Mark let make a proclamation through all the lands, that if a
knight would fight to save the truage of Cornwall he should fare the
better as long as he lived. But the days and weeks went by and no
knight came forward. Then Sir Marhaus sent at the last a message which
said, that if within a day and a night a champion for King Mark came
not forward, he should depart.

All that day King Mark was sore and ill of mind and haggard of face,
and could never stay still, but was for ever faring with his barons to
where he could look down upon the ship of Sir Marhaus, and see the
knight waiting in his armour.

Late in the afternoon, as the king stood thus, gnawing his nails for
rage, and so hot and wrathful that none of his barons dare speak to
him, there came two horsemen riding swiftly into the courtyard of the
castle, and at the sound of their horses' feet King Mark turned
eagerly.

A young squire was the foremost rider, and he was a youth full handsome
and tall, with brown curly hair and blue eyes. He was dressed in a
surcoat of red satin and a mantle of crimson, trimmed with gold; and on
his head was a cap of rich purple, and his feet and legs were clad in
fine leather, with gold bosses on his shoes. Alighting easily, he
doffed his hat and came towards the king:

'Sir,' said he, 'if ye will give me the order of knighthood, I shall do
battle to the uttermost with Sir Marhaus of Ireland.'

King Mark looked the young man up and down, and saw that though he was
young of age, yet he was passing well made of body, with broad
shoulders and of big limbs. The heart of King Mark became light.

'Fair son,' he said, and his barons marvelled at his soft words, 'what
are ye and whence come ye?'

'Sir,' said the youth, 'I come from King Talloch, Prince of Lyones, and
I am a gentleman's son.'

'And your name and birthplace--what are they?'

'My name is Tristram, sir, and I was born in Lyones.'

'Young sir,' said the king, 'I like your manner, and I think ye should
be a good man of your hands. Therefore will I make you knight if ye
will fight with Sir Marhaus.'

'That is why I have come,' said Tristram.

Eagerly the king bade a baron give him his sword, and commanded
Tristram to kneel, and then and there he tapped his shoulder with the
flat of the sword and bade him rise, 'Sir Tristram of Lyones.'

The king commanded his scrivener to come to him, and on the low wall
overlooking the sea the man of inkhorn and goosequill laid his
parchment, and wrote a letter to Sir Marhaus at the king's dictation,
saying that a knight would battle with him in the morning. A messenger
was sent therewith without delay, and the king went into supper,
snapping his fingers and joking with his barons in great glee.

But in the midst of supper a parchment was brought to the king and his
face fell, and he commanded the new-made knight to come from his seat
and stand before him.

'Hark ye,' he said, his face dark, 'this prideful Sir Marhaus, waiting
so long, hath made his terms the harder. I fear, good fellow, your
knighthood hath been earned of me too easily, even if ye are not in
league with this pesky Irish knight,' he went on, his narrow eyes
gleaming with suspicion. 'He sayeth now that he will not fight with any
knight unless he be of blood royal on his mother's side or father's.
Say, are ye some starveling knight's brat, or what are ye?'

Sir Tristram's face went hard and his eyes flashed.

'No starveling's brat am I, king,' he said, 'unless ye are that

thyself.'

'What mean you? Have a care of your saucy tongue.'

'I fear thee not,' laughed Sir Tristram, 'but this I would have you
know. I am thy nephew, son of thy sister Elizabeth, who died in the
forest, and of King Talloch of Lyones.'

At these words the king rose from his seat and embraced Sir Tristram,
crying:

'Now, in the name of Heaven, thou art right heartily welcome unto me,
dear nephew.'

That evening he made great cheer of Sir Tristram, and had his bed made
next to his own in his own royal chamber. On the morrow the king had
Sir Tristram horsed and armed in the best manner. Then he sent a
trumpeter down to the seashore, and let Sir Marhaus know that a better
born man than he was himself would fight with him, and that his name
was Sir Tristram of Lyones, son of the King of Lyones and his queen
Elizabeth, King Mark's sister. Sir Marhaus was right blithe that he
should have to do with such a gentleman.

Then it was ordained that the two knights should battle on a little
island near the ship of Sir Marhaus, and so young Sir Tristram and his
squire were rowed thereunto, and when he departed, King Mark and his
barons and all the common people were rejoiced to see the young
knight's noble and high bearing, and wished him Godspeed.

When Sir Tristram landed he saw Sir Marhaus waiting armed in the shadow
of his ship. Sir Tristram's squire brought his master's horse to land,
and clad his master in his armour as was right, and then the young
knight mounted upon his horse and rode towards Sir Marhaus.

While he was as yet six spear-lengths from him the knight of the Round
Table cried unto him:

'Young knight, Sir Tristram, what doest thou here? I grieve me of thy
courage, for ye are untried, while I have been well essayed in jousts
and tournaments with some of the best men of their hands as are now
living. I counsel thee to go back.'

'Fair and well-proved knight,' said Sir Tristram, 'I am for thy sake
made knight, and I have promised to fight thee, and I will do so, as
much for mine uncle's sake as for what worship I may win from doing
battle with ye, who are one of the best renowned knights of the world.'

'Then I would have ye know, fair sir,' said Sir Marhaus, 'that no
worship shalt thou lose if thou canst only stand against three strokes
of mine, for, by reason of my noble deeds, seen and proved, King Arthur
made me knight of the Round Table.'

Sir Tristram answered him naught, and then they dressed their spears
and spurred their horses, and ran so fiercely each against the other
that both were smitten to the ground, both horses and men. But Sir
Marhaus had struck a great wound in the side of Sir Tristram, yet so
eager was the young knight that he knew not of it. They leaped up and
avoided their horses, and drew out their swords, and with shield on arm
they lashed at each other like fierce wild boars. Yet for all Sir
Marhaus' strong and bitter strokes he could not beat down the young
knight's guard, and in despite he began to aim at his vizor and his
neck. At this Sir Tristram was wroth, and struck him more furiously.
Thus for two hours the battle waged, and both were sore wounded. But
Sir Tristram was the fresher and better winded and bigger of limb and
reach; and suddenly he heaved his sword up high, and closing upon Sir
Marhaus he smote him with so mighty a buffet upon his helm that the
blade shore through the steel even into the brain-pan.

So fierce had been the stroke that the sword stuck fast in the bone and
the helmet, and Sir Tristram pulled thrice at his sword before it would
loosen. Sir Marhaus sank to his knees with a deathly groan; then he
threw away his sword and shield, and rising, staggered away towards his
ship. Sir Tristram swooned and fell; and his squire came running to
him, just as the men of Sir Marhaus' ship came and drew their master on
board. Then they swiftly set their sail and flew over the sea.

Great was the mourning of the barons and the people of Cornwall when it
was known how deep and wide was the wound which Tristram had received
from the lance of Sir Marhaus. Many famous leeches came and searched
the wound and strove to close it, but none availed. When two months had
passed, came an old, old woman, a witch wise in leechcraft beyond all
others, who was called the Mother of the Mists, and who lived in the
Great Shuddering Moor, where only trolls dwelled, and no man ever dared
to go. She also came and searched his wound at the king's desire.

When she had made her search, with many mumblings and strange words,
she turned and looked keenly at the king. Her eyes gleamed like beads,
her skin was wrinkled and dark, and she laughed a little soft laugh.

'Lord king,' she said, 'this fine man's wound is poisoned, and naught
can heal it this side the great water. But if he goeth whither the
spear came from which poisoned it, he shall get whole of that wound.'

''Tis well,' said the king, 'he shall be sent to Ireland.'

'Ay, ay, ay,' said the old woman, and laughed in Sir Tristram's face.
'Thou shalt be healed, fair chief, but the hand that shall heal thee
shall give thee a deeper wound--a wound that shall never be healed this
side o' thy grave.'

Forthwith King Mark let a fair ship be purveyed and well stored with
necessary victuals, and Sir Tristram was carried thereto and laid on
his couch on the deck, and Governale, his faithful squire, went with
him. In the sunshine and the brisk wind Sir Tristram felt joyful, and
the merry waves slapped the sides of the ship full prettily as it
cleaved through the blue seas towards the west.

In the evening they saw the white cliffs and the brown rocks of
Ireland, and Sir Tristram took his harp and played thereon, for he had
learned to harp most featly in France, where he had lived seven years,
to learn all manner of courtly and noble pastimes. Soon the shipmen
cast anchor in a wide sheltered cove beneath a castle which stood on a
high rock beside a fair town.

Sir Tristram asked the master of the ship the name of that town.

'Cro-na-Shee, if it please you, my lord,' said the master.

'It pleases me well,' said Tristram; 'it should mean that there dwell
therein brave and noble knights, and damsels like unto fairies.'

Out of the merriness of his heart he thrummed his harp with so blithe
and strange a tune that in a little while the very folk upon the shore
came listening, and some began to dance, while others looked sad. For
though the tune was very merry, there was sadness also peeping from it.

It happened that King Anguish and his court were in that castle by the
sea, and a handmaiden of the queen came to where they sat and told them
of the knight that sat in his ship and harped so strange a lay that it
made one glad and sorry at the same time.

Then King Anguish sent a knight and begged the harper to take cheer
with him, and Sir Tristram was brought in a litter, and all the damsels
were sad at his sickness, and the knights sorrowed that a knight so
noble-looking should be so wounded. King Anguish asked him who he was
and how he came by his wound. And Sir Tristram, having learned that
this was the King of Ireland, whose champion he had worsted in the
battle, and thinking that his own name would be known, replied:

'I am of the country of Lyones, and my name is Sir Tramor, and my wound
was got in battle, as I fought for a lady's right.'

'I pity thee, sir knight,' said the king, who was a right noble king
and lovable, 'and by Heaven's aid, ye shall have all the help in this
country that ye may need.'

The king told him of the battle which Sir Marhaus had had on his behalf
with a knight named Sir Tristram, and how Sir Marhaus had come home
wounded unto death, and was dead this two months. On which Sir Tristram
feigned to be sorry, but said not much thereon.
Then did the king order his daughter to come before him. She was called
La Belle Isoude, for that she was the most lovely damsel in all Ireland
and the Out-Isles, and withal gentle and kind; and her father bade her
tend and minister to this stranger knight, who had come to Ireland to
heal him of his wound.

In a few weeks, so soft was she of her hands and so learned in

leechcraft, she had cleaned Tristram's wound of all poison and he was
hale and strong again. As some reward he taught her to harp, and gave
her many good and costly presents. These she took, but valued them not
so much as his kind words and smiles. More and more she loved to hear
his voice, and when he was gone out hawking or looking at jousts she
was sad and thoughtful, sitting with her fair hands in her lap and her
eyes looking far away, and when she heard his step or his voice in the
hall, then would her sad eyes light up, and a merry tune would hum upon
her lips, and she would gaily talk with her handmaidens, who,
whispering and glancing and nodding to each other as they sat about her
at their spinning frames, knew of her love for Sir Tristram before she
was aware of it herself.

Sir Tristram cared not overmuch to be with ladies, but was more joyful
to be in hall, talking of hunting, jousting and hawking. All men
regarded him highly for his great knowledge of these things, but as
yet, for fear of hurting his wound which was but freshly healed, La
Belle Isoude forbade him gently to take violent exercise. Sir Tristram
was impatient to be in the saddle again, with lance in rest and his
great charger leaping beneath him.

Now, to the court of King Anguish there had lately come a knight named
Sir Palomides, famed for his knightly deeds, though still a pagan, and
he was well favoured both of King Anguish and his queen. Sir Palomides
came and made great court to La Belle Isoude, and proffered her many
gifts, for he loved her passing well. Indeed, for her sake he declared
he would be christened and become a Christian knight; but La Belle
Isoude had no care for him, and avoided him as well as she might.

On a certain day King Anguish made a great cry that a joust and
tournament would be held, wherein only unmarried knights should join,
and the prize would be a fair lady called the Lady of the Laundes, near
cousin to the king. The heralds further said that he who should win her
should marry her three days after, and have all her lands with her.
This cry was made in all Ireland and Wales, and in Logres and Alban,
which are now called England and Scotland.

It befell the same day that La Belle Isoude came to Sir Tristram, and
she seemed distressed of mind and as if she had wept secretly.

'Sir Tramor,' she said, 'this tournament shall exalt Sir Palomides
beyond all other knights, unless a better do come forward and overcome
him.'

'Fair lady,' said Sir Tristram, 'Sir Palomides may well win the prize
against any knight, except it be Sir Lancelot. But if ye think I am fit
to joust I will e'en essay it. Yet he is a proved knight, and I but a
young one and but lately ill; and my first battle that I fought, it
mishapped me to be sore wounded. Yet I will essay it, for I love not
this Sir Palomides.'
'Ah, but I know thou wilt do well in the battle, and thou shalt have
all my prayers for thy safety and success,' said La Belle Isoude.

On the first day of the jousts Sir Palomides came with a black shield,
and he was a knight big of his body and on a great horse. He overthrew
many knights and put them to the worst, among them being many of the
knights of the Round Table, as Sir Gawaine and his brother Sir Gaheris,
Sir Agravaine, Sir Kay, Sir Sagramore le Desirous, Sir Owen, who had
been the little page-boy who had saved King Arthur's life in his hall
at Caerleon, and three other knights. All these he struck down, and the
others were adread of him. The people had great marvel, and acclaimed
him with much worship as the victor of the first day.

The next day he came and smote down King Morgant, the pagan King of
Scotland, as also the Duke of Cambenet. Then, as he rode up and down
the lists proudly flourishing his lance, dressing his shield and
waiting for the other knights to offer themselves to him, he was aware
of a knight all in white armour, with vizor closed, riding quickly
through the gate as if he came from the seashore.

The stranger knight came with swiftness, lifting his lance in token of
challenge. Whereat Sir Palomides rode to the other end of the lists,
dressed his lance, and together they put their horses in motion. Like
two bulls the knights thundered against each other in the centre of the
lists. The white knight's lance hit the shield of Sir Palomides full in
the centre, and with the shock the pagan knight was lifted from his
saddle, carried beyond his horse, and fell with a great thud to the
ground, while his horse careered onward riderless.

Sir Gawaine and his fellows marvelled who this stranger knight might
be. Then Sir Palomides, rising from the ground, caught his horse, and
full of shame, would have slunk from the field. But the white knight
rode after him and bade him turn, 'for,' said the stranger, 'he would
better prove him with the sword.'

Then, alighting, they lashed at each other with their swords. Now Sir
Palomides was a powerful man, and his strokes were passing heavy, but
Sir Tristram, for the stranger knight was he, felt so full of strength
and joy after his long leisure, that he played with Sir Palomides, and
men wondered at the might of his blows, and his swiftness was a marvel
to see. In a while, with a great buffet on the head of the pagan
knight, Sir Tristram felled him to the earth.

'Now yield thee,' said the white knight sternly, 'and do my command, or
I will slay thee of a surety.'

Sir Palomides was sore adread, and promised.

'Swear me this,' said the stranger, 'that upon pain of thy life thou
leave my lady La Belle Isoude, and come not unto her ever again, and
for a year and a day thou shalt bear no armour. Promise me this, or
here shalt thou die!'

'I swear it,' said Sir Palomides, 'but I am for ever shamed.'

In his rage Sir Palomides cut off his armour and threw it from him and
fled away on his horse.

Then the white knight also went away, and none knew who he was. The
king sent after him, to tell him he was the winner of the lady, whom he
should wed, but the messengers could not find him. Men marvelled much
at this, that the victor knight should not come to claim the rich lady
for his wife with the wide lands that went with her.

When Sir Tristram returned to the private postern where La Belle Isoude
had led him forth secretly, he found her standing breathless, and she
was pale and red by turns, and could not speak at first.

'Thou--thou hast not failed?' she said, and clasped her hands.

'Nay,' said Sir Tristram, laughing. 'He will never trouble you again.
And, by Our Lady, I wished there had been six of him, for I never felt
more full of fight and strength than I do this day.'

'But--but have ye not claimed the prize?' said La Belle Isoude, and hid
her face that was so deathly white.

'Nay, nor will I,' said Sir Tristram, 'for I crave not to be married. I
would be free and go forth into strange lands to seek adventures.'

He went from her, with the tune of a hunting song upon his lips, and
saw not how La Belle Isoude trembled against the wall and was near to
swoon.

For La Belle Isoude herself was the Lady of the Laundes who should be
given to the victor, though this was known to none but herself and the
king and queen.

The king and queen and all the court marvelled who should be the
stranger knight, and why he had departed, and some suspected Sir
Tristram, but none knew of this except La Belle Isoude and Governale
his squire, and none dared charge him therewith. La Belle Isoude kept
her counsel, and strove to seem lighthearted.

It fell upon a day that Sir Tristram was disporting himself with other
knights at a game of ball upon the green before the castle, and had
left his sword hung upon the post beside his seat in hall. The queen,
with La Belle Isoude, passed through the hall to go to see the men at
their sport, and on her way she espied Sir Tristram's sword, and the
strange device of a serpent which was upon the handle. She said it was
a marvellous piece of work, and never had she seen the like of it.
Then, by ill hap, she drew the sword from the scabbard, and they both
admired it a long time, looking at its keenness and brightness and the
words of mystery engraved on it.

Suddenly the queen gave a little cry as of terror, and she pointed to
where, within a foot and a half of the point, there was a piece broken
out of the edge. Then, very hastily, the queen ran with the sword into
her bower, and from her treasure-chest she drew a casket, and from the
casket she drew a tiny piece of doeskin, and from that she took a
fragment of steel.

While her daughter marvelled what it all might mean, the queen took the
piece of steel and placed it in the broken part of Sir Tristram's
sword, and it fitted so that the break could hardly be seen.

'Alas!' said the queen, 'this is the piece of sword that the leech took
from the brain of my brother, Sir Marhaus, and this Sir Tramor is the
traitorous knight that slew him!'

The heart of La Belle Isoude stood still for fear of the ill that would
befall Sir Tristram, for she knew her mother's rage.

The queen caught up the sword fiercely in her hand and rushed from the
room. Midway through the hall there met her Sir Tristram himself with
his squire Governale, and the queen sped to him and would have run him
through, but for Governale, who snatched the sword from her, though she
wounded him in her wrath.

Finding her rage thus put to naught, she ran to King Anguish, and threw
herself on her knees before him, crying out:

'Oh, my lord and husband, here have ye in your house that traitor
knight that slew my brother and your champion, that noble knight, Sir
Marhaus. It is Sir Tramor, as he falsely calleth himself, but the piece
of steel that was taken from my brother's brain fits a notch in his
sword.'

'Alas,' cried King Anguish, 'then am I right heavy, for he is as full

noble a knight as ever I knew; and I charge ye, have not to do with
him, but let me deal in this matter.'

The king went to Sir Tristram and found him fully armed, as if ready to
fight for his life, for he knew that now the truth had been discovered.

'Nay, Sir Tramor,' said the king gravely, 'it will not avail thee to
fight me. But this will I do for the love and honour I bear thee.
Inasmuch as ye are within my court it would be no worship for me to
have thee taken and slain, and therefore will I let thee freely depart
if thou wilt tell me this: Who is thy father and what is thy name? And
didst thou truly and rightly slay Sir Marhaus?'

'Tristram is my name,' replied the young knight, 'and I am son of King

Talloch of Lyones. For the truage of Cornwall I fought for the sake of
my uncle King Mark, and the battle with Sir Marhaus was the first I
had, for I was made knight for that alone. Sir Marhaus went from me
alive into his ship, though he left his sword and shield behind him.'

'I may not say that ye have done aught but what a good knight should
do,' replied the king, 'but I may not maintain you in this country
unless I would displease my wife and her kin.'

'Sir,' said Sir Tristram, 'I thank you for your goodness and for the
kind cheer which I have had here of yourself and your queen and La
Belle Isoude. I will depart straightway when I have bidden your
daughter farewell, for I owe my life to her gentle hands; and I promise
this, that I will be your daughter's servant and knight in right or
wrong, to shield her and fight for her, and do all that a knight may do
in her behalf, as long as I live.'

Then took he his leave of La Belle Isoude, and he told her all how he
had come to that land. He thanked her heartily for all her gentleness
to him and for her healing of his wound. At first she stood silent,
changing red and white of face, and with downcast eyes, her fingers
straining about each other. When he swore that he would be her knight,
to fight for her whenever she should send for him, and bade her
good-bye, she took the hand which he held forth, but would not look at
him.

Tristram wondered why her fair hand was so cold. 'Good-bye and God be
with ye always,' La Belle Isoude replied in a faint voice, and then
turned and went from him. Tristram thought she was angered with him for
the slaying of her uncle.

So in a little while he rode forth with Governale down to the seashore

and looked back not once. There he entered by a ship, and with good
wind he arrived at Tintagel in Cornwall, and King Mark and all his
barons were glad that Tristram was whole again.

Then Sir Tristram went to his father King Talloch, and there was made
great cheer for him, and wide lands were given him. Nevertheless, he
could not rest long in one place, but went into Logres and Alban and
Wales, seeking adventures, and his fame for prowess was almost as great
as the fame of Sir Lancelot. Whereever he went he took his harp, and in
hall and bower his favourite songs were those that praised the beauty
of La Belle Isoude, her gentle ways and her soft white hands.

After a year and a day he returned to the court of King Mark and lived
there, and all the knights and ladies admired him, and the praise of
his courtesy was in the mouths of all, noble and simple, high and low.
Then King Mark his uncle began to hate him for the love that all bore
him, and since he had never married and had no son to whom his kingdom
should go after his death, he saw that Sir Tristram would have it, for
he was his next kin, and then, with Lyones and Tintagel, the fame and
power of Tristram would increase abundantly.

So the king began to cast about in his mind for a way whereby he might
do some hurt to Sir Tristram, or even destroy him.

He called the young knight to him one day and said:

'Dear nephew, I have been thinking a long while of taking unto myself a
wife, and I hear much of the beauty and goodness of the king's daughter
of Ireland, whom men call La Belle Isoude. Now I would that you go to
the king and bear my message to him.'

Sir Tristram was troubled in mind at these words. Since he had left La
Belle Isoude he had had no ease of spirit, for now he knew that he
loved her. Though she had been angered with him for his slaying her
uncle, and he knew that the queen and other kinsfolk of Sir Marhaus
would surely slay him if they could, yet had he hoped in a while to
have gone to King Anguish and found some way to win Isoude for his
wife.

'Ye are feared to go, then?' sneered King Mark, noting the silence of
Sir Tristram. 'Then I will e'en send some other knight that is bolder.'

At that Sir Tristram flushed hotly and said:

'I fear not to go there or anywhere, and I will bear thy message, sir.'

'It is well,' said the king. 'I will send thee with a fine ship, and a
rich company of knights, and I will get my scrivener to write my
message.'

Now King Mark said all this by reason of his craft and treachery. He
had heard how Sir Tristram had been full of the praises of La Belle
Isoude, while yet, as he had learned, Sir Tristram had not promised
himself in love to her. By his crafty speech King Mark had hoped to
make Sir Tristram promise to go to Ireland to obtain her, not for
himself, but for King Mark. So, therefore, if the king married La Belle
Isoude, this would cause some grief and hurt to Sir Tristram.

But King Mark cared not overmuch whether he wedded La Belle Isoude or
not. He believed that Sir Tristram would of a surety be slain by the
kin of Sir Marhaus in Ireland, and, if so, King Mark's plot would
succeed to the full.

Sir Tristram, sad and troubled, went apart, and rode into a forest, for
now he knew that he had done himself an ill turn. The lady he loved and
whom he wanted to wife for himself he had now promised to woo for
another.

As he rode moodily through the forest drive, a knight came swiftly

riding on a great horse, its flanks flecked with the foam of its speed.

'Fair knight,' said the stranger, 'will ye of your courtesy tell me

where I may quickly come at a knight called Sir Tristram of Lyones?'

'I am he,' said Tristram. 'What would ye?'

'I thank Heaven that hath led me to you, sir knight,' said the other.
'Here is a message from my master, King Anguish of Ireland, who is in
dire peril of honour and life, and craves aid of you for the love that
hath been atween you.'

Sir Tristram, much marvelling, took the parchment and read: 'These to
you, Sir Tristram of Lyones, most noble knight, from his lover and
friend King Anguish of Ireland, in sore trouble and straits at Camelot.
Know ye, Sir Tristram, that I have been summoned to King Arthur's court
on pain of forfeiture of his lordship's royal grace, to answer a charge
whereof I knew naught till I came here. Which is that by treason and
felony I caused to be slain at my court in Ireland a cousin of Sir
Bleobaris de Ganis and Sir Blamor de Ganis, and of this evil deed these
knights do most falsely accuse me. And there is none other remedy than
for me to answer them in knightly fashion, my armed body against
theirs. But inasmuch as I am old, and my wasted arm could naught avail
me, and in that they are of such renown and prowess that none of my
knights may hope to overcome them, I pray ye, Sir Tristram, of your
ancient love for me, to come to my aid and fight for me as my champion
in this most cruel charge. But if ye will not, and if ye choose to
remember rather that I thrust you from my court, and would not protect
you against those that meant you ill, then forgive my request, and
leave me to my fate and my dishonour.'

The heart of Sir Tristram lifted within him for love of the good old
king, and turning, he said:

'For what day is the trial by combat which your master speaketh of?'

'For midday on the day before next Sabbath,' said the knight.

'Go ye at once to your master,' said Sir Tristram, 'and say to him that
I will not fail him, but will make all speed.'
'Sir, I thank you from my heart,' said the knight, and bowed. Then
wheeling his horse he dashed swiftly away.

At Camelot, on the day and hour appointed, the lists were set, and
knights and nobles and the common people waited to see the trial by
battle which should prove the innocence or guilt of King Anguish. King
Arthur was not at Camelot, nor was Sir Lancelot, for both were at
Joyous Gard, the castle of Sir Lancelot, which King Arthur had given to
him by the sea in the Northern Marches. In their places, King Kador of
Cornwall and King Uriens of Reged were judges at the trial.

Ere noon was marked by the gnomon of the dial set up before the judges,
Sir Tristram and his squire Governale rode up the lists, and were met
by King Anguish and his knights. When Sir Tristram saw the King of
Ireland he got swiftly from his horse and ran towards him, and would
have held his stirrup; but the king leapt lightly from his horse, and
with bright looks each embraced and kissed the other.

'My good lord,' cried Tristram, 'gramercy of your goodness which ye

showed me in your marches, and of your nobleness in calling me unto
your aid, for it is great honour to me that ye ask this, and I will do
all for you to the utmost of my strength.'

'Ah, worshipful knight,' said the king, 'ye are courteous and noble
beyond all others to come to my aid when I am in such dire need.'

'Who is he that is appointed to fight with you or your champion?' asked

Sir Tristram.

'He is of Sir Lancelot's blood,' replied the king, 'and I wot that he
will be hard to overcome, for all those of King Ban's kin are passing
good fighters beyond all others. It is Sir Blamor de Ganis, a great
warrior.'

'Sir,' said Sir Tristram, 'for the great goodness that ye showed to me
in Ireland and for your daughter's sake, La Belle Isoude, I will take
the battle in hand for you. But ye must first swear that ye never
caused or consented to the death of the knight of which you are
charged, and if I avail in your battle I will crave a boon of you which
you shall grant me.'

'I swear to Heaven,' replied the king, 'that I did neither cause nor
consent to the death of the knight; and as to the boon that ye shall
ask, I grant it you already.'

Then King Anguish departed to the judges and cried unto them the name
of his champion, and all the knights of the Round Table that were
there, and the common people, were all agog to see Sir Tristram. The
fame of his fight with Sir Marhaus, and his renown as a harpist and a
lover of hunting, were well known unto all; but never yet had he come
to the court of King Arthur.

Sir Blamor and Sir Tristram went to each end of the lists and dressed
their harness and their shields. Sir Bleobaris, that was brother to Sir
Blamor, went to him and said:

'Brother, now remember of what kin ye be, and what manner of man is our
lord, Sir Lancelot, and see that ye suffer not shame. For never would
Sir Lancelot bear it, and he would sooner suffer death.'
'Have no doubt of me,' said Sir Blamor, 'I shall never shame Sir
Lancelot nor any of our high blood; nevertheless, this Sir Tristram is
a passing good fighter, and if by ill hap he strike me down, then he
shall slay me and so end my shame.'

'God speed you well,' said Sir Bleobaris, 'but he may not be so great a
warrior as fame saith. For fame grows false as she goes further.'

When the knights were ready, the herald of the court of Arthur stood
with his trumpet and recited the cause of the quarrel and the names of
the knights about to do battle. Then, lifting his tabard, he bade both
knights make ready; and when his tabard fell to the ground, the knights
lowered their lances in the rests, set spurs to their horses, and
thundered down the lists. With a clang and a crash they met midway, and
then men marvelled as they saw how suddenly Sir Blamor's horse reared
in mid-career, turned right round, and upsetting its rider over its
back, fell to the ground. Sir Blamor, however, was unhurt, and quickly
rising to his feet he drew out his sword, crying to Sir Tristram, as
that knight turned his horse and came towards him:

'Alight thee, Sir Tristram, for though this mare's son of mine hath
failed me, I trust my good sword shall not fail me.'

With that Sir Tristram alighted and dressed him to battle, and there
they lashed at each other with mighty strokes on both sides, cutting
and hacking, feinting and guarding, so that as time went on and still
they fought fiercely, the kings and knights marvelled that they were so
great-winded and strong.

Soon men saw that Sir Blamor was headstrong, and mad with rage, while
Sir Tristram beat not so many false blows, but each was sure, though
slower. Yet Sir Blamor would not rest, but like a wild man would ever
dash against his enemy. Where they fought the trampled sand was stained
with red from their wounds.

Suddenly men saw Sir Blamor make a heavy stroke which Sir Tristram
avoided, and ere the other could recover, Sir Tristram's sword
descended on his helm with so great a stroke that Sir Blamor fell upon
his side. Sir Tristram leaped upon him and placed the point of his
sword between the bars of Sir Blamor's vizor, bidding him yield.

When Sir Blamor got his breath he panted forth:

'Nay, nay, Sir Tristram, I will not say the word, but I require thee,
Sir Tristram de Lyones, as thou art a noble knight and the mightiest
that ever I found, that thou wilt slay me out of hand, for now I would
not live to be made lord of these lands of Britain. Liefer I would die
than live a life of shame, and therefore slay me! slay me!'

Sir Tristram started back, remembering of what noble blood was this
brave knight. Knowing that he must either make Sir Blamor say the loth
words 'I yield,' or else slay him, he went to where the judges sat, and
kneeled before them and told them what Sir Blamor had said.

'Fair lords,' Sir Tristram ended, 'it were shame and pity that this
noble knight should be slain, for ye well hear that he will not say the
words of shame, and if King Anguish, whose true knight and champion I
am, will suffer me, I will neither shame nor slay so stout-hearted a
knight.'

'By Heaven,' said King Anguish, 'I will be ruled for your sake, Sir
Tristram, as ye are the most knight of prowess that ever I saw in my
long life. Therefore I pray these kings and judges that they take the
matter into their own hands.'

The judges called Sir Bleobaris to them and required his counsel.

'My lords,' he said, 'though that my brother be beaten of body by this

valiant knight, he hath not beaten his heart, and so I thank God he
hath not been shamed in this fight. And rather than he be shamed,' said
Sir Bleobaris, white and stern, 'I require that you command Sir
Tristram to slay him out of hand!'

'That shall not be,' said the judges, 'for neither King Anguish nor Sir
Tristram desire to shame your valiant brother.'

'We do not,' said both the king and Sir Tristram.

Therewith, by the advice of the judges, Sir Tristram and Sir Bleobaris
took up Sir Blamor; and the two brothers made peace with King Anguish
and kissed each other and swore friendship with him for ever. Then Sir
Blamor and Sir Tristram kissed, and the two brothers, their hands
clasping those of Sir Tristram, swore that there should for ever be
peace and love between them; and this did Sir Tristram swear also.

Inasmuch as, of his nobleness and generosity, Sir Tristram would not
take Sir Blamor's life because he refused to yield him, Sir Lancelot
and all his kinsmen loved Sir Tristram, and were ever his friends and
spoke well and knightly of him.

Then King Anguish and Sir Tristram took their leave and sailed into
Ireland with great joy; and when they had arrived there, the king let
make a great cry throughout his dominions, of the manner in which Sir
Tristram had fought for him, and how for that deed he accounted him the
noblest knight among his friends, and that all should treat him with
friendship and no deceit.

When, also, the queen and the kin of Sir Marhaus heard how Sir Tristram
had borne himself in the trial by combat, they agreed that now they
should not seek to slay him, since his great help in this matter had
wiped out his ill-doing in the slaying of Sir Marhaus.

So the queen and the knights of the court and the common people made
much of Sir Tristram wheresoever he went; but the joy that La Belle
Isoude had in her heart no tongue may tell. When Sir Tristram was led
to her and they met after so long an absence from each other, men saw
the lovely face light up with so sweet and high a look that they
marvelled at her beauty. Yet they saw how straitly Sir Tristram held
himself, and made not much of his meeting with her and did not seek her
company.

Then on a day King Anguish asked Sir Tristram what was the boon he
craved.

'But whatever it be,' said the king, 'it is yours without fail.'

Sir Tristram's face went hard and white, and after a little while he
said:

'It is this, my lord. I bear a request from my uncle, King Mark, and it
is that you give him your daughter La Belle Isoude for his wife, and ye
let me take her unto him, for so I have promised him.'

'Alas,' said the king, and looked full heavily into the eyes of Sir
Tristram, 'I had liefer than all the land that I have that ye should
wed her yourself.'

Sir Tristram turned away, and made this reply:

'I have given my promise, and I were ashamed for ever in the world if I
did aught else. I require you to hold to your promise, and to let your
daughter depart with me to be wedded to my uncle, King Mark.'

'As I have promised, so will I do,' said the king. 'But I let you know
'tis with a heavy heart.'

Nor would the king say more, knowing that he might make bad worse. But
the surprise and grief of La Belle Isoude, when she knew that Sir
Tristram was to take her to be wife not unto himself but to a stranger,
what tongue may tell and what words may say? Nightly, on the days when
she was being prepared to depart, she wept full sorely in the arms of
her mother or of Bragwine her faithful gentlewoman; but in hall or
abroad she was ever calm and cold, though pale.

The queen, her mother, feared much of this marriage, and so sent a
swift message to a great witch who dwelled in a dark wet valley in the
midst of the Purple Hills, and for much gold a potent philtre was
prepared. Then, on the day when, with much weeping and many sad
farewells, La Belle Isoude with her gentlewomen and many noble ladies
and knights were to go into the ship, the queen called Bragwine aside,
and giving her a little golden flasket, said to her:

'Take this with thee, Bragwine, for I misdoubt this marriage overmuch,
and I charge thee do this. On the day that King Mark shall wed my
daughter, do thou mix this drink in their wine in equal parts, and then
I undertake that each shall love the other alone all the days of their
lives.'

Anon Sir Tristram and La Belle Isoude took ship and got to sea. During
the voyage Sir Tristram kept himself much with the other knights and
rarely sat with Isoude; for in his heart was much grief, and he hated
the fair wind that drove the ship more quickly to the time when he must
give up La Belle Isoude to his uncle. He knew now that he loved none
other woman in the world but her, and never would so long as he should
live.

Bragwine the maid, seeing the pensive looks of her mistress, and
knowing the wretchedness of her heart, determined to give her mistress
what she most desired. By the aid of Governale, the squire of Sir
Tristram, they poured the philtre into the wine of Isoude and Sir
Tristram as they were about to sit at dinner.

They thought that the philtre being so potent, it would cause Sir
Tristram to do as King Anguish wished that he would do, and take La
Belle Isoude into his own home at Lyones and wed her himself.
Sir Tristram and La Belle Isoude sat at dinner and drank the wine. In a
little while Sir Tristram looked at the wine that was in his silver cup
and smelled at it.

'Sure this is the best wine that ever I drank,' said he, and smiled at
her.

'It is truly a most sweet and noble drink,' said Isoude, and her heart
was glad to see him smile, who hitherto had kept his face so stern.

Sir Tristram called his squire.

'Governale,' said he, 'what wine is this thou hast given us this day?
Let us have another flask of the same.'

Governale was ever ill at a deception, and began to stammer.

'My lord,' he said, 'I fear me there is none other.'

'Ah,' said his master, 'and where got you that?'

'The gentlewoman of my Lady Isoude,' said he, 'brought it and bade me

mix it in your lordship's wine.'

'What?' cried Sir Tristram, rising angrily. 'What means this? What
trickery is this?'

'Oh, my lord, forgive me,' cried Governale. 'But we saw the sorrow of
both your hearts, and we gave you the philtre that was meant for my
lady and King Mark, and--and--my lord, you will break my lady's heart
and your own if ye suffer this.' But Sir Tristram would hear no
further, and fiercely sent his squire from his presence.

'Ah, my lord,' said La Belle Isoude, 'have those two poor souls done
more evil than we are doing by hiding our hearts from each other? I
would have you know that no ease shall you have all the days of your
life, for I know that you love me, and as to that, there is no living
man in all this world that I love as I love you. If ye think it
unmaidenly in me to say that--then my own wretched heart forgives me.'

The gentle sorrow in her voice caused Sir Tristram's heart to swell
with rage because he had promised to take her to wed King Mark.

'Lady,' he said, and his face was full pitiful and pale, 'Heaven knows
that ye say right, and that nevermore shall I have ease after this. But
no more should I have ease, but rather more shame and remorse, if I
should do what my heart bids me do. I gave my promise to mine uncle,
madman that I was, and I must perform it, and suffer. But I could slay
myself to think that you will suffer also.'

She saw the rage and sorrow in his eyes, and her heart was full of
pity.

'Do thyself no harm, O noble knight and friend,' said Isoude, 'for thou
art right, and I wrong. But I would have you promise to be my knight
and champion in things both ill and good, while you shall have life.'

'Lady,' he replied, 'I will be all the days of my life your knight, in
weal and in woe, to come to your aid and battle for your dear name,
when you shall send for me.'

Sir Tristram gave her a ring, and she gave him another, and quickly
they parted, lest they should repent them of their duty.

That evening they got to shore, and landed at the foot of Tintagel, and
Sir Tristram led up La Belle Isoude and gave her into the hands of King
Mark, whose looks, for all that he tried to appear satisfied, were sour
as he dwelt on the noble figure of Sir Tristram. Men noticed how pale
and stern the young knight seemed, and that he said few words.

In a little while, after the wedding of his uncle to La Belle Isoude,

Sir Tristram said farewell to all the court, 'for,' said he, 'he would
go fight the pagans who were ravening in the north,' and so departed,
with Governale his squire.

Afterwards, seeing the pale queen seated in hall beside King Mark, and
remembering the heaviness of Sir Tristram, some guessed how full of woe
was their parting, but for love and sorrow of Sir Tristram they said
naught of what they thought.

VI

THE DEEDS OF SIR GERAINT

King Arthur was spending Whitsuntide at Caerleon-upon-Usk, and one day

he hunted the stag in the forests that lay thereby. As he had given
permission for his queen to go and see the hunting, she set out with
one handmaiden, and rode in the misty dawning down to the river, and
across the ford.

They climbed up the other bank, following the track of the men and
horses which had formed the king's hunting party, until they stood on
the edge of the dark forest, where the young leaves were fresh and
sweetly green. The sun burst forth, and sucked up the mists along the
meadow flats beside the river below them, and the water flashed and the
birds sang.

'Here will we stay,' said the queen, who felt happy with the sunlight
upon her, and the smell of the forest blowing out from the trees, 'and
though we shall not see the killing, we shall hear the horns when they
sound, and we shall hear the dogs when they are let loose and begin to
cry so eagerly.'

Suddenly they heard a rushing sound and the thud of hoofs behind them,
and, turning, they saw a young man upon a hunter foal of mighty size.
The rider was a fair-haired handsome youth, of princely mien, yet
withal kindly of look and smile. A riding-robe and surcoat of satin
were upon him, low-cut shoes of soft leather were on his feet, and in
his girdle was a golden-hilted sword. A fillet of gold bound his curly
hair, and a collar of gold, with a blue enamel swastika pendant, hung
about his neck.

He checked his horse as he neared the queen, and it came towards her
with step stately, swift and proud, and the rider bowed full low to
Gwenevere.

'Heaven prosper thee, Sir Geraint,' she said. 'And its welcome be unto
thee.'

'Heaven accord you long life and happiness, O queen,' replied Geraint.

'Why didst thou not go with my lord to hunt?' asked the queen.

'Because I knew not when he went,' said Geraint. 'But men told me in
hall that you had gone out alone, and I came to crave permission to
accompany and guard you.'

'Gramercy,' said the queen. 'Thy protection is very agreeable to me.'

As they stood talking, they heard the clatter of steel armour, and
looking between the trees, they beheld a proud knight upon a war-horse
of great size, wearing a heavy chain-mail jesseraunt, with coif and
vizored helm, and his horse was also clothed in harness of chain mail.

Following him was a lady upon a beautiful white horse, which went with
stately and proud steps along the forest way. The lady was clothed in a
great robe of gold brocade, and her headcloth, of fine cambric, was
turned so that her face was hidden. Behind them rode a little dark man,
hairy and fierce of face, dressed as a page; and he sat on a great
horse, strong and spirited, yet the dwarf held it well in hand. Hung to
his saddle-bow was the knight's shield, but the device was hidden by a
cloth, and two lances were fixed to the girdle of the dwarf. In his
right fist the page carried a whip, long and heavy and knotted.

'Sir Geraint,' said Gwenevere, 'knowest thou the name of that tall
knight?'

'I know him not, lady,' said Geraint, 'and his helm conceals his face,
and his shield is also hidden. But I will go and ask the page, that you
may learn his name.'

And Sir Geraint rode up to the dwarfish page.

'Who is yonder knight?' said Sir Geraint.

'I will not tell thee,' replied the dwarf, and scowled.

'Then I will ask him himself,' said Sir Geraint.

'That thou wilt not, by my head,' said the dwarf angrily, 'for thou art
not of honour enough to speak to my lord.'

Geraint turned his horse's head to go towards the knight, whereupon the
dwarf spurred forward and overtook him and lashed towards him with the
long and knotted whip. The lash struck the mouth of Sir Geraint, and
blood flowed, and dropped upon the silken scarf that he wore.

Instantly Sir Geraint turned, with sword half drawn, and the dwarf
cowed and pulled back. But Sir Geraint thought it would be no vengeance
to carve the dwarf's head from his shoulders, and to be attacked
unarmed by the mail-clad knight.

He thrust his sword back with a clang into its scabbard, and rode
towards the queen.

'Thou hast acted wisely and nobly, Sir Geraint,' said the queen, 'and I
sorrow for the insult the craven knave hath placed upon thee.'

'Lady, I fear he was but copying his master,' said Geraint, whose eyes
flashed with anger. 'But if your ladyship will permit me, I will follow
this knight, and at last he will come to some town where I may get arms
either as a loan or from a friend, and then will I avenge the insult
which this stranger knight hath given to you, my queen and lady.'

'Go,' said Gwenevere, 'but I beg of thee, do not encounter with the
knight until thou hast good arms, for he is a man almost as big as Sir
Lancelot du Lake. And I shall be anxious concerning thee until thou
dost return, or send tidings.'

'If I be alive,' said Sir Geraint, 'you shall hear tidings of me by

to-morrow at evensong.'

Thus he departed. All that day Sir Geraint followed the knight and the
lady and the page, keeping them in sight, though at a distance. Through
the forest they went first, and thereafter the road ran along a ridge
of high ground, with the great downs and combes falling and heaving
below their feet, the sun flashing back from lakes and streams, the
bees humming at the flowers in the grass, and the larks rising with
thrilling song in the warm sweet air of the spring.

Sir Geraint loved it all, but he kept his eyes ever on the knight, who
flashed as he moved far before him. At length he saw the towers of a
high castle, and beneath it the red roofs of a little town nestling at
the foot of the grey walls. They rode into the town, and as the haughty
knight passed through it the people in the booths and cabins and those
beside the way saluted him. He did not acknowledge any of their
greetings, but looked before him proudly, as he had done when he rode
through the solitary paths of the wilderness.

Sir Geraint looked about him as he rode behind, to see if there was any
armourer or knightly person whom he knew, but there was none. When he
saw the knight and the lady and the dwarf enter the castle, and was
sure that they would sojourn there, he rode about the little town, and
found it full of knights and squires, with armourers and others
cleaning arms, sharpening swords and repairing harness. But no one did
he know of whom to beg a suit of armour and a lance.

Then he took his way to a little stream beneath the wall of the town,
and on the other side he saw a manor-house, old and ruinous, standing
amidst tall weeds. And thinking he might get lodging there for that
night, he forded the river and went towards the manor. He saw that the
hall-door yawned open, and that a marble bridge led up to it, over a
wide ditch full of stagnant water and thick with green weeds and
rushes.

On the bridge sat an old and reverend man in clothes that once had been
rich, but now were thin and tattered. And Geraint thought it was not
possible that so poor a place could help him in what he desired. He
looked steadfastly at the old man.

'Young sir,' said the latter, 'why art thou so thoughtful?'

'I was thinking, fair sir,' said Geraint, 'whether thou couldst give me
lodging here for this night.'

'Of a surety,' said the old man, rising. 'It is poor we are, but such
as can be given shall be of our best.'

He led Sir Geraint into the hall, which was bleak and desolate, and the
hearthstone in the centre was thick with last year's leaves, as if it
had been long since fire had flickered upon it. On the wall there hung
rusty weapons and helms, and through the cracks there crept the ivy
from the outer wall. The horse was tethered in the hall by the old man.

Then he led Sir Geraint to a door upon the dais, and ushered him into
the bower, and there he saw an old decrepit woman, sweet of look though
thin and peaked. She rose from the cushion on which she sat, greeting
him kindly, and he saw that the satin garments upon her were also old
and tattered. Yet Sir Geraint thought she must have been a lovely woman
in her happy youth.

Beside her was a maiden, upon whom was a vest and robe poor and thin,
and the veil of her headcloth was old though clean. Yet truly, thought
Geraint, he had never seen a lovelier maiden, nor one with more
sweetness and grace in her smile or gentleness in her voice. And the
heart of him stirred with pity to see her so pale and wan, as if she
fared but poorly.

'Welcome, fair sir,' said the old dame. 'This is my daughter Enid, who
will gladly prepare food for you.'

When food had been prepared they sat down, and Geraint was placed
between the white-haired man and his wife, and the maiden served them.

Afterwards, as they drank weak mead from cups of earthenware, they

spoke together; and Geraint asked whose was the manor in which they
sat.

'Mine,' said the old man, 'for I built it. And the castle up there and
the town were also mine.'

'Alas!' said Geraint, 'how is it you and yours have lost them?'

'For my sins and my greed,' said the old man sadly, 'and bitterly have
I repented me of my wrong. I am Earl Inewl, but I have lost the lands
that made my earldom. For I have a nephew, whom his father, on his
deathbed, gave into my keeping, with all his lands. And I added his
possessions to my own, and when the boy was a man he demanded them of
me, and I would not give them up. So he made war upon me, and took
everything from me except this ruined hall and one poor farm.'

'Since you are sorry for the greed that hath ruined you,' replied
Geraint, 'I will do what I may to regain your possessions, if God gives
me life. But first I would ask, why went that knight and the lady and
the dwarf just now into the town, and why is there so much furbishing
of arms there?'

'The preparations are for the jousting that is to be held to-morrow's

morn in the level meadow beside the ford,' responded the old earl. 'And
the prize is to be a falcon of pure gold. The knight thou sawest has
won the falcon two years running, and if he wins it this time he will
have it for his own, and will win the title of the Knight of the Golden
Falcon. And to gain it from him all those knights in the town will
essay. And with each will go the lady that he loveth best, and if a man
takes not his lady with him he may not enter the lists.'

'Sir,' said Sir Geraint, 'I would willingly have to do with that
knight, for he hath, by the hands of his dwarf page, most evilly
insulted the queen of my dear lord, King Arthur; but I have no armour.'

'As for that,' said the old man, 'I have arms here that will fit thee;
but if thou hast no maiden with thee, thou canst not do battle.'

'If, sir,' replied Sir Geraint, 'you and this maiden, your daughter,
will permit me to challenge for her, I will engage, if I escape alive
from the tournament, to be the maiden's knight while I shall live.'

'What say you, daughter?' said the old earl.

'Indeed, sir,' replied the maiden, gently flushing, 'I am in your

hands. And if this fair knight will have it so, he may challenge for
me.'

This said Enid to hide her true thoughts; for indeed she felt that she
had never before seen as noble a youth as Geraint, or one for whom her
thoughts were so kind.

'Then so shall it be,' said Earl Inewl.

On the morrow, ere it was dawn, they arose and arrayed themselves; and
at break of day they were in the meadow. Before the seat of the young
earl, who was Inewl's nephew, there was set up a post, and on it was
the figure of a gyr-falcon, of pure gold, and marvellously wrought,
with wings outspread and talons astretch, as if it were about to strike
its prey.

Then the knight whom Geraint had followed entered the field with his
lady, and when he had made proclamation, he bade her go and fetch the
falcon from its place, 'for,' said he, 'thou art the fairest of women,
and, if any deny it, by force will I defend the fame of thy beauty and
thy gentleness and nobleness.'

'Touch not the falcon!' cried Geraint, 'for here is a maiden who is
fairer, and more noble, and more gentle, and who has a better claim to
it than any.'

The stranger knight looked keenly at Geraint, and in a haughty voice

cried:

'I know not who thou art; but if thou art worthy to bear arms against
me, come forward.'

Geraint mounted his horse, and when he rode to the end of the meadow
laughter rippled and rang from the people watching him. For he bore an
old and rusty suit of armour that was of an ancient pattern, and the
joints of which gaped here and there. And none knew who he was, for his
shield was bare.

But when, thundering together, the two knights had each broken several
lances upon the shield of the other, the people eyed Sir Geraint with
some regard. When it seemed that the proud knight was the better
jouster, the earl and his people shouted, and Inewl and Enid had sad
looks.

'Pity it is,' said Enid, 'that our young knight hath but that old
gaping armour. For when they clash together, I feel the cruel point of
the proud knight's spear as if it were in my heart.'

'Fear not, my dear,' said the old dame, her mother. 'I feel that him
you have learned to love so soon is worthy a good maiden's love, and I
think that his good knighthood will overcome the other's pride.'

Then the old knight went to Geraint.

'O young chief!' he said, 'since all other lances break in thy strong
young hand, take you this. It was the lance I had on the day when I
received knighthood. It was made by the wizard smith who lives in the
Hill of Ithel, and it hath never failed me.'

Then Sir Geraint took the lance and thanked the old earl, and looked
back to where stood Enid. And his heart leaped to see how proud and
calm she stood, though her lips trembled as she smiled at him.

With that the strength seemed to course like a mountain stream through
all his body; and from the uttermost end of the meadow he pricked his
horse and rushed towards the proud knight. His blow was so mighty, and
the good lance so strong, that the shield of the proud knight was cleft
in twain, and he was thrust far beyond his horse and fell crashing to
the ground.

Then Geraint leaped from his horse and drew his sword, and the other
rising to his feet, they dashed together with the fury of wild bulls;
and so battled long and sore until the sweat and blood obscured their
sight. Once, when the proud knight had struck Sir Geraint a mighty
blow, the young knight saw, as he fought, how the maid Enid stood with
clasped hands and a pale face of terror, as if she feared for his life.

With the sight of the maiden's dread and the memory of the insult done
by the proud knight to Queen Gwenevere, Sir Geraint waxed both fiercer
and stronger; and gathering all his might in one blow, he beat with his
sword upon the crown of the knight's helm, and so fierce was it that
the headpiece broke and the sword-blade cut to the bone.

Straightway the knight fell down upon his knees and craved mercy.

'Why should I give mercy to one so full of pride and arrogance?' said
Sir Geraint. 'Thou, through thy servant, hast shamefully insulted the
queen of my lord, King Arthur.'

'Fair knight,' cried the other, 'I confess it, and I give up my
overbearing henceforth, and I crave for mercy. And if ye give me my
life, I will be your man and do your behest.'

'I will give thee mercy on one condition,' said Geraint, 'which is that
thou and thy lady and thy dwarf page go instantly and yield yourselves
into the hands of the queen, and claim atonement for your insult. And
whatsoever my lady the queen determines, that shall ye suffer. Tell me
who art thou?'
'I am Sir Edern of the Needlands,' replied the other. 'And who art
thou, sir knight,' he asked, 'for never have I met so valiant and good
a knight of his hands as thou art.'

'I am Geraint of Cornwall,' said the young knight.

'It giveth comfort to me to know that I am overcome by so noble a

knight,' said the other. Then he got upon his horse, all wounded as he
was, and with his lady and the page beside him took his way sadly to
Arthur's court.

Then the young earl rose and came to Sir Geraint, and asked him to stay
with him at his castle, for he loved all knights of great prowess and
would have them to talk to him.

'Nay, I will not,' said Sir Geraint coldly; 'I will go where I was last
night.'

'Have your will, sir knight,' replied the young earl courteously. 'But
I will ask Earl Inewl to permit me to furnish his manor as it should be
furnished for your honour and ease.'

Sir Geraint went back to the manor, conversing with Earl Inewl and his
wife, and with the maiden Enid.

When they reached the house, they found it full of the servants of the
earl, who were sweeping the hall and laying straw therein, with tables
and benches as were suitable, and soon a great fire leaped and crackled
on the stone in the centre. Then when Sir Geraint's wound had been
washed and salved and bound, and he had placed upon himself his walking
attire, the chamberlain of the young earl came to him and asked him to
go into the hall to eat. Sir Geraint asked where was Earl Inewl and his
wife and daughter.

'They are in the bower putting on robes which my lord the earl hath
sent, more befitting their station and your honour,' said the earl's
chamberlain.

Sir Geraint liked it not that the maiden should be dressed in robes
given by the man who had stripped her father of all his wealth, and he
said coldly:

'I would that the damsel do not array herself, except in the vest and
veil she hath worn till now. And those she should wear,' he said,
'until she come to the court of Arthur, where the queen shall clothe
her in garments fitting for her.'

It was so done, and the maiden sat in her poor robes while the other
knights and ladies in the young earl's company glittered and shone in
satin and jewels. But she cared not for this, because Sir Geraint had
bidden her.

When meat was done and mead was served, they all began to talk, and the
young earl invited Sir Geraint to visit him next day.

'It may not be,' said Sir Geraint; 'I will go to the court of my lord
Arthur with this maiden, for I will not rest while Earl Inewl and his
dame and daughter go in poverty and rags and trouble. And it is for
this I will see my lord, so that something may be done to give them
maintenance befitting their station.'

Then, because the young earl admired Sir Geraint for his knightly
strength, his nobility of manner and his prowess, there was sorrow in
his heart for the old Earl Inewl.

'Ah, Sir Geraint,' he said, 'I am sorry if your heart is sore because
of my kinsman's poor condition; and if you will give me your
friendship, I will abide by your counsel and do what you think I should
do of right.'

'I thank thee, fair sir,' said Geraint, 'and I will ask ye to restore
unto the Earl Inewl all the possessions that were rightly his, and what
he should have received up to this day.'

'That I will gladly do for your sake,' said the young earl.

Thus it was agreed; and such of the men in the hall who held lands
which rightly belonged to Earl Inewl came and knelt before him and did
homage to him. And next morning the lands and homesteads and all other
his possessions were returned to Earl Inewl, to the last seed-pearl.

Thereafter Sir Geraint prepared to return to the court of King Arthur,

and the Earl Inewl came to him with the maiden Enid, whose gentle face
went pale and red by turns. Putting her hand in the hand of Sir
Geraint, the old man said:

'Fair sir, your pursuit of that knight, Sir Edern, and your revenge for
his insult, I shall bless until the last day of my life. For you have
done more goodness and justice than I can ever repay you. But if this
my daughter, for whom ye fought yesterday, is pleasing unto you, then
take her for your wife, with the blessing of myself and my countess.'

Sir Geraint clasped the hand of the young maiden, and said:

'My lord, I thank thee, and if my lord King Arthur shall give this
maiden unto me for wife, then will I love her and cherish her all the
days of my life, if she in her heart would choose me for her husband.'

'My lord,' said the maiden, raising her frank eyes and flushing face to
him, 'I have never known a knight to whom I gave so great goodwill as I
find in my heart for thee. And if thy lord Arthur shall give me unto
thee, I will plight thee my love and loving service till I die.'

Thereupon they proceeded on their way to the court of King Arthur, and
what had seemed a long journey to Geraint when he had followed Sir
Edern, now seemed too short, for he and the maid Enid passed it in much
pleasant converse.

Towards evening they arrived at Caerleon-upon-Usk, and Queen Gwenevere

received Sir Geraint with great welcome, calling him 'her glorious
knight and champion,' and telling him that Sir Edern had yielded
himself into her hands to do such atonement as seemed fitting, when he
should have recovered from his wounds.

At the beauty of the maid Enid all the court marvelled; and the queen
hastened to clothe her in robes of satin, rich and rare, with gold upon
her hair and about her throat. And when she was so dressed, all were
glad that one of so sweet a dignity and rare a beauty had come among
them.

King Arthur gave her to Sir Geraint with many rich gifts, and Enid and
Geraint were married in the abbey church, and the court gave itself up
to feasting and sport, and acclaimed her one of the three most lovely
ladies in all the isle of Britain.

When a year had passed in great happiness, ambassadors came from King
Erbin of Cornwall, with a request to King Arthur that he should let Sir
Geraint go home to his father.

'For,' said the messengers, 'King Erbin waxes old and feeble, and the
more he ageth the more insolent and daring are the barons and lords on
his marches, trying to wrest parts of his lands to add to their own.
Therefore,' said they, 'the king begs you to let his son Sir Geraint
return home, so that, knowing the fame of the strength of his arm and
his prowess, the turbulent lords would desist, and if they would not,
Sir Geraint would hurl them from his boundaries.'

King Arthur, though very reluctant to let so great an ornament of his

court depart, let him go, and Geraint and Enid went with a great party
of the best knights of the Round Table, and rode to the Severn Shore,
and there took ship to the shores of Cornwall.

When they reached there, all the people came from their villages
welcoming Sir Geraint and his lovely bride, for the fame of his
prowess, and the way in which he had won his wife, had spread over all
the land. And King Erbin welcomed his son and was glad of his coming,
and the next day all the chief subjects, the lords and barons holding
land or offices, and the chief tenants of common degree, came into the
hall, and, kneeling before Sir Geraint, did honour to him and swore
fealty.

Then, with a great company of his chief warriors, Sir Geraint visited
all the bounds of his territory. Experienced guides went with him, and
old men learned in the marks of the boundaries, and priests, and they
renewed the mere-marks that were broken down, and replaced those which
had been wrongfully moved.

Thereafter men lived peacefully in the land, and on all the borders,
for under the shadow of the strong young chief no border lords dared to
invade the land, and no fierce baron used oppression.

Then, as had been his wont at the court of Arthur, Sir Geraint went to
all tournaments that were held within easy reach of his kingdom. Thus
he became acquainted with every mighty knight of his hands throughout
the lands of Cornwall, Wales and Logres; and so great in strength and
prowess did he become that men hailed him as one of the Three Great
Heroes of the Isle of Britain; the other two being Sir Lancelot du Lake
and Sir Tristram of Lyones. And though there Were other great and
valiant warriors, as Sir Lamorake, Sir Bors, Sir Gawaine and his
brother, Sir Gareth, and Sir Palomides, yet all these had been overcome
by one or other of the three heroes. For as yet Sir Perceval was in the
forest with his widowed mother, and knew no arms but a stone or a
stick; and Sir Galahad was not yet born. And these two were knights
stainless of pride or any evil desire, and by that force alone did
strike down every arm, however mighty, that relied on knightly prowess
alone.
When his fame had spread over all the kingdoms south of Trent, so that
no knight that knew him or saw the device of the golden falcon on his
shield would have to do with him, Sir Geraint began to seek ease and
pleasure, for there was no one who would joust with him. He began to
stay at home and never went beyond his wife's bower-chamber, but sat
and delighted in playing chess, or hearing the bards of the court sing
songs of glamour and wizardry, or tell him tales of ancient warriors
and lovers, long since dead.

The whole court marvelled at his slothfulness as time passed and he

changed not. He gave up the friendship of his nobles, and went not
hunting or hawking; and found no pleasure but in the company of his
wife, whom he dearly loved.

Men began to scoff and jeer at his name over their cups in hall, or as
they rode with hawk on fist to the hunting, or as they tilted in the
lists. And the lawless lords upon the marches of the land began to stir
and to dare, and when none came to punish them, their plunderings and
oppressions grew.

Soon these things came to the ears of the old King Erbin, and great
heaviness was upon him. And he called the Lady Enid to him one day, and
with stern sorrow in his eyes spoke thus:

'Fair woman, is it thou that hast turned my son's spirit into water? Is
it thy love that hath made his name a byword among those who should
love him because he is not as he once was--a man no one could meet in
arms and overcome? Is it thou that hath sunk him in slothfulness, so
that the wolfish lords and tyrant barons upon his marchlands begin to
creep out of their castleholds, and tear and maim his people and wrest
from them and him broad lands and fertile fields?'

'Nay, lord, nay,' said Enid, and he knew from the tears in her brave
eyes that she spoke the truth. 'It is not I, by my confession unto
Heaven! I know not what hath come to my dear lord. But there is nothing
more hateful to me than his unknightly sloth! And I know not what I may
do. For it is not harder, lord, to know what men say of my dear
husband, than to have to tell him, and see the shame in the eyes of him
I love.'

And Enid went away weeping sorely.

The next morning, when Enid awoke from sleep, she sat up and looked at
Geraint sleeping. The sun was shining through the windows, and lay upon
her husband. And she gazed upon his marvellous beauty, and the great
muscles of his arms and breast, and tears filled her eyes as she leaned
over him.

'Alas,' she said half aloud, 'am I the cause that this strength, this
noble and manly beauty have all lost the fame they once enjoyed? Am I
the cause that he hath sunk in sloth, and men scoff at his name and his
strength?'

And the words were heard by Geraint, and he felt the scalding tears
fall upon his breast, and he lay appearing to be asleep, yet he was
awake. A great rage burned in him, so that for some moments he knew not
what to do or say.

Then he opened his eyes as if he had heard and felt nothing, and in his
eyes was a hard gleam. He rose and swiftly dressed, and called his
squire.

'Go,' he said to the man, 'prepare my destrier, and get old armour and
a shield with no device thereon, old and rusty. And say naught to
none.'

'And do thou,' he said to his wife, 'rise and apparel thyself, and
cause thy horse to be prepared, and do thou wear the oldest riding-robe
thou hast. And thou wilt come with me.'

So Enid arose and clothed herself in her meanest garments.

Then Geraint went to his father and said, 'Sir, I am going upon a quest
into the land of Logres, and I do not know when I may return. Do thou
therefore keep our kingdom till I return.'

'I will do so, my son,' said Erbin, 'but thou art not strong enough to
go through the land of Logres alone. Wilt thou not have a company with
thee?'

'But one person shall go with me,' said Geraint, 'and that is a woman.
Farewell.'

Then he put on the old and rusty suit of armour, and took the shield
with no device, and a sword and a lance, and then mounting his horse he
took his way out of the town. And Enid went before him on her palfrey,
marvelling what all this might mean.

Geraint called unto her and said sternly:

'Go thou and ride a long way before me. And whatever ye see or hear
concerning me, say naught, and turn not back. And unless I speak to
thee, speak not thou to me.'

All day they rode thus, and deeper and deeper they sank into a desolate
land, where huge rocks jutted from the starved soil, and there was no
sound or sight of living thing, except it was the wolf looking from his
lair beneath a stone, or the breaking of a branch, as the brown bear on
a distant hillslope tore at a tree to get a honeycomb, and blinked down
at them, marvelling, maybe, to see a knight and a lady in his desolate
domain.

When, late in the afternoon, their long shadows marched before them
down a broad green road which they had struck upon, Enid's heart
suddenly lifted to see the white walls and roofs of what looked like a
rich town; for she knew not what was in her lord's mind, and feared
lest his strange anger should push him to go on through the night, and
so become a prey to robbers or wild animals. But she marvelled that
there was no sight or sound of people; no carters or travellers going
to or coming from the city, and no smoke rose above the housetops.

When they came nearer, she saw the wall of the gate was broken down,
and that along the broad road beyond the wall the grass waved high
across the street, and the little wooden booths and cabins beside the
road were rotting and decayed. Anon they rode into a broad market-place
or forum, where white buildings rose above them, the windows gaping,
grass growing on the roofs or in the crannies of the walls, and the
doorways choked with bushes. And out of the broad hallway of the
basilica she saw the grey form of a wolf walk and slink away in the
shadows.

With a sinking heart she knew that this was one of the fair cities
which the Romans had built, and when they had left Britain this town
had been deserted and left desolate, to become a place where the wolf
and the bear made their lairs, where the beaver built his dam in the
stream beneath the wall of the palace, and where robbers and wild men
lay hid, or the small people of the hills came and made their magic and
weaved their spells, with the aid of the spirits haunting the desolate
hearths of the Romans.

And as Enid checked her horse and waited for Geraint to come up, that
she might ask him whether it was his pleasure to pass the night there,
she saw, down the wide street before her, the forms of men, creeping
and gathering in the gloom. Then, fearing lest they should fall upon
her husband before he was aware of them, she turned her horse and rode
towards him and said:

'Lord, dost thou see the wild men which gather in the shadows there in
the street before us, as if they would attack thee?'

Geraint lifted up his angry eyes to hers:

'Thou wert bid to keep silent,' he said, 'whatsoever thou hast seen or
heard. Why dost thou warn one whom thou dost despise?'

Even as he spoke, from the broken houses through which they had crept
to assail the single knight, dashed ten robbers, naked of feet, evil of
look, clothed in skins. One leaped at the knight with a knife in his
hand, to be cut down, halfway in his spring, by Sir Geraint's fierce
sword-stroke. Then, while Enid stood apart, terror in her heart, prayer
on her lips, she saw him as if he were in the midst of a pack of
tearing wolves, and in the silent street with its twilight was the
sudden clash of steel, the howls and cries of wounded men.

Then she was aware that six lay quiet on the road, and the remaining
four broke suddenly away towards the shelter of the houses. But two of
these Sir Geraint pursued, and cut down before they could reach cover.

He rejoined her in silence and sought for a place of lodging; and in a

small villa they found a room with but one door. Here they supped from
the scrip of food and the bottle of wine which Enid had brought, and
there they slept that night.

On the morrow they pursued their way, and
of the ruined city until they reached the
brightness of the high noon the green and
were sweet, and the sound of tiny streams
refreshing.
followed the green road out
forest. And in the heat and
coolness of the forestways
hidden beneath the leaves was

Then they came upon a plain where was a village surrounded by a bank of
earth, on which was a palisade. And there was a wailing and weeping
coming from between the little mud-cabins therein; and as they
approached they saw in the middle green four knights in armour and a
crowd of poor frightened folk about them.

As they passed the gate of the village a poor man ran from the group,
and threw himself before Sir Geraint.
'O sir knight,' he cried full piteously, 'if thou art a good knight and
a brave, do thou see justice done here. For these four lords would cut
my father's throat if he say not where his money is hid.'

'Are they his proper lords?' asked Geraint.

'Nay, sir knight,' said the man. 'Our land is Geraint's, and these
lords say that he sleeps all day, and so they will be our masters. And
they do ever oppress us with fine and tax and torture.'

Therewith Sir Geraint rode through the gate of the village and
approached the group. He saw where the four knights stood cruelly
torturing a poor old man whom they had tied to a post, and the sweat
stood upon the peasant's white face, and the fear of death was in his
eyes.

'Lords! lords,' he cried in a spent voice, 'I have no money, for you
did take all I had when you told us our lord Geraint was become a court
fool.'

'Thou miser!' jeered one of the knights, 'that was two months agone,
and thou hast something more by now. Will this loose thy secret,
carrion?'

At the cruel torture the man shrieked aloud, and by reason of the pain
his head sank and he slid down the post in a swoon. And a young woman
rushed forth, threw her arm about the hanging body, and with flashing
eyes turned and defied the knights.

Next moment it would have gone ill with her, but the voice of Sir
Geraint rang out.

'Ho, there, sir knights,' he cried, 'or sir wolves--I know not which ye
are--have ye naught to do but to squeeze poor peasants of mean
savings?'

The knights turned in rage, and laughed and sneered when they saw but
one solitary knight in old and rusty armour.

'Ah, sir scarecrow!' cried one, leaping on his horse, 'I will spit thee
for thy insolence.'

'Knock him down and truss him up with this starveling peasant,' cried
another.

All now had mounted, and the first prepared to run at Sir Geraint, who
backed his horse through the gateway into the open plain. Anon the
first knight came, hurling himself angrily upon him. But deftly Sir
Geraint struck the other's lance aside with his sword, and as the rider
rushed past him, he rose in his stirrups, his blade flashed, and then
sank in the neck of the felon knight, who swayed in his saddle and then
crashed to the ground.

Then the second horseman attacked him furiously, being wroth at the
death of his companion. But Sir Geraint couched his lance, and caught
the other on the edge of his shield, and the spear passed through his
body.
And by good hap also he slew the other two, one with his lance, the
other with his sword on foot.

Enid, full of fear while the fight was raging, felt gladness and sorrow
when she saw how nobly her husband had smitten these torturers with
justice, and she said that of a truth she had been wrong, and that
there was no sloth in his heart, no weakness in the strong arm of her
lord.

Then Sir Geraint took off the armour from each of the four knights and
piled them on their horses, and tied them together, and bade her drive
them before her.

'And do thou go forward some way,' said he sternly, 'and say not one
word to me unless I speak first unto thee.'

As he mounted his horse, the man that had been tortured came forward
with his people and knelt before him, and kissed the mail-clad shoe in
his stirrup, and in rude few words they thanked him tearfully, asking
for his name, so that they could speak of him in their prayers.

'I am called Sir Slothful,' said Sir Geraint, 'and I deserve not your
worship. But, hark ye, if other evil lords come upon these marches and
seek to oppress thee, tell them that though Sir Geraint sleeps now, he
will soon awake and they shall not stand before his vengeance.'

And so he rode on, leaving the poor folks marvelling but happy.

Then in a little while they came upon a highroad, and the lady went on
first, and for all his anger, Geraint was sorry to see how much trouble
Enid had in driving the four horses before her, yet how patient she
was.

Soon they beheld a wide valley below them, the fairest and richest in
homesteads and farms that they had yet seen. A river ran through the
middle of it, and the road on which they passed ran down to a bridge
over the river, beyond which was a castle and a walled town.

Sir Geraint took the road towards the bridge, and soon a knight came
cantering towards them.

'Fair sir,' said Sir Geraint, 'canst thou tell me who is the owner of
this fair valley and that walled city?'

'Of a truth,' said the other, 'these are the lands of King Griffith,
whom men call the Little King. He holds them of King Erbin, whose son,
that was so famous, men say has become a worthless court dandy.'

'I thank thee for thy words, fair sir,' said Geraint, and would pass
on.

'I would counsel thee not to attempt to cross the bridge,' said the
knight, 'unless thou dost intend to fight the little king. For armed
strangers he will not suffer to pass, and I doubt me if thy arms are of
much use to thee.'

And the knight smiled at the rusty arms and shield of Sir Geraint.

'Nevertheless,' said Sir Geraint, 'though my arms are old, I will go

this way.'

'If thou dost so,' said the knight, 'thou wilt meet with shame and
defeat. For the little king is a man of giant strength.'

But Sir Geraint passed down towards the bridge and crossed it, and went
along the road beyond towards the town. Presently Sir Geraint heard the
sound of hoofs behind him, and looking round he saw a knight following
him upon a great black horse, tall and stately and stepping proudly.
The knight was the smallest that Sir Geraint had ever seen.

When the stranger had come up to him, he said:

'Tell me, fair sir, is it by presumption or by ignorance that thou

comest armed along this road?'

'I knew not that in any of the lands of King Erbin, a peaceful man,
though he be armed, could not go without hindrance,' replied Sir
Geraint.

'That was so,' replied the knight, 'when King Erbin's son Sir Geraint
was a man of prowess, not a soft fool. Then his name alone kept his
borders clean of robber lords and bandit knights; but now that he is
less than naught, I myself must keep my land clean of thieves in rusty
armour that would frighten and oppress poor folk.'

'Nevertheless,' said Sir Geraint, 'I will travel by this road, and ye
hinder me at your peril.'

'Have at thee, then,' said the little knight, and together they spurred
towards each other.

Sir Geraint marvelled to feel how powerful were the lance-strokes of

the little man, while, as for himself, so high was the little knight's
horse and so small was the rider, that he was hardly able to get a good
blow at him. But they jousted until at the third bout the little king's
lance broke short, and then they dismounted, and lashed at each other
with their swords.

At first Sir Geraint thought it was nigh unseemly that one so strong
and tall as himself should have to do with so small a knight; but if he
thought that he had advantage in his longer reach and greater strength
he quickly saw his error.

For the little king was a man of marvellous strength and agility, and
for all Sir Geraint's knowledge and strength, the other's strokes were
so boldly fierce, so quick and powerful, that it was not long ere Sir
Geraint found he had need of great wariness.

Soon their helmets were cracked and their shields dented and carved and
their hauberks in rags, and hardly could they see between the bars of
their vizors for the sweat and blood in their eyes.

Then at last Sir Geraint, enraged that one so small should give him so
much trouble to conquer, gathered all his strength in one blow, so that
the little king was beaten to his knees, and the sword flew from his
hand ten yards away.

'I yield me!' cried King Griffith, 'and never have I fought with so
valiant and strong a knight. Have mercy and spare me, and I will be thy
man.'

'Be it so!' said Sir Geraint, 'but thou hast already sworn to be my
man.'

And he lifted up his vizor and showed his face, whereat the little king
did off his own helm quickly and came and kneeled humbly before him.

'Sir Geraint,' he said, 'forgive me my words concerning thee, but men

told me that ye had forgotten that you had once been so glorious a man,
and were softening to a fool.'

'Nay,' said Sir Geraint, 'they were the fools that said so. And now I
will depart, for I see these marches are in safe keeping in your hands,
fair king.'

But the little king wished Geraint to come to his castle to be rested
and healed of his wounds, and Geraint and Enid went and abode there a
few days. But ever Sir Geraint was cold and stern to his wife, for he
was still angry at her disbelief in him.

Sir Geraint would not stay longer, though his wounds were but half
healed, and on the third day he commanded Enid to mount her horse and
to go before him with the four other horses.

While the sun climbed up the sky they rode through the wilderness, by
tangled woods, deep valleys and quaking marshes, until they reached a
deep dark forest. Suddenly as they rode they heard a great wailing of
distress, and bidding Enid stay, Geraint dashed through the trees
towards the crying, and came out upon a great bare upland, and beside
the wood were a knight, dead in his armour, and two horses, one with a
woman's saddle upon it.

And looking further Geraint saw three small dark shaggy trolls making
swift way up the hill towards a great green mound, and in the arms of
one of them was a damsel, who shrieked as she was borne away.

Fiercely Sir Geraint spurred his horse up the slope, bidding the trolls
to stop, but they only ran with an exceeding great swiftness. But he
pursued them, and when they were within a few steps of a small door in
the hillside, the one dropped the maiden, and the three of them turned
at bay. And the damsel ran shrieking away down the hill.

The trolls had dark thin faces, with curly black hair and fierce black
eyes, and their rage was horrible to see. They were lightly clothed in
skins, and in their arms they held, one a bar of iron, another a great
club, and the third a long sharp stick.

Sir Geraint commended his soul to Heaven, for he knew he was to battle
with evil dwarfs who lived in the hollow hills, and whose strength was
greater than any man's, and whose powers of wizardry were stronger than
Merlin's.

He dashed with his lance at the one with the iron bar, but the
hill-troll slipped away, and brought the great bar with a heavy blow
upon his lance, so that it snapped in twain. Then one leaped like a
wild cat upon the arm that held the rein, but happily Sir Geraint had
drawn his sword, and with one stroke slew him. Then the two others
leaped towards him, but the blows of the bar and club he caught upon
his shield and slew the troll with the club.

Ere Sir Geraint could draw his sword back from this blow, he felt his
horse fall under him, for the dwarf with the iron bar had with one blow
broken the beast's back. Quickly avoiding the horse, Sir Geraint dashed
at the dwarf, who ran towards the hole in the hill, but ere he could
reach it Sir Geraint gave him a blow on the crown of his head, so
fierce and hard, that the skull was split to the shoulders.

So then Sir Geraint turned and walked slowly down the hill, for he was
dazed, and his old wounds had broken afresh. But he came to where Enid
stood comforting the damsel mourning over the dead knight, and when he
was there, straightway he fell down lifeless.

Enid shrieked with the anguish of the thought that he was dead, and
came and knelt beside him and undid his helm and kissed him many times.
And the sound of her wailing reached an earl named Madoc, who was
passing with a company along the road from a plundering expedition, and
he came and took up Geraint and the dead knight, and laid them in the
hollow of their shields, and with the damsels took them to his castle a
mile along the road.

Now the earl was a tyrant and a robber, and had done much evil on the
borderlands of Geraint, in burning, plundering and slaying, since he
had heard that Geraint was become soft and foolish. And he had
recognised Sir Geraint while he lay in the swoon, and rejoiced that now
he was like to die.

As he rode along he thought that if he could prevail upon the Lady Enid
to wed him, he might get much land with her, as the widow of the dead
Sir Geraint, future King of Cornwall. And he determined to make her
marry him.

When, therefore, he and his host had reached his castle, he ordered the
dead knight to be buried, but Sir Geraint he commanded to be laid in
his shield on a litter-couch in front of the high table in the hall. So
that Sir Geraint should die, he commanded that no leech should be sent
for.

While his knights and men-at-arms sat down to dine, Earl Madoc came to
Enid and begged her to make good cheer. But, thinking to gain more from
secrecy, he did not tell her that he knew who she was, nor did he show
her that he knew who was her lord.

'Take off thy travelling clothes, fair lady,' he said, 'and weep not
for this dead knight.'

'I will not,' she said, and hung over Geraint, chafing his hands and
looking earnestly into his pallid face.

'Ah, lady,' the earl said, 'be not so sorrowful. For he is now dead,
and therefore ye need no longer mourn. But as ye are beautiful, I would
wed thee, and thou shalt have this earldom and myself and much wealth
and all these men to serve thee.'

'I tell you I will rather die with my dead lord, if indeed he be dead,'
cried Enid, 'than live in wealth with you or any one.'
'Come, then,' said the earl, 'and at least take food with me.'

'Nay, I will not,' said Enid, 'and never more will I eat or be joyful
in life.'

'But, by Heaven, thou shalt,' said Madoc, furious at her resistance to

his will.

And he drew her from beside the litter, and forced her to come to the
table where his knights sat eating, and commanded her to eat.

'I will not eat,' she cried, straining from his hold towards where
Geraint lay, 'unless my dear lord shall eat also.'

'But he is dead already, thou mad woman,' cried the earl. 'Drink this
goblet of wine,' he commanded, 'and thou wilt change thy mind.'

'I will not drink again until my dear lord drink also,' said Enid, and
strove to free herself from the grasp of the earl.

'Now, by Heaven!' said Madoc wrathfully, 'I have tried gentle means
with thee. Let this teach thee that I am not to be baulked of my will.'

With that he gave her a violent blow on the ear, and tried to drag her
away out of the hall. And Enid shrieked and wept and cried for help,
but none of the knights that sat there dared to oppose their lord.

But suddenly men started up from their seats in terror to see the
corpse of Geraint rise from the hollow of the shield. Enid's cries had
roused him from his swoon, and his hand as he raised himself felt the
hilt of the sword beside him.

He leaped from the litter, and, drawing his sword, he ran towards the
earl, who by now had almost dragged Enid to the door. Raising the
sword, Geraint struck him with so fierce a blow that he cleft his head
in twain.

Then, for terror at seeing what they thought was a dead man rise up to
slay them, the knights ran from the hall and left Geraint and Enid
alone.

Enid threw her arms about Geraint, her face bright with happiness.

'My dear lord, I thank God thou art not dead, as this man said thou
wert. And I pray thy forgiveness for doubting that thou hadst forgotten
thy manhood, for of a truth none is so brave, so good as thou art.'

Geraint kissed his wife, smiling wanly the while.

'Sorry I am, my dear wife,' he said, 'that I was swooning when thou
hadst need of me. And as for any doubts thou hadst of me, why, let us
both forget them from this time forth. And now we must away, ere this
lord's men recover their fright and pursue us.'

Enid led him instantly to the stalls where she had seen the horses had
been led, and Geraint took the spear and the horse of the knight whom
the trolls had slain, and, when he had mounted, he took up Enid from
the ground and placed her before him.
Thus they rode out of the castle, and away as rapidly as they could.
And now that they were reconciled, much joyful and loving talk was
between them.

But night was coming on, and Geraint was weak from his wounds and loss
of blood, and Enid was full of trouble for the pain her husband
suffered. She prayed fervently that soon they might reach a town where
she could obtain help for him.

Suddenly she heard far away in the distance the tramp of horses, and
Enid could have wept for sorrow. But she kept her face calm, though her
lips trembled, Geraint also heard the beat of the hoofs, and turning in
his saddle he looked up, and saw on the skyline of the narrow road the
glint of spears between them and the sky.

'Dear wife,' he said, with a faint brave smile, 'I hear some one
following us. I will put thee in hiding behind this thicket, and should
they slay me, do thou make thy way homeward to my father Erbin, and bid
him avenge my death.'

'O my dear Geraint!' said Enid, sobbing, for all her bravery, as she
thought that he would surely be slain, and that, after all their
trouble, they were not to be allowed to enjoy the happiness of their
reconciliation. 'I would liefer die with thee, my dear, dear lord. Let
them kill us both, if it is to be.'

'Nay, dear wife,' said Geraint, 'I would not have thee slain. Revenge
my death if they slay me.'

So, with many lingering kisses, he set her down upon the road, and saw
her hide in the thickets.

By now the gloom of evening had settled upon them, and the sound of
trampling horses had rapidly approached. And painfully, by reason of
his stiff wounds, Geraint dressed his armour as best he could, and laid
spear in rest, and drew his shield before him, and so waited in the
dark road.

He heard a single knight riding before the others, and soon saw his
figure issue from the gloom with couched lance. And Sir Geraint made
him ready also, resolved to sell his life dearly at the last.

But as they began to spur their horses, there came the voice of Enid
from the hedgerow beside them. And she cried out piteously in the dark:

'O chieftain, whoever thou art, what renown wilt thou gain by slaying a
dead man?'

The stranger stopped his horse, and called out:

'O Heaven, is it my lord, Sir Geraint?'

'Yes, in truth,' said Enid, 'and who art thou?'

'I am the little king!' said the other, and rode swiftly towards Sir
Geraint. Then he leaped from his horse and came to the stirrup of his
chief.

'My lord,' he said, 'I learned that thou wert in trouble, and came to
see if I could aid thee.'

And Enid ran forward with joy at hearing this, and welcomed the little
king, and told him in what a hard pass was Sir Geraint.

'My lord and my lady,' said Griffith, 'I thank Heaven sincerely for the
favour that I come to you in your need. I learned of thy fight with the
trolls and of thy slaying of Earl Madoc, and that thou wert wounded.
Therefore I rode on to find thee.'

'I thank thee heartily,' said Sir Geraint, 'and my dear wife also
thanks thee. For of a truth I am spent, and must needs get me rest and
a leech for my wounds.'

'Then come at once with me,' said the little king, and after he had
helped Enid to her place before Geraint, he leaped on his own horse.

'Now thou shalt go to the hall of a son-in-law of my sister which is

near here,' said King Griffith, 'and thou shalt have the best medical
advice in the kingdom.'

At the hall of the baron, whose name was Tewder, and a most knightly
and gentle lord, Sir Geraint and the Lady Enid were received with great
welcome and hospitality. Physicians were sent for, and they attended
Geraint day by day until he was quite well again.

The fame of his adventures began to spread along the borders of his
kingdom, and at length reached his own court. And the robber lords and
brigands of the marches, hearing of his deeds, ceased their evil-doing
and made haste to hide from his wrath. Also his father Erbin and the
host at his court repented of their hard thoughts and sneers concerning
him, and praised the strength of his arm, the gentleness of his
courtesy, and his justice and mercy.

When Sir Geraint and the Lady Enid returned home, all the people
gathered to welcome them. And thenceforth he reigned prosperously, and
his warlike fame and splendour lasted with renown and honour and love,
both to him and to the Lady Enid, from that time forth.

VII

HOW SIR PERCEVAL WAS TAUGHT CHIVALRY, AND ENDED THE EVIL WROUGHT BY SIR
BALIN'S DOLOROUS STROKE

It befell upon a time when King Arthur was Pendragon, or overlord of

the island of Britain, that Earl Evroc held an earldom of large
dominion in the north under King Uriens. And the earl had seven sons,
the last being but a child still at play about his mother's chair as
she sat with her maidens in the bower.

Lord Evroc was a valiant and a mighty warrior, ever battling against
the hated pagans, when their bands of blue-eyed fierce fighters landed
on his coasts. And when peace was on the land, he went about on
errantry, jousting in tournaments and fighting champions.
His six elder sons did likewise, and all were famed for their knightly
prowess.

But the mother sat at home, sad of mood. For she hated war, and would
rather have had her lord and her six tall sons about her in the home.
And in her heart she resolved that she would plead with Evroc to let
her have her little son Perceval to be a clerk or a learned bard, so
that he should stay at home with her and run no risk of death.

The sorrow she was ever dreading smote her at length. For a messenger
came one day, saying that Earl Evroc her lord had been slain at
Bamborough, in a mighty mel�e between some of the best and most valiant
knights of Logres and Alban, and two tall sons with him.

As the years passed, and her little son began to run, three black days
came within a little of each other, for on these days messengers came
with the sad news of the death of her other boys. One of them had been
done to death by an evil troll on the lonely wastes by the Roman wall,
two others were slain by the shores of Humber, repelling a horde of
fair-haired Saxon raiders, and the other was killed at a ford, where he
had kept at bay six bandit knights that would have pursued and slain
his wounded lord.

Then, in her grief, the widow dame resolved that she would fly with her
little son, and make a home for him in some wilderness, where never
sounds or sights of war or death would come, where knights would be
unknown, and no one would speak to him of arms and battles. And thus
did she do, and she left the hall where she had lived, and removed to
the deserts and wastes of the wilderness, and took with her only her
women, and a few boys and spiritless men, too old or feeble to fight,
or to think of fighting.

Thus she reared the only son left to her, teaching him all manner of
nobleness in thought and action and in learning, but never suffering
him to see a weapon, nor to hear a tale of war or knightly prowess.

He grew up loving all noble things, gentle of speech and bearing, but
quick to anger at evil or mean actions, merciful of weak things, and
full of pity and tenderness.

Yet was he also very strong of body, fleet of foot, quick of eye and
hand. Daily he went to divert himself in the great dark forest that
climbed the high mountains beside his home, or he roamed the wide
rolling moors. And he practised much with the throwing of stones and
sticks, so that with a stick he could hit a small mark at a great
distance, and with a sharp stone he could cut down a sapling at one
blow.

One day he saw a flock of his mother's goats in the forest, and near
them stood two hinds. The boy wondered greatly to see the two deer
which had no horns, while the goats had two each; and he thought they
had long run wild, and had lost their horns in that way. He thought he
would please his mother if he caught them, so that they should not
escape again. And by his great activity and swiftness he ran the two
deer down till they were spent, and then he took them and shut them up
in the goat-house in the forest.

Going home, he told his mother and her servants what he had done, and
they went to see, and marvelled that he could catch such fleet
creatures as the wild red deer.

Once he overheard his mother say that she yearned for fresh venison,
but that the hunter who was attached to her house was lying wounded by
a wild boar. Always Perceval had wondered what the little dark man did
whom they called the hunter, who was always so secret, so that Perceval
could never see where he went or when he returned from the forest.

So he went to the hut where Tod the hunter lay sick, and charged him by
the love and worship he bore to the countess, that he should tell him
how he could obtain fresh venison. And the dwarf told him.

Then Perceval took a few sticks of stout wood, with points hardened by
fire, and went into the forest as Tod had told him, and seeing a deer
he hurled a stick at it and slew it. And then he brought it home.

The countess was greatly wroth that Tod had taught him how to slay, and
she said that never more should the dwarf serve her. And Tod wept, but
when he was well again the countess would not suffer him to stay, but
said he should leave the hall and never come there again.

She commanded Perceval never to slay any more living things, and the
lad promised. But hard was it to keep his word, when he was in the
forest and saw the wild things passing through the brakes.

Once, as he strayed deep in the wood, he came upon a wide glade or

laund, with two green hillocks in the middle thereof. And feeding upon
the grass was a great buck, and it had a silver ring round its neck.
Perceval wondered at this beast being thus adorned, and went up to it
to stroke it.

But the buck was fierce, and would have gored him with its horns, but
Perceval seized them, and after a great struggle he threw the animal,
and held it down, and in his wrath he would have slain it with a sharp
stick. With that a swarm of little angry trolls poured from the hollow
hillocks with great cries, and seizing Perceval would have hurt him.

But suddenly Tod ran among them, and commanded them to release him. And
in the end Tod, who came himself of the troll folk, made the little
people pass the words of peace and friendship with Perceval, and ever
after that the boy went with the trolls, and sported with them in
wrestling, running and other games; and he learned many things of great
wisdom from them concerning the secrets of the earth and air and the
wind, and the spirits that haunt waste places and standing stones, and
how to put to naught the power of witches and wizards.

Tod ever bade them treat the young lord with reverence. 'For this is he
who shall do great deeds,' he said. 'He shall be a stainless knight,
who shall gain from evil the greatest strength, and, if God wills, he
shall beat down the evil powers in this land.'

But the lad knew not what he meant, though he was very content to have
the trolls for his friends.

One day Perceval was in the forest far up the mountain, and he looked
over the blue distance far below across the moor, and saw a man riding
on a wide road which he had never noticed before. And the man rode very
fast, and as he went the sun seemed to flash from him as if he was
clothed in glass. Perceval wondered what he was, and resolved to go
across the moor to the road he had seen.

When he reached the road he found it was very broad, and banked on
either side, and went straight as the flight of a wild duck right
across the moor, and never swerved by the hills or pools, but went over
everything in its way. And as he stood marvelling what mighty men had
builded it, he heard a strange rattling sound behind him, and, turning,
he saw three men on horseback, and the sun shone from them as he had
seen it shine from the first horseman.

The foremost checked his horse beside Perceval, and said:

'Tell me, good soul, sawest thou a knight pass this way either this day
or yesterday?'

'I know not what a knight is,' answered Perceval.

'Such a one as I,' said the horseman, smiling good-naturedly, for it

was Sir Owen, one of King Arthur's knights.

'If ye will tell me what I ask, I will tell you,' said Perceval.

[Illustration: YOUNG PERCEVAL QUESTIONS SIR OWEN]

'I will answer gladly,' said Sir Owen, smiling, yet wondering at the
fearless and noble air of this youth in so wild a waste.

'What is this?' asked Perceval, and pulled the skirt of the hauberk.

'It is a dress made of rings of steel,' answered Sir Owen, 'which I put
on to turn the swords of those I fight.'

'And what is it to fight?'

'What strange youth art thou?' asked Sir Owen. 'To fight is to do
battle with spears or swords, so that you would slay the man that would
slay you.'

'Ah, as I would have slain the buck that would have gored me,' said
Perceval, nodding his head.

Many other questions the youth asked eagerly, as to the arms they bore
and the accoutrements and their uses. And at length he said:

'Sirs, I thank you for your courtesy. Go forward swiftly, for I saw
such a one as ye go by here but two hours ago, and he flashed in the
sun as he rode swiftly. And now I will be as one of you.'

Perceval went swiftly back to his mother's house and found her among
her women.

'Mother,' he said, 'I have seen a great and wonderful sight on the
great road across the moor.'

'Ah, my dear son, what was that?' she asked.

'They were three honourable knights,' he said. 'And, mother, I will be

a knight also.'
With a great shriek his mother swooned away, and the women turned him
from the room and said he had slain his mother.

Much grieved was Perceval that he had hurt his mother, and so, taking
his store of pointed sticks, he went off into the forest, and strayed
there a long time, torn between his love for his mother, and the
strange restlessness which the sight of the three warriors had caused
in him.

As he wandered, troubled, his quick ear caught the clang of metal,

though he knew not what it was. And swiftly he ran towards the sound a
long way, until he came into a clearing, and found two knights on
horseback doing mighty battle. One bore a red shield and the other a
green one.

He looked eagerly at this strange sight, and the blood sang in his
veins. And then he saw that the green knight was of slighter frame than
the other, and was weakening before the strokes of the red knight.

Full of anger at the sight, Perceval launched one of his hard-wood

javelins at the red knight. With such force did it go, and so true was
the aim, that it pierced the coif of the knight, and entered between
the neck and the head, and the red knight swayed and then clattered to
the ground, dead.

The green knight came and thanked Perceval for thus saving his life.

'Are knights then so easy to slay?' asked the lad. 'Methought that none
might pierce through the hauberk of a knight, and I sorrow that I have
slain him, not thinking what I did.'

'He was a full evil knight,' said the other, 'and deserved death richly
for his many villainies and oppressions of weak orphans and friendless
widows.'

The knight took the body of the dead knight to be buried in a chapel,
and told Perceval he could have the horse. But the lad would not have
it, though he longed greatly to possess it, and the green knight took
it with him.

Then Perceval went home, sad, yet wild with wonder at what he had done.
He found his mother well again, but very sorrowful. And for fear of
giving her pain, he did not tell her of the knight he had slain.

She called him to her, and said:

'Dear son of mine, it seems I may not keep thy fate from thee. The
blood of thy warlike generations before thee may not be quenched,
whatever fond and foolish plans I made to keep thee from knowledge of
battle and weapons. Dear son, dost thou desire to ride forth into the
world?'

'Yes, mother, of a truth,' said Perceval. 'I shall not be happy more
until I go.'

'Go forward, then,' she said weeping, 'and God be with thee, my dear
son. And as I have no man who is strong of his hands, thou must go
alone, yet will I give thee gold for thy proper garnishing and lodging.
But make all the haste ye may to the court of King Arthur at
Caerleon-upon-Usk, for there are the best and the boldest and the most
worshipful of knights. And the king will give thee knighthood. And
wherever thou seest a church, go kneel and repeat thy prayers therein;
and if thou hearest an outcry, go quickly and defend the weak, the poor
and the unprotected. And be ever tender towards women, my son, and
remember that thy mother loves thee and prays for thy stay in health
and life. And come thou to see me within a little while.'

And he thanked her, saying he would do naught that should shame her,
but would remember all the nobleness of her teaching; also, that he
would return to see her within a little while.

Perceval went to the stable and took a bony, piebald horse, which
seemed the strongest, and he pressed a pallet of straw into the
semblance of a saddle, and with pieces of leather and wood he imitated
the trappings he had seen on the horses of the knights.

Then, after taking leave of his mother, he rode forth, sad at first for
leaving her in sorrow and tears, but afterwards glad that now he was
going into the world to become a knight. And for armour he had a rough
jerkin, old and moth-eaten, and for arms he had a handful of
sharp-pointed sticks of hard wood.

He journeyed southwards two days and two nights along the great
straight road, which went through the deep dark forests, over desert
places and over the high mountains. And all that time he ate nothing
but wild berries, for he had not thought to bring food with him.

While he was yet but a little way from the court of King Arthur, a
stranger knight, tall and big, in black armour, had ridden into the
hall where sat Gwenevere the queen, with a few of the younger knights
and her women. The page of the chamber was serving the queen with wine
in a golden goblet richly wrought, which Lancelot had taken from a
knight whom he had lately slain.

The stranger knight had alighted before the chair of Gwenevere, and all
had seen that full of rage and pride was his look. And he caught sight
of the goblet in the hand of Gwenevere, and he snatched it from her,
spilling the wine over her dress and dashing it even into her face.

'Now am I well lighted here,' he said, 'for this is the very goblet
which thy robber knight Sir Lancelot reaved from my brother, Sir
Wilder. And if any of you knights here desire to wrest this goblet from
me, or to avenge the insult I have done your queen, let him come to the
meadow beside the ford, and I will slay him, ay, if it be that traitor
Sir Lancelot himself.'

All the young knights hung their heads as he mounted his horse and
insolently rode out of the hall; for it seemed to them that no one
would have done so daring an outrage unless, like Sir Garlon whom Balin
slew, he fought with evil magic, so that the strength and prowess of
the mightiest knight would be put to naught.

Then Perceval entered the hall, and at sight of him upon his rough
piebald horse, with its uncouth trappings, and the old and mouldy
jerkin upon the youth, the knights and others broke forth in excessive
laughter, as much at the sight as to cover their discomfiture and fear
of the knight who had just gone.
But Perceval took no note of their laughter, but rode up the hall to
where Sir Kay the seneschal stood, wrathful at the outrage on the queen
which he had not dared to avenge instantly. And Perceval looked about
and saw a knight more richly dressed than the others, and, turning to
Kay, he said:

'Tell me, tall man, is that King Arthur yonder?'

'What wouldst thou with Arthur, knave?' asked Kay angrily.

'My mother told me to seek King Arthur,' responded Perceval,' and he

will give me the honour of knighthood.'

'By my faith, thou farmer's churl,' said Kay, 'thou art richly equipped
indeed with horse and arms to have that honour.'

Thereupon the others shouted with laughter, and commenced to throw

sticks at Perceval, or the bones left by the dogs upon the floor.

Then a dwarf pressed forward between the laughing crowd and saluted
Perceval. And the lad rejoiced to recognise him. It was Tod, who had
been his friend among the trolls of the mountains, and with Tod was his
wife. They had come to the court of Arthur, and had craved harbourage
there, and the king of his kindness had granted it them. But by reason
of the prophecy which the trolls knew of concerning the great renown
which Perceval was to gain, they had been dumb of speech since they had
last seen the young man.

And now at sight of him their tongues were loosed, and they ran and
kissed his feet, and cried together:

'The welcome of Heaven be unto thee, goodly Perceval, son of Earl

Evroc! Chief of warriors art thou, and stainless flower of knighthood!'

'Truly,' said Kay wrathfully, 'thou art an ill-conditioned pair, to

remain a year mute at King Arthur's court, and now before the face of
goodly knights to acclaim this churl with the mouldy coat, chief of
warriors and flower of knighthood!'

In his rage he beat Tod the dwarf such a blow, that the poor troll fell
senseless to the ground; and the troll-wife he kicked, so that she was
dashed among the dogs, who bit her.

'Tall man,' said Perceval, and men marvelled to see the high look on
his face and the cold scorn in his eyes, 'I will have vengeance on thee
for the insult and ill-treatment thou hast done these two poor dwarfs.
But tell me now which of these knights is Arthur?'

'Away with thee,' shouted Kay, enraged. 'If thou wouldst see Arthur, go
to the knight with the goblet who waits for thee at the ford, and take
the goblet from him, and slay him. Then when thou comest back clad in
his armour, we will speak further with thee.'

'I will do so, angry man,' said Perceval, and amid the shouts of
laughter and the sneers of the crowd he turned his horse's head and
rode out of the hall.

Going to the meadow beside the ford, he saw a knight riding up and
down, proud of his strength and valour.

'Tell me, fellow,' said the knight, who bore on his shield the device
of a black tower on a red field, 'didst thou see any one coming after
me from the court yonder?'

'The tall man that was there,' said Perceval, 'bade me to come to thee,
and I am to overthrow thee and to take from thee the goblet, and as for
thy horse and thy arms I am to have them myself.'

'Silence, prating fool!' shouted the knight, 'go back to the court and
tell Arthur to come himself, or to send a champion to fight me, or I
will not wait, and great will be his shame.'

'By my faith,' said Perceval, 'whether thou art willing or unwilling,

it is I that will have thy horse and arms and the goblet.'

And he prepared to throw his javelin-sticks.

In a proud rage the knight ran at him with uplifted lance, and struck
him a violent blow with the shaft between the neck and the shoulder.

'Haha! lad,' said Perceval, and laughed, 'that was as shrewd a blow as
any the trolls gave me when they taught me their staff play; but now I
will play with thee in my own way.'

Thereupon he threw one of the pointed sticks at the knight, with such
force and with such sureness of aim that it went in between the bars of
his vizor and pierced the eye, and entered into the brain of the
knight. Whereupon he fell from his horse lifeless.

And it befell that a little while after Perceval had left the court,
Sir Owen came in, and was told of the shameful wrong put upon the queen
by the unknown knight, and how Sir Kay had sent a mad boy after the
knight to slay him.

'Now, by my troth,' said Owen to Kay, 'thou wert a fool to send that
foolish lad after the strong knight. For either he will be overthrown,
and the knight will think he is truly the champion sent on behalf of
the queen, whom the knight so evilly treated, and so an eternal
disgrace will light on Arthur and all of us; or, if he is slain, the
disgrace will be the same, and the mad young man's life will be thrown
away.'

Thereupon Sir Owen made all haste, and rode swiftly to the meadow,
armed; but when he reached the place, he found a youth in a mouldy old
jerkin pulling a knight in rich armour up and down the grass.

'By'r Lady's name!' cried Sir Owen, 'what do you there, tall youth?'

'This iron coat,' said Perceval, stopping as he spoke, 'will never come
off him.'

Owen alighted marvelling, and went to the knight and found that he was
dead, and saw the manner of his death, and marvelled the more. He
unloosed the knight's armour and gave it to Perceval.

'Here, good soul,' he said, 'are horse and armour for thee. And well
hast thou merited them, since thou unarmed hast slain so powerful a
knight as this.'

He helped Perceval put on his armour, and when he was fully dressed
Owen marvelled to see how nobly he bore himself.

'Now come you with me,' he said, 'and we will go to King Arthur, and
you shall have the honour of knighthood from the good king himself.'

'Nay, that will I not,' said Perceval, and mounted the dead knight's
horse. 'But take thou this goblet to the queen, and tell the king that
wherever I be, I will be his man, to slay all oppressors, to succour
the weak and the wronged, and to aid him in whatever knightly
enterprise he may desire my aid. But I will not enter his court until I
have encountered the tall man there who sent me hither, to revenge upon
him the wrong he did to my friends, Tod the dwarf and his wife.'

And with this Perceval said farewell and rode off. Sir Owen went back
to the court, and told Arthur and the queen all these things. Men
marvelled who the strange young man could be, and many sought Tod and
his wife to question them, but nowhere could they be found.

Greater still was their marvelling when, as the weeks passed, knights
came and yielded themselves to King Arthur, saying that Perceval had
overcome them in knightly combat, and had given them their lives on
condition that they went to King Arthur's court and yielded themselves
up to him and his mercy. The king and all his court reproved Kay for
his churlish manner, and for his having driven so splendid a youth from
the court.

And Perceval rode ever forward. He came one day towards the gloaming to
a lonely wood in the fenlands, where the wind shivered like the breath
of ghosts among the leaves, and there was not a track or trace of man
or beast, and no birds piped. And soon, as the wind shrilled, and the
rain began to beat down like thin grey spears, he saw a vast castle
rise before him, and when he made his way towards the gate, he found
the way so overgrown with weeds that hardly could he push his horse
between them. And on the very threshold the grass grew thick and high,
as if the door had not been opened for a hundred winters.

He battered on the door with the butt of his lance; and long he waited,
while the cold rain drove and the wind snarled.

After a little while a voice came from above the gateway, and glancing
up he saw a damsel looking through an opening in the battlements.

'Choose thou, chieftain,' said she, 'whether I shall open unto thee
without announcing thee, or whether I shall tell her that rules here
that thou wishest to enter.'

'Say that I am here,' said Perceval. 'And if she will not house me for
the night, then will I go forward.'

Soon the maiden came back and opened the door for him, and his horse
she led into the stable, where she fed it; and Perceval she brought
into the hall. When he came into the light and looked at the girl, he
thought he had never seen another of so fair an aspect.

She had an old garment of satin upon her, which had once been rich, but
was now frayed and tattered; and fairer was her skin than the bloom of
the rose, and her hair and eyebrows were like the sloe for blackness,
and on her cheeks was the redness of poppies. Her eyes were like deep
pools in a dark wood. And he thought that, though she was very
beautiful, there was great arrogance in her look and cruelty in her
lips.

When Perceval went towards the dais of the hall he saw a tall and
stately lady in the high seat, old of years and reverend of aspect,
though sorrowful. Several handmaids sat beside her, sad of face and
tattered of dress. All welcomed him right kindly. Then they sat at
meat, and gave the young man the best cheer that they had.

When it was time to go to rest, the lady said:

'It were well for you, chieftain, that you sleep not in this castle.'

'Wherefore,' said Perceval, 'seeing that the storm beats wildly without
and there is room here for many?'

'For this reason,' said the lady, 'that I would not that so handsome
and kindly a youth as you seem should suffer the doom which must light
upon this my castle at dawn.'

'Tell me,' said Perceval, 'what is this castle, and what is the doom
you speak of?'

'This castle is named the Castle of Weeds,' replied the lady, 'and the
lands about it for many miles belonged to my husband, the Earl Mador.
And he was a bold and very valiant man; and he slew Maelond, the eldest
son of Domna, the great witch of Glaive, and ever thereafter things
were not well with him. For she and her eight evil sisters laid a curse
upon him. And that in spite of this, that he slew Maelond in fair
fight, for all that he was a false and powerful wizard. And Domna came
to my husband, when he was worn with a strange sickness, and as he lay
on his deathbed. And she said she should revenge herself upon his
daughter and mine, this maiden here, when she shall be full twice nine
years of age. And she will be of that age ere dawn to-morrow morn, and
at the hour will the fierce Domna and her fearful sisters come, and
with tortures slay all that are herein, and take my dear daughter
Angharad, and use her cruelly.'

The maiden who had opened to Perceval was that daughter, and she
laughed harshly as her mother spoke.

'Fear not for me, mother,' she cried. 'They will deck me in rich robes,
and I shall not pine for fair raiment, as I have pined these ten years
with thee.'

The lady looked sadly upon her as she heard her words.

'I fear not, my daughter, that they will take thy life,' she said, 'but
I dread this--that they will destroy thy soul!'

And Angharad laughed and said:

'What matter, so it be that I live richly while I live!'

'Nay, nay,' said Perceval, and in his voice was a great scorn, 'it is
evil to speak thus, and it belies your beauty, fair maiden. Rather a
life of poverty than one of shamefulness and dishonour. Thus is it with
all good knights and noble dames, and thus was it with our dear Lord.'

Then turning to the lady, he said:

'Lady, I think these evil witches will not hurt thee. For the little
help that I may give to thee, I will stay this night with thee.'

After he had prayed at the altar in the ruined chapel of the castle,
they led him to a bed in the hall, where he slept.

And just before the break of day there came a dreadful outcry, with
groans and shrieks and terrible screams and moanings, as if all the
evil that could be done was being done upon poor wretches out in the
dark.

Perceval leapt from his couch, and with naught upon him but his vest
and doublet, he went with his sword in hand to the gate, and there he
saw two poor serving-men struggling with a hag dressed all in armour.
Behind her came eight others. And their eyes, from between the bars of
their helms, shone with a horrible red fire, and from each point of
their armour sparks flashed, and the swords in their grisly hands
gleamed with a blue flame, so fierce and so terrible that it scorched
the eyes to look upon them.

But Perceval dashed upon the foremost witch, and with his sword beat
her with so great a stroke that she fell to the ground, and the helm on
her head was flattened to the likeness of a dish.

When she fell, the light of her eyes and her sword went out, and the
armour all seemed to wither away, and she was nothing but an old ugly
woman in rags. And she cried out:

'Thy mercy, good Perceval, son of Evroc, and the mercy of Heaven!'

'How knowest thou, hag,' said he, 'that I am Perceval?'

'By the destiny spun by the powers of the Underworld,' she said, 'and
the foreknowledge that I should suffer harm from thee. And I knew not
that thou wert here, or I and my sisters would have avoided thee. But
it is fated,' she went on, 'that thou come with us to learn all that
may be learned of the use of arms. For there are none in Britain to
compare with us for the knowledge of warfare.'

Then Perceval remembered what he had heard the trolls--the people of

the Underworld--say, though he had not understood their meaning. 'The
stainless knight,' they said, 'shall gain from evil greater strength,
and with it he may confound all evil.'

'If it be thus fated,' he said, 'I will go with thee. But first thou
shalt swear that no evil shall happen to the lady of this castle nor to
her daughter, nor to any that belong to them.'

'It shall be so,' said the witch, 'if, when the time comes, thou art
strong enough to overcome my power. But if thou failest, Angharad is
mine to do with as I will.'

Then Perceval took leave of the lady of the Castle of Weeds, and of
Angharad. And the lady thanked him with tears for saving their lives,
but the girl was cold and scornful and said no word of thanks. Then
Perceval went with the witches to their Castle of Glaive.

He stayed with them for a year and a day, learning such knowledge of
arms, and gaining such strength, that it was marvel to see the feats
which he performed. And while he lived with them they strove to bend
him to their wills, for they saw how great a knight he would become in
prowess and in knightly deeds. They tempted him every hour and every
day, telling him what earthly power, what riches and what great
dominions would be his, if he would but swear fealty to the chief
witch, Domna, and fight for her against King Arthur and his proud
knights.

Perceval prayed daily for strength to withstand the poison of their

tongues, and evermore he held himself humble and gentle, and thought
much of his widowed mother in her lonely home in the northern wastes,
and of the promise he had made her. Sometimes he thought of Angharad,
how beautiful she was, and how sad it was that she had so cold a heart,
and was so cruel in her words.

Anon the witch Domna came to him, and said that he had now learned all
that she could teach him, and he must go and prove himself against
greater powers than he had ever yet known. If he prevailed not in that
battle, the ladies of the Castle of Weeds would become the prey of the
witches, and greater power of evil would they have in the world than
ever before. Then she gave him a horse and a full suit of black armour.

So Perceval took the horse, and armed himself and rode forth. And anon
he came to a hermit's cell beside a ruined chapel, and he alighted and
went into the chapel, and stripped himself, and laid all his armour,
his lance, and his sword, before the high altar.

Prayerfully he gave his arms to the service of God, and devoted them
one by one to do only knightly and pure deeds, to rescue the oppressed
and the weak, to put down the proud, and to cherish the humble.

And as he ended praying, the armour stirred of itself, and though it

had been black before, now did the darkness fade from it, and it all
became a pure white. While he marvelled, a faint light glowed over
hauberk, helm, shield, sword and lance, and there was an exceeding
sweet savour wafted through the place. And ghostily, as in a silver
mist, he saw above the altar the likeness of a spear, and beside it a
dish or salver. And at the wondrous sight his breath stayed on his
lips. Then slowly the vision faded from his sight.

He arrayed himself in his armour that was now of a dazzling white, and
he rode forth and thought to go towards Camelot, where was the court of
King Arthur. But he felt that some power drew him aside through the
desolate ways of a hoar forest, where all the trees were ancient and
big, and all bearded with long moss.

In a little while he saw a vast castle reared upon a rock in the midst
of the forest. He rode up to it, and marvelled that it was all so
quiet. Then he beat upon the door with the butt of his lance, and the
door opened, and he entered into the wide dark hall. On the pallets
under the wall he saw men lying as if dead. And in the high seat at the
head of the hall sat a king, old and white, but richly clothed, and he
seemed dead like all the rest. All were clad in garments of an ancient
kind, as if they had lived and died a thousand years agone, yet had not
rotted into dust. On the floor, about the wide heap of ashes where the
fire had burned, the hounds still lay as if asleep, and on the posts
the hawks sat stiff upon their perches.

Much did Perceval marvel at this strange sight, but most of all he
marvelled to see where a shaft of light from a narrow window gleamed
across the hall full upon a shield hung on the fire-pillar beside the
high seat in which the king sat like one dead.

Perceval caused his horse to pick its way through the hall, and he
approached the shield. And he saw that it was of shining white, but
whiter than the whiteness of his own, and in the centre thereof was a
heart. As he sat looking thereat, he marvelled to see that the heart
seemed to stir as if it were alive, and began to throb and move as if
it beat. Then the whiteness of the shield began to dazzle like to a
light that mortal eyes could not bear.

He lifted his hand and took the shield by its strap from the peg on
which it hung, and as he did so, a great sigh arose from within the
hall, as if at one time many sleepers awoke. And looking round, he saw
how all the men that had seemed dead were now on their knees, with bent
heads and folded hands as if in prayer.

The king in the high seat stirred and sat upright, and looked at
Perceval with a most sweet smile.

'The blessing of God is upon thee, young White Knight,' said he, 'and
now is my watch and ward all ended, and with these my faithful
companions may I go.'

'Tell me, sir,' said Perceval, 'what means this?'

'I am Marius,' said the king, 'and I was that Roman soldier who took
pity of the gentle Saviour dying in His agony upon the rood. And I
helped to take Him from the cross. For my pity did God, whom till then
I had not known, deal with me in marvellous wise. And this shield was
mine, and a holy hermit in a desert of Syria did bless it, and prophesy
concerning it and me. I came to this land of Britain when it was full
of evil men, warring fiercely together, and all in heathen darkness. I
preached the Word of Christ, I and my fellows that came with me, until
the heathens rose up and would slay me. And by that time I was wearied
and very old, and wished to die. Yet I sorrowed, wondering whether God
would do naught to rescue these people from this slavery to the old
evil law. Then a man of God came to me at night, a man of marvel, and
he caused this castle to be builded in this ancient wood, and he put my
shield upon the post, and bade me and my dear friends sleep. 'For,'
said he, 'thou hast earned thy sleep, and others shall carry on thy
work and reveal the mercy of God and his Christ to these poor heathens,
and they shall turn to God wholly. And no evil shall be able to break
in upon thy repose. But when, in the distant future, men's hearts are
turning to evil again, one that is of the three white knights shall
come and take this shield, to ward him in the great battle against
evil, and then thou and all that are with thee shall have the
restfulness of death thou hast merited. Go then, thou good knight,'
went on King Marius, 'fight the good fight against that thing of evil
whom the good man spoke of, and may my shield encompass thee and ever
guard thee.'

Perceval took the shield and left his own. Turning, he rode back
between lines of silent forms bent in prayer. He went forth into the
forest some little way, and heard from the castle the singing of a
joyful hymn. And, looking back, he saw that the castle had vanished.
But still above him and about him was the sound of singing, of a
sweetness indescribable, as if they sang who had gained all that they
desired.

Then Perceval rode forward till it was night; but never could he get
sight of castle or knight's hold or hermit's cell where he could be
houselled for the night. So he abode in the forest that night, and when
he had prayed he slept beside his good horse until it was day.

Just before the dawn he awoke to the sound of a great rushing wind all
about him. Yet marvel it was to see that the trees in that hoar wood
did not wave their branches, but all were still.

Then he was aware of a sweet savour which surrounded him, and anon a
gentle voice spoke out of the darkness.

'Fair White Knight,' said the voice, 'it is ordained of thee that thou
goest to the lands of the King Pellam in the north, where an evil power
seeks to turn men from the New Law which Christ brought, and to make
them cleave to the Old Law with its cruelty and evil tortures. And
there at the Castle of the Circlet thou shalt fight a battle for the
Saviour of the world. And whether thou shalt win through all, none know
as yet. But in thy purity, thy humility, is thy strength. Fare thee
well!'

Much moved at these words, Perceval knelt and prayed, and then, as the
dawn filtered through the trees, he mounted his horse and began his
long journey to the north.

On the seventh day he crossed a plain, and saw far in the north where
the smoke as of fires rose into the clouds, and here and there he saw
the fierce red gleam of flames. And he passed through a ford, and then
he entered a land all black and desolate, with the bodies of the dead
beside the way, unburied, and the houses all broken or burned. In other
places the grass and weeds grew over the hearths of desolated homes,
and wild beasts made their lairs where homely folk seemed lately to
have lived their simple happy lives.

No man or child could be seen anywhere to ask what all this might mean.
But one day, as he walked his horse beside a brook, over the long
grass, he came upon a poor half-starved peasant who had not strength to
run. And the man knelt before him, and bared his breast, and said,
'Strike, sir knight, and end my misery!'

But Perceval raised him in his arms and kissed him, and gave him bread
and wine from his scrip, and when the poor man was revived, Perceval
asked him what his words meant.

'Ah, Sir White Knight!' said the man, whose tears fell as he spoke,
'surely thou art an angel of heaven, not of the pit, such as have
ravened and slaughtered throughout this fair land since good King
Pellam was struck by the Dolorous Stroke that Balin made. For of that
stroke came all our misery. The sacred relics of the Crucifixion fled
our land, our king sickened of a malady that naught could heal, our
crops rotted, and our cattle died. Yet did some among us strive to live
and do as brave men should in all adversity. But into the land came an
evil and a pagan knight, the knight of the Dragon, and he willed that
all should scorn and despise the good Christ, and should turn to the
old gods of the standing stones and the oaken groves. And those that
would not he slew, and their folk he trampled underfoot, and their
herds and fields he destroyed and desolated. And I, fair lord, have
lost my dear wife and my wee bairns, and I wonder why I fled and kept
my life, remembering all I have lost.'

'Take heart,' said Perceval, 'and remember that it is God His mercy
that chastiseth, and that while thou hast life thou hast hope. It is a
man's duty, a man's nobility, to bear sorrows bravely, and still to
work, to do all and to achieve. I think God will not long let this evil
knight oppress and slay. In His good time He will cut him down.'

'Fair sir,' said the peasant, 'I thank thee for thy cheer, and I will
take heart and trust in God's good time.'

And Perceval rode forward through the blackened land and found the
forests burning and the fields wasted. Anon he came to the edge of a
plain, and saw a great castle in the distance. And there came to him a
damsel, weeping, and when he craved of her to tell him why she mourned,
she stayed, and looked at him as if astounded. Then she cried with a
great cry of joy.

'Oh, tell me, fair sir, who art thou? Thou hast the white armour which
it was foretold the spotless knight should wear, and on thy shield is
the Heart as of Him that bled to save the world.'

'I know not what you say,' replied Perceval, 'but my name is Perceval,
son of Evroc, and I seek the wicked knight that doeth all this evil.'

'Then thou art the White Knight,' said the damsel, 'and now I pray that
God aid thee, for my lady and all this poor land have need of thee.
Come thou to my mistress, the lady of the Chaplet.'

Therewith she led him to the castle, and the lady thereof came out to
him. She was of a sad countenance, but of a great beauty, though poorly
clothed.

'Fair sir,' she said, 'my maiden hath told me who thou art, and I
sorrow that one so noble as thou seemest shall essay to overcome the
fiend knight of the Dragon. Yet if thou shouldst prevail, all men in
this tortured land will bless thee, and I not the least. For daily doth
the evil knight slay my poor knights, and cometh and casteth their
blackened and burned bodies before my hall. And many of my poor folk
hath he slain or enslaved, and others hath he caused to follow his evil
worship, and many of my rich and fair lands hath he wrested from me.'

'Therefore, fair lady,' said Perceval, 'I would seek him without delay,
for to essay the force of my body upon him, by the grace of God.'

'And shouldst thou conquer,' said the lady, 'with the fiend's death the
hallowed relics which King Pellam guarded shall return to bless this
land. Now, therefore, go ye towards the Burnt Land beyond the brook,
for that is where is the lair of the fiend that doth oppress us.'

Perceval went forward across the plain to a brook, and having forded
the water he came to a wide hollow where the ground was all baked and
burned, and the trees were charred and black. Here and there lay pieces
of armour, red and rusted, as if they had been in a fierce fire; and in
one place was the body of a knight freshly slain, and he was charred
and black.

Then, as Perceval looked about him, he saw the dark hole of a cave in a
bank beside the hollow, and suddenly therefrom issued a burst of
horrible fire and smoke, and with a cry as of a fiend a black knight
suddenly appeared before him on a great horse, whose eyes flashed as
with fire and whose nostrils jetted hot vapours.

'Ha! thou Christian!' cried the knight in a horrible voice, 'what dost
thou here? Wouldst thou have thy pretty white armour charred and
blackened and thyself killed by my dragon's power?'

Then Perceval saw how the boss of the Black Knight's shield was the
head of a dragon, its forked tongue writhing, its teeth gnashing, and
its eyes so red and fiendish that no mortal, unless by God's aid, could
look on it and live. From its mouth came a blinding flash as of
lightning and beat at Perceval, but he held up his shield of the
Throbbing Heart, and with angry shrieks the Black Knight perceived that
the lightning could not touch the shield.

Then from his side the evil knight tore his sword, and it flamed red as
if it was heated in a fierce furnace, and thrusting forward he came and
beat at Perceval. But the White Knight warded off the blows with his
shield, which the flaming sword had no power to harm.

Then did the Black Knight marvel greatly, for never had a knight,
however skilled, withstood him, for either the lightning of the dragon
shield had burnt him, or the stroke of his flaming sword had slain him
swiftly. And by this he knew that this knight was Perceval.

'Thou knowest not who it is thou fightest,' said the Black Knight, with
a scornful laugh. 'Thou must put forth more than the skill thou didst
learn of the witches of Glaive if thou wouldst overcome me. For know
ye, that I am a fosterling of Domna the witch, and she taught me more
than ever she taught you. Now prepare ye to die.'

Then Perceval knew that this indeed was the fight which Domna had
foretold, and that if he failed in this, ruin and sorrow would be the
lot of many.

And Perceval began to thrust and strike full valorously and skilfully,
but naught seemed to avail him. Thus for a long time they went about,
thrusting and striking. Always the strength of the Black Knight seemed
as unwearied as that of a demon, while Perceval felt his arm weaken, as
much from the great strokes he gave, as from the burning fires that
darted at him from the dragon shield.

Then Perceval cried in prayer for aid, and asked that if Christ would
have this land saved for His glory, strength should be given him to
slay this fiendish oppressor.

Forthwith strength seemed to nerve his arm mightily, and lifting his
sword he struck at the shield of the knight, and so vehement was the
blow that he cut down the shield even to the head of the dragon.
Feeling the wound, the dragon gave forth a great flame, and Perceval
wondered to see that now his own sword burned as if on fire.
Then, while the Black Knight marvelled at this stroke, Perceval struck
at him more fiercely and beat in the other's helm, so that the fiend
knight bent and swayed in his saddle. But recovering, he became so
wroth that, with his fiery sword, he heaved a mighty blow at Perceval,
and cut through his hauberk even to the shoulder, which was burned to
the bone.

Ere the other could withdraw himself, Perceval thrust his sword to the
hilt into the loathsome throat of the dragon. Thereupon the dragon gave
so terrible a cry that the earth seemed to shake with the horror of it.
And in its wrath and pain the dragon's head turned upon the Black
Knight its master, and vomited forth fire so fiercely, that it scorched
and burned him utterly, so that he fell from his horse dead.

Perceval, dizzy and weak from the battle, alighted from his horse, and
went towards the knight, that he might slay the dragon. But suddenly he
swooned and fell and his consciousness went from him.

When Perceval came to his senses again, he found himself upon a pallet,
and the rough walls of a room were about him, while above him was the
window, as it seemed, of an abbey or convent. And he was so weak he
could not lift his hand.

Some one came to him, and he recognised Tod the troll.

'Ah, good Tod,' said he faintly. 'Where am I?'

'Now God be praised,' said Tod, and smiled joyfully. 'For the nuns
feared ye might not win through the poison of your wound which the
dragon knight did give you. 'Twas I who had followed you, lord, since
that you did leave the hold of the witches, and when you swooned I
brought you here, to the convent of the White Nuns. And now that I know
ye live, I go to your lady mother to tell her the good news, for she is
weary to know tidings of you.'

'Go, good Tod,' said Perceval, 'and say I will come for her blessing
when I may mount my horse again.'

When Tod had left him, there came a nun to him, and he knew her for
Angharad, who had been so proud and scornful when he left her at the
Castle of Weeds. And he asked her how she had fared, and why she was a
nun.

'To repent me of my evil mind,' she said. 'For when you left us I did
not in my heart thank ye that you had saved my mother and me from death
and worse. And the witches came to me and tempted me with riches and
power, even as they were tempting you while you were with them. I heard
how you withstood them, and I scorned you and hated you and said you
would yield some day. And then you left the witches, having learned all
their strong powers, yet having withstood them, and I marvelled much. I
heard men say you were one of three stainless knights of the world that
should achieve the Holy Graal, because of your great humility and
purity, and that great honour and glory would be yours, because you put
not your trust in your own strength. Then I repented, and would not
listen to the evil women. But they followed me, whispering and
tempting, and then for terror I sought a holy hermit, and he brought me
here, and now am I at peace, and my proud heart is humble.'

'By my faith, sister,' said Perceval, 'I am rejoiced to hear thee. For
I thought when I saw thee that thou hadst a proud and a hard heart. But
as thou wert a beauteous and lovely maiden I thought much of thee; and
had it not been foreordained otherwise, I would have loved thee above
all women and wedded thee.'

The sister's pale face flushed.

'Nay, but thou hadst a greater glory in store for thee,' she said. 'For
thou shalt find the Holy Graal and restore it to this kingdom, and with
it weak men shall forsake their leanings to the old law of hate, and
cleave only to Christ and His new law of love.'

'It is as God may will it,' said Perceval.

In a little while he strengthened and rose from his pallet, and fared
forth towards the north where his widowed mother sat in her lonely
hall, waiting for him whose fame was sweet in every man's mouth.

As he passed through the land, he saw how it had already begun to smile
again. Men went to their work unafraid, the corn was brightening on the
hills, the cattle lowed, women sang at their work, and children played.
And all blessed him as he rode.

Thus was ended at last the sorrow in the land of King Pellam which was
brought in by the Dolorous Stroke which Sir Balin had given a
generation before.

VIII

HOW SIR OWEN WON THE EARLDOM OF THE FOUNTAIN

Now the young page Owen, who had saved King Arthur from midnight murder
at the hand of the evil Sir Turquine, whom Lancelot slew, had tarried
at the court of the king, and in prowess and knightly achievements was
among the most famous of the knights of the Round Table. And always was
he wishful to go on strange adventures, however far might be the
country, or dangerous the ways thereto, or cruel and crafty the foes.

One day King Arthur was at Caerleon-upon-Usk, and sat conversing with a
few of his knights in the presence-chamber. With him was Sir Owen and
Sir Kay, and there was also Sir Conan and Sir Bedevere. The queen sat
near them, while her handmaidens stood by the window at needlework.

In a little while Arthur said he would sleep until the horn sounded for
dinner. For he had come from London late the night before, and had not
had his full rest.

'But,' said he, 'do you, my knights, continue your talk, and tell each
other tales as before, and if you are hungry, Kay will give you collops
of meat and horns of mead.'

So the king slept on his broad seat of green rushes, over which was
spread a splendid covering of flame-coloured satin. And cushions of red
satin were under his head.
Kay ordered a page to bring meat and bread and mead, and when the four
had eaten, Sir Conan was called upon to tell how he became possessed of
a dark bay palfrey, as to which all envied him for its beauty, but
concerning which he always put off telling the tale of how he had
obtained it.

'You must know,' began Sir Conan, 'that I was the only son of my
parents, and the confines of my father's barony in Lothian were too
small for my aspiring and my daring. I thought there was no adventure
in the world too great for my doing, and when I had fought all the
knights who would meet me in my own country, and had slain all the
trolls that wrought evil there, I equipped myself in my best armour and
set forth to seek greater adventures in deserts and wild regions. And I
fared south for many weeks, over desolate mountains and wild and
terrible fastnesses of rock and moor, where only the robber seemed to
live, and the wild, magic people of the green mounds, and where there
was no sound but the song of the lark, the plunge of the beaver and
otter in the river, the growl of the brown bear from the rock, and the
howl of the wolf at night.

'And I fared through all these terrors unscathed, and one day I came to
a high ridge, and saw stretching below me the fairest valley I had ever
seen. The grass was green and smooth, the trees were soft and of an
equal growth; and a river ran gently through the dale, with a path
beside it.

'I followed the path all day until the evening, but met no one, until,
as the afternoon was waning, I came suddenly upon a large and massive
castle, which shone in the westering sun. And I approached the green
before the gateway, and saw two youths with curling auburn hair, clad
richly in garments of yellow satin, with frontlets of gold upon their
forehead. And they had daggers with jewelled hilts, and these they were
shooting at a mark.

'And on a bench a little way from them was a handsome man in the prime
of life, of a proud look, clad in a rich mantle.

'I went forward and saluted him, and he returned my greeting with great
courtesy. And, rising, he led me into the hall, which, however, was but
poorly furnished. And I wondered that the knight and the youths should
be so richly clothed, while the hall was scanty.

'Six maidens came forward, and while three took my horse, the others
unarmed me, and gave me water wherein to wash, and a dining-robe to put
on. And the six maidens were fairer than any I had ever seen. Then we
sat down when the meat was ready, and though the food was good, it was
simple, and the vessels and flagons upon the table were of silver, but
very old and dented, as if they had been long in use.

'And no word was spoken until the meal was ended, and then the knight
asked me my name and whither I was going.

'I told him my name, and he told me his. And he was, he said, Sir Dewin
of Castle Cower. And I told him that I was faring south seeking any
great adventure, so that I might gain glory and renown. "For," I said,
"I wish to find a knight who is stronger and more dexterous in arms
than I."

'At that he looked upon me and smiled.

'"If I did not fear to distress you too much," he said, "I would show
you what you seek!"

'"Tell me," I said, "for I am eager to obtain this adventure."

'"Sleep here to-night," said Sir Dewin, "and in the morning rise early,
and take the road to the wood behind the castle. Follow the path till
you come to a fountain in a glade. There you will see a large cup, with
a chain. Strike the cup with your lance, and you will have the
adventure ye desire."

'And Sir Dewin smiled again as if he thought the adventure was one
which he deemed was beyond me, and I was angered and soon retired to my
pallet. But I could not sleep, for I was eager to rise and meet this
adventure, and to come back and mock Sir Dewin for his laughter.

'Before dawn I arose and equipped myself, and mounted my horse, and
took my way to the wood, as Sir Dewin had told me. And the road was
long and difficult; but at length I came to the glade and found the
fountain. On a stone pillar beside it a chain was fastened, and at the
end of the chain was a large cup.

'With my lance I struck the cup, and instantly there was a great peal
of thunder, so that I trembled for fear. And instantly there came a
great storm of rain and of hail. The hailstones were so large and so
hard that neither man nor beast could live through that storm, for they
would have slain them, so fiercely did they beat. And the way that I
escaped was this. I placed the beak of my shield over the head and neck
of my horse, while I held the upper part over my own head. Thus did we
withstand the storm, though the flanks of my horse were sore wounded.

'Then the sky cleared, the sun came out, and a flock of birds began to
sing on a tree beside the fountain. And surely no one has heard such
entrancing music before or since. So charmed was I with listening, that
I noticed not at first a low rumbling which seemed to come nearer and
nearer.

'And suddenly I heard a voice approaching me, and I looked round just
as a big knight in sky-blue armour rode swiftly up the valley.

'"O knight," cried he, "what ill have I done to thee, that thou usest
me so evilly? Knowest thou not that the storm which thou hast sent by
evil magic hath slain my best flocks on the hills, and beaten to death
all my men that were without shelter?"

'He came at me furiously. I put my lance in rest and spurred towards

him, and we came together with so great an onset that I was carried far
beyond the crupper of my horse.

'Then the knight, taking no further notice of me, passed the shaft of
his lance through the bridle of my horse, and so rode swiftly away. And
it moved me to anger to think he despised me so much as not even to
despoil me of my sword.

'Very depressed of spirit was I as I took my way back to the castle of

Sir Dewin. And as I passed through the wood I came to a glade, in the
midst of which was a green mound. And as I passed it I heard laughter,
which seemed to come from the earth. And I heard a voice sneering and
mocking me. And I guessed it was the voice of a troll or moundman whom
I could not see, who lived in the hillock, and I wonder I did not go
mad with the shame of his derision.

'And I had not the spirit to go to try to break into the mound, lest he
should work magic and more disaster upon me. So I left that glade, with
the sound of his hoarse laughter ringing in my ears.

'I reached the castle of Sir Dewin, and well entertained was I, and
rested for the remainder of that day. And full of courtesy was Sir
Dewin and his household, for none of them referred to my encounter, and
to the fact that I had come back without a horse. And when I rose next
day, there was a dark bay palfrey, ready saddled, waiting in the
courtyard for me. That horse I still possess, though the sight of him
ever brings back the memory of my defeat.

'Verily it seems strange to me that neither before nor since have I

ever heard of any person besides myself who knew of this adventure, and
that the subject of it should exist within the bounds of the lands of
King Arthur, without any other person lighting upon it.'

'It would be well, indeed,' said Sir Owen, 'to go to try to discover
that valley and that fountain.'

'Well, indeed,' said Sir Kay sourly, for he had ever been jealous of
Sir Owen, even when he had been but a page, 'if thy mouth were not more
ready to say more than thou ever carest to do.'

'Thou art worthy of punishment, Sir Kay,' said Gwenevere sharply, 'in
that thou speakest thus of a man so tried in prowess and brave deeds as
Owen.'

'Fair lady,' said Sir Owen, laughing, 'we take no heed of Kay's raw
words. He ever growls like a surly dog.'

At that the king awoke, and asked whether it was not time for meat. And
the horn was sounded, and men came in from the tilting-ground and the
play-field, and washed, and the king and all his household sat down to
dinner.

On the morrow, before dawn, Sir Owen rose privily, and put on his
armour and took his horse, and rode out of the town, and for many days
rode over mountains, until he saw the sea like a sheet of burnished
lead lying on his left hand.

Then he turned his horse's head away, and rode far through wild and
distant places, into the heart of the land. And at length he arrived at
the valley which Conan had described to him, whereat he rejoiced
greatly.

He descended to the path beside the river, and journeyed along it till
he came to the castle of Sir Dewin, as Conan had described. And the two
youths were on the green before the gate wrestling together, and the
tall knight of proud mien was standing by. To Owen it seemed that he
was fiercer and prouder-looking than Conan had described. Nevertheless,
he returned the salute of Sir Owen courteously and led him into the
castle.

Sir Owen was entertained as well as Conan had been, though the hall
seemed poorer, the food coarser, and the maidens seemed careworn, and
not so fair as his friend had described. After the meal Sir Dewin asked
Sir Owen who he was and whither he wended, and Sir Owen replied:

'I have heard of the Knight of the Fountain, and I would fight him and
overcome him, if I may.'

Whereat Sir Dewin looked at him with keen fierce eyes, and observed
narrowly the build of Sir Owen's body.

'Knowest thou aught of the prize if thou slayest the Knight of the
Fountain?' asked Sir Dewin.

'Naught know I of that,' answered Sir Owen; 'but I would seek the
adventure, and whatever it will bring.'

At this the knight was silent, and seemed to brood for some moments,
with dark and frowning brows. Then he laughed and said:

'Take thou the path thou seest through the wood behind the castle.
Follow that till thou comest to a glade wherein is a great mound. There
ye will see a stone slab. Knock on that three times, and the troll-man
that dwells therein will tell thee thy further way.'

Sir Owen marked how evil was the smile with which Sir Dewin said these
words; but Sir Owen thanked him, and then he was shown to his pallet
and all retired to rest.

When he arose in the morning Sir Owen found his horse already prepared,
and, having put on his armour, he rode forth along the way which the
knight had indicated to him. And he came at last to the glade wherein
he saw the great mound, with grass growing all over it, as if it were a
little hill. In the side he saw a stone slab as if it were a door, and
he struck upon it with the butt of his lance.

Three times he struck, and at the third blow he heard a voice, rough
and loud, from somewhere above his head.

'Get thee gone,' cried the voice, 'darken not the door of my house, or
'twill be worse for thee.'

Sir Owen could not see who was speaking, for no one was visible.

'I would ask thee the way to the fountain,' he replied. 'Tell me, and I
will not trouble thee further, thou surly troll.'

'The fountain?' cried the voice. 'I will save thee thy journey, thou
overbearing knight, as I have saved it for others as proud and as
would-be valiant, whom my master hath sent to me!'

With that Sir Owen received so hard and fierce a blow upon his
headpiece that he was hard put to it to keep his wits and his seat; and
looking round he saw the troll, a fierce dark little man, on the very
top of the mound, wielding a long thick bar of iron, as thick as a
weaver's beam.

Sir Owen thrust at the troll with his lance; but the moundman seized it
below the point of steel, and so strong was he, that though Sir Owen
drew him down from the top of the hillock, he could not loose it from
the little man's hold.

Meanwhile, the troll was beating at Sir Owen with the staff of iron,
which, for all its weight and size, he wielded as if it was no more
than a stout cudgel. And hard bestead was Sir Owen to shield himself
from the smashing blows which rained upon him. At the seventh blow his
shield was cracked across and his shield arm was numbed.

Suddenly he dashed his horse forward, and the little man, still holding
the lance, was thrown backward upon the grassy slope of his own mound.
Swiftly Sir Owen leaped from his horse and drew his sword, and while
the troll was rising he dashed at him and wounded him.

But next moment the troll was up, his dark narrow face terrible with
rage, for the blood ran down the deer-skin tunic which half covered
him. And then the blows of his iron rod came thicker and faster, while
he moved so swiftly round about the knight that Sir Owen, though he
thrust quickly and fiercely, could not strike him again.

Sir Owen was becoming dizzy and weak, and felt that not for long now
could he bear up his dented and broken shield against the blows that
must at length smash his arm.

Suddenly the quick movements of the little troll ceased, and he

staggered. Then he dropped the iron bar and swayed like a drunken man
towards the knight. He fell on his knees before Sir Owen, put his head
upon the ground, and clutched the knight's steel-clad foot as if to put
it upon his neck. But he could do no more, and so lay panting and spent
with exhaustion.

And Sir Owen could not find it in himself to pierce him through with
his sword, for the troll's subjection made pity come into his heart.

'Ah, sir troll!' said the knight, panting also, and very fain to rest.
'A brave troll thou art, seeing thou hast used no magic, but hath
fought me like a very man.'

'Chieftain,' gasped the troll, 'my heart is like to break, for thou
hast tried me sore. Never yet hath a knight that sought the fountain
withstood my rod as valiantly as thou hast, and thou hast put my
strength all to naught.'

'But I know not why thou didst try to slay me,' said Sir Owen, 'seeing
that I did but ask thee to show me my way to the fountain.'

'I am the slave of him that overcometh me,' answered the troll, 'and I
must do his bidding. Sir Dewin did conquer me by evil wizardry, and he
sent thee to me with the three knocks on my door, whereby I knew he
commanded me to slay thee.'

'Well, and what wilt thou do now, valiant troll?'

'I must hide me from the wrath of Sir Dewin,' said the troll, 'until my
sore wound is healed. Then will I be thy slave, sir knight, and help
thee in whatever adventure thou mayst wish!'

'Get thee gone, then, good troll,' said Sir Owen, with a smile. 'But
first tell me my way to the fountain.'
Whereupon the troll showed him the way and gave him certain directions,
and then said:

'Chieftain, thou wilt conquer in all thy fighting, and great honour and
reward shall be thine. But beware thee of leaving the side of her that
shall love thee, for more than a night and a day, or long woe shall
find thee. And do thou take this, for it may find thee friends.'

And the troll, whose name was Decet, held towards him a blue stone upon
a silver string. The stone burned with the dazzling blue of the
lightning flash, when the light caught it.

Sir Owen thanked him, put the string about his neck, and stood watching
the troll as he limped, faint and wounded, into the mound that was his
home.

Then, picking up his lance, Sir Owen mounted his horse, and rode
forward through the wood, thinking of this strange adventure.

When he reached the fountain where a silver cup hung by a silver chain,
he filled the cup with water, as the troll had bidden him, and threw it
over a pillar of stone that was set beside the fountain. And instantly
there came a clap of thunder as if the earth would dash asunder, and
after the thunder came the shower, and so fierce and heavy were the
hailstones that they would surely have slain horse and rider, but that
Sir Owen, as the troll had bidden him, had put his horse's forefeet in
the fountain, and kept his own hand therein, whereby the hailstones
became thin rain before they touched him.

Then the sky became bright, and the flock of birds descended on the
tree and began to sing. But Sir Owen heeded them not, but mounted his
horse, dressed his shield and lance, and prepared for the combat.

There came a mourning cry through the wood, and a sky-blue knight on a
high-stepping destrier dashed through the trees towards Sir Owen, and
came against him, lance in rest. Whereupon Sir Owen put spurs to his
horse, and furiously rode against the knight. At the first onset each
broke his lance; whereat they drew their swords and lashed at each
other most fiercely.

Sir Owen feinted, and then, quickly recovering, he smote the other so
hard and stern a blow that the blade bit through headpiece, skin and
bone, until it wounded the brain itself.

Then, with a great cry, the blue knight wheeled his horse and fled,
with Sir Owen in pursuit. But the other knight's horse was fleeter, and
Sir Owen could not overtake him, though he kept within a few yards.

In a little while a great castle, resplendent with new stone, shone

before them. The wounded knight thundered across the drawbridge, with
Owen close behind him; but when the blue knight gained the street
beyond, the portcullis was let fall with a rush. Sir Owen fell from his
horse, and looking round he found that the horse had been cut in twain
by the gate.

So that Sir Owen found himself, with the forepart of the dead horse, in
a prison between the two gates, while the hinder part of the horse was
outside. And Sir Owen saw that his death must be very near, for already
he saw one of the soldiers who were guarding the gate run after the
knight to the castle, as if for orders to slay him.

Looking through the inner gate, he saw a narrow street facing him, with
booths and little houses on each side; and coming towards him he beheld
a maiden, small but beautiful, with black curling hair and a circlet of
gold upon her forehead; and she was of high rank, for she wore a dress
of yellow satin, and on her feet were shoes of speckled leather.

She stopped when but a few steps from the gate where the soldiers stood
watching Sir Owen; and he saw that her eyes were bent fixedly upon the
blue stone which lay on the knight's breast. And he saw that, in the
darkness of his prison, it shone with a fierce blue flame.

He looked up and saw the maiden's eyes bent on his, and he seemed to
hear the voice of the maiden speaking to him, as clearly as if she
stood beside him. In these words she spoke:

'Take that stone which is on thy breast, and hold it tightly in the
palm of one hand. And as thou concealest it, so will it conceal thee.
Thus wilt thou be able to pass unseen between the bars of the portcullis.
And I will wait for thee on the horseblock yonder, and thou wilt be
able to see me, though I cannot see thee. Therefore, come and place thy
hand on my shoulder, and I shall know that thou art come. And then thou
must accompany me to the place where I shall hide thee.'

He saw the maiden turn away and go up the street, and Sir Owen did as
the voice had bidden him. And looking down he saw nothing of himself,
although he could see the soldiers looking in, and he saw the surprise
and then the horror on their faces, as they realised that they had seen
him spirited away before their eyes.

Sir Owen passed between them and rejoined the maiden, as she had bidden
him. He went with her, still invisible, and she led him to a small
house, and in it was a large and beautiful chamber, all painted with
gorgeous colours, and well furnished. And there she gave him food, and
he rested securely until late in the afternoon.

Then, as he looked out of the window upon the wall of the castle, which
towered dark and high above him, he heard a clamour and sounds of a
mourning coming from it. He asked the maiden the cause of it.

'They are administering extreme unction to the Lord Cadoc, who owns the
castle, for he hath been wounded.'

'And who art thou, that thou shouldst save me who am a stranger?' he
asked of the maiden.

'My name is Elined,' said the maiden, 'and since thou bearest the Blue
Stone of the Little Folk, I must aid thee all I can.'

At that time she would tell him no more, but shortly left him to his
rest, saying she would come to attend upon him again at the dawning.

In the silence and darkness of the night Sir Owen awoke by reason of a
woful outcry and lamenting; and then he knew that Earl Cadoc, the
Knight of the Fountain, was dead from the wound he had given him.

Soon after dawn he arose and clothed himself; and looking out of the
window he saw the streets filled with a great host of people in black,
and the weeping and the mourning were pitiful to hear. Knights, with
their armour craped, rode in great companies before; then came the
men-at-arms with weapons reversed; then the ladies of the household,
and after these the priests came, and in their midst was the bier.

And over it was a veil of white linen, and wax tapers burning beside
and around it, and of the gentlemen who supported the bier on their
shoulders none was lower in rank than a powerful baron, owning broad
lands and great companies of retainers.

Last of all there came a lady walking behind the bier. And though her
face was stained with the many tears she had shed, and was pale with
sorrow, Sir Owen thought he had never seen so beautiful a lady, or one
so gentle and kind of mien.

Deeply he sorrowed because he had caused the death of her lord,

inasmuch as it had given her such grief.

Her hair, yellow and long and curled, hung dishevelled about her
shoulders, and her dress of rich yellow satin was torn, and across it
was a wide sash of black velvet. And it was a marvel that she could see
how to walk, for the tears filled her eyes.

Sir Owen could not take his gaze from her, and love and pity for her
filled his mind.

When the procession had passed out of the town the maiden Elined came
into the room, and Sir Owen asked her eagerly who was the lady he had
seen.

'Heaven is my witness,' replied Elined, 'but she is the fairest and the
sweetest and the most noble of women. She is my beloved mistress, and
her name is Carol, and she is Countess of the Fountain, the widow of
him thou didst slay yesterday.'

'I sorrow for that,' said Owen, 'for I have seen her grief. But,
verily, she is the woman that I love best. And if my hand hath wounded
her grievously, my arm would more willingly protect her.'

'Indeed, thou art brave and bold, sir knight,' said the maiden, 'and
much may you win, if you are as faithful in your service and devotion
to her as you have been in the service of your king, the great Arthur.'

And when it had passed midday, Elined said to Sir Owen:

'You must keep this chamber while I go and woo for thee. Stir not out
into the city lest ill befall thee.'

Elined went to the castle and found all was in confusion, with mourning
and lamentation. Her mistress she found sitting listlessly looking from
the window with pale sorrow on her face; and to Elined's greeting she
would respond not.

'It astounds me,' said Elined at length, 'to find you giving yourself
up to unavailing sorrow in this way.'

'It astounds me also,' said the countess reproachfully, 'that in my

time of trouble and affliction, you, whom I have enriched and favoured
beyond all my handmaidens, should desert me. If I did not love thee, I
should order thee to be executed.'

'It was for thy advantage that I was absent,' said Elined. 'I
reproached not thy grief when thy lord lay dying, but now you have
yourself to think of. Yet you seem more willing to live with the dead
than to take heed what may happen to yourself in a few hours. I would
have thee remember that a live dog is better than a dead lion.'

'Hence from my sight, unfeeling girl!' cried the countess in anger.

'There is no one in the world to compare with my dead lord in beauty,
in strength, and in prowess. Get thee gone!'

Without a word Elined turned and went from the room. But she had not
gone far before she heard the countess coughing behind her, and on
looking back her mistress beckoned to her.

'You are indeed hardhearted, Elined,' said she, 'to think to leave me
in my grief, and in my need of good counsel. I will overlook thy
cruelty if, as you say, you have been absent for my advantage. What
mean you by that?'

'This is my meaning,' said Elined. 'Thou knowest that without a man of

knightly prowess and bravery, thou canst not hope to guard the fountain
and keep these wide dominions in the power of thyself. Thou art the
prey and booty of any bold bandit lord that chooses to make war upon
thee, and to capture and wed thee. And dost thou forget the wiles and
treachery of thy old lover whom thou hast flouted, Sir Dewin of Castle
Cower? Hath he not sworn to take thee and thy kingdom, sooner or later,
by fair means or by foul? Therefore it behoves thee at once to find a
noble and generous knight, courtly and worshipful, who will guard thee
and love thee, and hold down the turbulent lords, thy vassals and thy
neighbours.'

'Hard will such a task be,' sighed the countess, 'for the Earl Cadoc
was a man among men.'

'Yet I will wager to find thee such another, even excelling him in
knightly prowess, in beauty of person, and for love and devotion to
thee more than his equal,' replied Elined, who remembered that the dead
earl had not been over tender to his gentle countess on many occasions.

'And where couldst thou find this paragon?' said the countess, flushing
a little at the reminder of her late lord's neglect.

'At the court of King Arthur,' replied Elined; 'for there are to be
found the peerless knights of the world, men of their knightly words,
and devoted to love and war.

'If it be that I must think of wedding again so soon,' sighed the

countess, 'go then to King Arthur, and find me such a knight. But let
him be gentle as well as brave, with fine and courtly manners--a man,
indeed, whom I can really love.'

Elined went and kissed the flushing cheek of her mistress.

'Trust me for that,' she said gently. 'I would do that as much for
myself as for thee, my dear Carol. For did it not often go to my heart
to see thee pine for gentle speech and affection, and sorrow at the
harsh words thou didst suffer? I will set forth at once to Caerleon,
and him that I bring shall be worthy of thee. And all others that may
come and woo thee, do thou keep at arm's length until I return.'

Elined departed from the castle, but she did not go beyond the town. It
was in her mind to lie hidden for as long a time as it would take her
to go to Caerleon and return therefrom. Meanwhile, going about
disguised, she would be able to see what the many lords were doing who
would essay to woo the countess, seeing that, lovely and rich as she
was, she would be a splendid prize.

And things happened as she had foreseen. Every day there came into the
town one cavalcade or more, with some baron or earl in flashing armour
at the head of his vassals, come to try his fortune and to win the
lovely Countess of the Fountain, and to possess her wide dominions.

Daily the countess was compelled to receive fresh comers in audience,

and while with deft excuses she kept each at arm's length, they crowded
her audience-chamber, proud and insolent, humble or crafty, eyeing each
other with high looks, each prepared to slay his rival if the need
arose.

At last there came an earl who, as he came up the street at the head of
a large company of knights, seemed to shine like the sun. For his
armour was all of gold, and jewels were about his neck, and on his
girdle and his wrists. Every toss of his destrier's head dazzled the
eyes with the fountain of flashing lights given off by the jewels which
adorned the cloth of gold about its head.

This knight called himself the Earl of Drood, but Elined was in the
crowd of gaping townspeople that saw him enter, and she knew him for
the old insolent lover of her mistress, whom the countess had ever
despised, Sir Dewin of Castle Cower.

Sir Dewin disguised himself so that the countess did not know him. She
received him in audience, and though she was startled by the
magnificence of his dress, and a little moved by the gentleness of his
manner, she felt that she feared and distrusted him.

The next day he craved to see her again, and then said:

'Fair and noble lady, so deeply doth thy beauty move me, that I am
eager to put to the test swiftly the question whether I or some other
happier knight among these noble gentlemen shall obtain thy hand.
Therefore I crave permission of thee to proclaim a joust between all
these knights that sue for thee, and the winner among them all shall be
he that thou shalt wed.'

'Sir,' said the countess with great dignity, 'it is not for thee to
order here, but for me. I wish nothing to be done for the space of nine
days, and then will I make my choice.'

At which Sir Dewin, though full of rage, must needs seem content. And
the countess hoped that, in the space she had named, Elined would have
returned with the knight of her choice, and she herself could choose
him for her lord, if she thought he was the man whom she could most
trust and love.

But Sir Dewin wrought upon many of the suitors who were of his mind,
and they resolved that, will she, nill she, the countess must needs
abide by a contest between all her wooers to be holden on the tenth
day.

And on the tenth day all the knights, barons, and earls met together in
full armour in a broad green jousting-place beneath the windows of the
countess, and having made the rules of contest, and committed them to
the seneschal of the countess, they prepared to prove which among them
all was the knight of most prowess.

Then there was fierce hurtling to and fro of knight against knight, and
lances splintered, horses reared, knights fell wounded or dead, and
were dragged away. And for long, among the ninety-nine knights that
there jousted, none of the crowds who looked on could see which were
they who were gaining the day.

From her window the countess watched with a sorrowing and dreading
heart; for Elined had not yet returned, and therefore the countess must
be the prize of one of these suitors who had pestered her, and none of
whom she cared for.

Then, when the dust of the jousting had a little cleared, and the
knights had withdrawn to the sides of the lists, to breathe and rest
awhile, it was seen that twelve remained of the ninety-nine.

The countess, looking from her window, knew them all from the devices
on their shields, and none of them were men she favoured. Some she knew
were evil men, yet, as knights, were powerful in jousting. And she
dreaded which of them should be the victor, to be her lord and master.

Then the knights hurtled together again, and as one after the other was
unhorsed by stronger opponents and went from the field, she went pale
with fear and anxiety.

At last there were but two, and these were Sir Dewin, whom she knew as
the Earl of Drood, and the other was a knight in blue armour, with a
shield on which was painted a hillock or mound. And she knew him to be
a man named Sir Daunt, or the Knight of the Mount, a man of fierce
temper, quarrelsome and cruel.

The countess could have swooned with terror, for she knew that now she
was doomed to an unhappy life, whichever of these knights prevailed.
For though the Earl of Drood was soft and gentle in speech and manner,
she feared that this but covered a wicked heart.

She could hardly bear to look as she heard these two, the last of all
the ninety-nine, crash together in the midst of the jousting-ground.
And she heard the cries of the onlookers.

'The blue knight's the better man! How he heaves with his sword! Ah,
the golden knight is down!'

And looking from her window the countess saw the earl was lying
wounded, and the Knight of the Mount stood over him. Then the earl
surrendered and was carried off the field.

The great shouts that saluted the victor made the countess turn faint
and sick with dread, so that she fell back among her handmaidens in a
swoon. But, quickly recovering, she stood up, resolved to meet her fate
with proud dignity.
In a few moments the door opened and the arras was pushed aside, and
the groom of the chambers announced with a shout:

'The Knight of the Mound, victorious in the joust, craves leave to

greet our lady the countess.'

The lady bowed assent, trembling in every limb. Then the groom stepped
aside, and into the chamber came a comely gentleman, clad in purple
tunic, rich with chains and jewelled belt.

But it was not the knight whom the countess had expected, but a
stranger, with a courtly and gentle manner and a winning smile.

Then from behind him came Elined, full of smiles, with a look of
triumph in her eyes.

'My lady,' she said, bowing low, 'this is the knight, Sir Owen of
Wales, from the court of King Arthur, whom I have brought to protect
you and wed you. He hath just proved himself the doughtiest among a
hundred.'

The terror of the countess was changed instantly into joy, and she put
forth her hand, and Sir Owen bent and kissed it, and she led him to the
window seat, and commanded Elined to sit with them. And they spoke full
joyously together, for the countess was much taken with the noble and
gentle bearing of Sir Owen, and admired him because he had proved
himself the best man of all her wooers.

In a few days she sent for the bishops and priests, and her nuptials
with Sir Owen were celebrated with such feasting that all the country
was full of merriment and joy. And the men of the earldom came and did
homage to Owen, and he became the Earl of the Fountain.

In a little while thereafter Sir Owen told his lady that it was he who
had chased the soul from the body of her former lord. But the countess
was not vexed by the knowledge, for Sir Owen loved her greatly, and
with all tenderness and honour, and never had the countess been so
happy with Earl Cadoc as she was with Owen.

Thereafter Earl Owen defended the fountain with lance and sword against
all who ventured to challenge him in his earldom. And the knights who
were thus conquered he held to ransom, and the money he thus obtained
he divided equally among his barons and knights. Never had they had so
generous a lord, nor one of such prowess and knightly worth. And all
his subjects loved Earl Owen passing well.

Thus for three years in all happiness and quiet did Owen and the
countess dwell. Sir Dewin of Castle Cower had not power to hurt them,
nor did any other evil light upon them.

But at the end of this space, towards the close of a summer's day, Sir
Owen, by the magic whereby it was made known to him, knew that there
was a knight who challenged him at the fountain. So, putting on his
sky-blue armour, he went forth and found the knight.

They rushed together, and the strange knight was overthrown. But others
who were with him took him away, and Sir Owen waited. But none other
challenge was made, and in the twilight he retired, resolved to attend
next day in case any others desired to challenge him.

In the morning the same knight came forth from the company of knights
which was among the trees about the fountain. And so fiercely did Sir
Owen assail him that the head of his lance broke the helmet of the
stranger and pierced the flesh to the bone. Again his companions
carried him off.

Then other knights came forth and had to do with Sir Owen, but all were
overthrown. At length came one having over himself and his horse a rich
satin robe of honour, and Sir Owen knew that he must be a man of great
dignity, big of body and of knightly prowess.

They fought together that evening and half through the next day, but
neither could obtain the mastery. And about noon they took still
stronger lances and fought most stubbornly. At length they came so
furiously together that the girths of their horses were broken and both
were borne to the ground.

They rose up speedily and drew their swords and resumed the combat; and
all those that witnessed it felt that they had never seen such a battle
of heroes before. And suddenly with a blow fiercely strong and swiftly
keen, Sir Owen cut the fastenings of the strange knight's helm, so that
the headpiece came off.

With a cry Sir Owen dropped his weapon, for he knew that this was Sir
Gawaine, his cousin.

'My Lord Gawaine,' he said, 'the robe of honour that covered thee
prevented my knowing it was thee with whom I fought. Take my sword and
my arms, for I yield me to thee.'

'Nay, Sir Owen,' said Gawaine, 'take thou mine, for I am at thy mercy.'

Then came forward King Arthur, and Sir Owen knew him and kneeled before
him and kissed his hand, and then embraced him. And there was much joy
between all the knights and Owen, for all had feared that he had been
slain, and the king in despair had come upon this adventure to learn
tidings of him.

Then they all proceeded to the castle of the countess, and a great
banquet was prepared, with joustings and hawking parties and games.
They stayed three months in great happiness and diversion.

At last, when King Arthur prepared to depart, he went to the countess

and besought her to permit Owen to go with him for the space of three
months, that he might renew his friendships at the court at Caerleon.
And though it made the countess sorrowful to lose the man she loved
best in all the world, she consented, and Owen promised to return even
before the time appointed.

So King Arthur returned to Caerleon with Sir Owen, and there was much
feasting and diversion to welcome him. And his kindred and friends
tried to make Owen forget the countess and his earldom, but they could
not. For she was the lady he loved best in the world, and he would
liefer be with her, to guard and cherish her, than in any other place
on the surface of the earth.

One night, as the court sat after dinner over the mead cups, a juggler
came into the hall and performed many tricks, and there was much
laughter and gaiety at his merry quips and jests. And he craved that he
might search the hands of each lord and lady present, so that he could
tell them if they would be happy in love.

He began with Sir Kay, and so along the board, uttering merry thoughts
on all, but speaking with serious and solemn looks, until he came to
Sir Owen. And he looked long and earnestly at the marks in that
knight's palm, and then said, in a croaking voice:

'A night and a day, a night and a day!

Thou'lt grieve for thy love for ever and aye.'

None knew what this might mean, and they marvelled to see how pale went
the face of Sir Owen.

For he had suddenly remembered the words of Decet the troll-man, who
had said, 'Beware thee of leaving the side of her that shall love thee
for more than a night and a day, or long woe shall find thee.'

Instantly Sir Owen rose from the board and went out. Going to his own
abode he made preparations, and at dawn he arose and mounted his horse,
and set forth swiftly to go to the dominions of the countess. Great was
his fear that some evil had befallen her in consequence of his leaving
her unprotected from the evil powers of Sir Dewin.

He rode hard and fast northwards through the wild and desolate
mountains, until he saw the sea like burnished lead lying on his left
hand.

Then he turned his horse's head away and rode far into the deep heart
of the land. But though he knew the way passing well, he could not find
the road now, and wandered up and down the lonely moorlands and the
dark forest rides, baffled and wearied, heartsick and full of dread.

Thus he wandered, for ever seeking the way, and trying this one and
that, until all his apparel was worn out, and his body was wasted away
and his hair was grown long. And at length, from misery and
hopelessness, he grew so weak that he thought that he must die.

Then he descended slowly from the mountains, and thought to find a

hermit, to whom he might tell all his misery before he died. But he
could not find any harbourage, and so he crawled to a brook in a park,
and sat there wondering why this evil fate had been visited upon him,
and grieving that now his beloved countess must be in wretchedness and
sorrow by reason of his forgetting, and that never more could he hope
to see her and tell her how grieved he had been to cause her such pain.

Then in a little while he swooned under the heat of the sun, from
hunger and weakness, and lay half in and half out of the brook.

It befell that a widowed lady, to whom the brook and the land belonged,
came walking in the fields with her maids. And one of them saw the
figure of Sir Owen and, half fearful, she went up to him and found him
faintly breathing.

The widow lady had him taken into the farmstead of one of her tenants,
and there he was tended carefully until he came again to his senses.
And with the good care, meat, drink, and medicaments, he soon began to
thrive again.

He asked the man of the house who it was that had brought him there.

'It was our Lady of the Moors,' said the man sadly. 'And though she is
herself in sore straits and narrowly bestead by a cruel and oppressive
earl, who would rob her of these last few acres, yet she hath ever a
tender heart for those in greater distress than herself.'

'It grieves me,' said Sir Owen, 'that the lady is oppressed by that
felon earl. He should be hindered, and that sternly.'

'Ay,' said the man, 'he would cease his wrongful dealing if she would
wed him, but she cannot abide the evil face of him.'

Ever and anon the Lady of the Moors sent one of her maidens to learn
how the stranger was progressing, and the maiden came one day when Sir
Owen was quite recovered, and she was greatly astounded to see how
comely a man he was, and how straight and tall and knightly was his
mien.

As they sat talking, there came the jingle and clatter of arms, and,
looking forth, Sir Owen saw a large company of knights and men-at-arms
pass down the road. And he inquired of the maiden who these were.

'That is the Earl Arfog and his company,' she said sadly. 'And he
goeth, as is his wont, to visit my mistress, and to insult her, and to
treat her unmannerly, and to threaten that he will drive her from the
one remaining roof-tree she possesses. And so will he and his knights
sit eating and drinking till night, and great will be my lady's sorrow
that she hath no one to protect her.'

They talked of other things for a while, and then said Sir Owen:

'Hath thy mistress a suit of armour, and a destrier in her possession?'

'She hath indeed, the best in the world,' said the maiden, 'for they
belonged to her late husband, the Lord of the Moors.'

'Wilt thou go and get them for me for a loan?' he asked.

'I will,' said the maiden, and wondered what he would do with them.

Before the day was passed there came a beautiful black steed, upon
which was a beechen saddle, and a suit of armour, both for man and
horse. And Owen armed himself, and when it was dark he went forth and
stationed himself under a great oak, where none could see him.

When the earl, elated with insolence and wine, came back that way,
shouting and rolling in his saddle, Owen marked him as he rode. He
dashed out at him, and so fiercely swift was he, and so heavy were his
blows, that he had beaten to the earth those who were beside the earl,
and the earl he had dragged from the saddle and laid him across his
crupper, before the earl's companions were aware of what was done.

As the countess sat in hall, sadly thinking how soon the craven earl
would thrust her out of her home, there came the beat of hoofs, the
great door of the manor swung open, and a tall knight in black armour
strode in, thrusting another knight before him.
'I am the stranger whom ye rescued from death, my lady,' said Sir Owen,
bowing, 'and this is thy rascally enemy, the Earl Arfog. Look you,
churl in armour,' said Owen, shaking the other till every piece of
steel upon him rattled, 'if you do not instantly crave pardon humbly of
this lady, and restore unto her everything you have robbed of her, I
swear to you, by the name of the great Arthur, I will shear your head
from your shoulders.'

In great terror the earl, who, since he oppressed women, was an abject
coward, sank upon his knees and promised to restore all he had ever
taken from the lady, as a ransom for his life; and for his freedom he
would give her many rich farms and manors, and hostages as surety.

Two more days Sir Owen stayed at the manor to see that these things
were duly performed, and then he took his departure.

'I would that you could stay with us,' said the lady, who was sweet and
gentle, with kindly eyes and a soft voice.

'Lady, I may not,' said Sir Owen. 'I seek my dear wife and her
dominions, and have been seeking them these many months. But I fear me
some evil necromancy hath been reared against me, so that I may not
find her again, and she must be in much sorrow and misery in my
absence. And if I never see my lady in life again, yet must I seek for
her until I die.'

'What is the name of your lady and of her dominions?' asked the lady.

'She is the Lady Carol, Countess of the Fountain,' answered Owen. 'Do
you know aught of her, and in which direction her lands lie?'

The lady caused inquiries to be made, and her foresters said that the
lady's lands of the fountain lay fifteen leagues beyond the mountains,
and that his way lay through the Wisht Wood, the Dead Valley, and the
Hill of the Tower of Stone, and only a knight of great valour could
hope to win through these places, which were the haunt of warlocks,
wizards, and trolls, and full of magic, both black and white.

Joyously Sir Owen mounted his horse, glad to learn that now he might
hope to find his countess again, and the Lady of the Moors wished him
Godspeed, and looked after him long and earnestly till he disappeared
into a forest.

He journeyed three days through the Wisht Wood, and many were the
dreadful things he saw and heard there, and great eyes, green and black
and yellow, peered at him from the bushes as he sat over his fire at
night. But he clasped the blue stone which the troll Decet had given
him, and naught could hurt him.

On the fourth day he descended into the Dead Valley. And here he was
like to die, for the air was so thick, and filled with the poison of
witches who haunted there at night, that if he had not ridden fiercely
and fast through its deathly vapours, he could not have reached the
slopes of the Hill of the Tower of Stone, where the air was pure and
blew out of the clean sky.

Long and toilsome and exceedingly steep was the way up the side of the
mountain, and many times Sir Owen thought he would have to sink down
for sheer weariness. And it was dark night before he reached level
ground, and he could not see where he was or what place he was in.

But having said his prayers, fed his horse, and eaten from the scrip
which the Lady of the Moors had made up for him, he lay down beside a
thick bush and slept soundly.

Many were the terrible sounds that came from far below, where fierce
witches and warlocks battled and tore each other in the Dead Valley;
but Sir Owen was so overcome that he awoke not. And just as the morning
broke, a great serpent issued from a rock near where he lay and crept
towards him to slay him.

Sir Owen still lay asleep, and the huge creature reared his head to
strike. But at that moment a great brown bear, that had sat near Sir
Owen through the night, leaped forward with a fierce growl, and gripped
the serpent by the head. And the serpent hissed and writhed.

With the noise of the struggle Sir Owen awoke, and marvelled to see the
two animals closed in deadly combat. He drew his sword and slew the
serpent, and having wiped his weapon, he went to his horse and led it
forward.

But the bear followed him and played about him, as if it was a
greyhound that he had reared. And Sir Owen stopped and said:

'This is a marvel, sir bear, that you would follow me gambolling,

because I slew the serpent. Are ye so grateful, then, or is it that ye
have been captive unto men, and are fain to see one in this desolate
waste?'

The bear gambolled as if pleased to hear him speak, and went on a

little way and looked back as if to see that the knight was following.
And when Sir Owen would go another way, the bear stamped his foot, so
that at length, with a laugh, Sir Owen said he would follow the way he
wished.

Wild was that place and rocky, full of great boulders and with deep
pits obscured by bushes. Full irksome was it to pass through, for
besides the slipperiness of the way, the sun shone pitilessly down, and
its heat was returned by the hard rocks. And there was no water.

If the bear had not led him, Sir Owen would have missed his footing
many times, and been hurled down one of the many chasms that yawned
everywhere.

At length Sir Owen became faint with hunger, and he dismounted and
tethered his horse to a leafless thorn. Then he went and lay in the
shadow of an enormous rock that reared up like a huge tower. And the
bear looked at him for a little while and then disappeared.

Sir Owen wondered sadly whether he should ever win through the perils
that encompassed him, and see again the lady whom he loved best in all
the world. And weak with famine, he doubted whether he should not leave
his bones to bleach beside the great rock.

Then he looked, and saw the bear coming towards him, and it carried a
roebuck, freshly slain, which it brought and laid at Sir Owen's feet.
The knight sprang up with a glad cry, and struck fire with his flint,
and the bear brought dried sticks, and soon a fire was blazing, and
juicy collops were spluttering on skewers before the fire.

When Sir Owen had finished eating, the bear seemed to wish him to
follow him, and the bear led him to a brook in a little green patch,
and there the knight quenched his thirst.

By now it was twilight again, and Sir Owen made up the fire and
prepared himself to slumber; and the bear lay down beside him and
blinked at the fire like a great dog.

The knight saw the sun far in the west dip beneath a cloud, and a cold
wind blew across the waste. And then he heard a sigh from somewhere
behind him, and then another and again a third. And the sound seemed to
come from within the towering stone.

He cried out, 'If thou art a mortal, speak to me! But if thou art some
evil thing of this waste, avaunt thee!'

A voice, soft and sad, replied, 'A mortal I am indeed, but soon shall I
be dead, and as cold as the stone in which I am imprisoned, unless one
man help me.'

The stone was so thick that the voices of both were muffled, so that
neither recognised the other.

Sir Owen asked who it was who spoke to him.

'I am Elined, handmaiden to the Lady of the Fountain,' was the reply.

'Alas! alas!' cried Sir Owen. 'Then if thou art in so sore a pass, thou
who wouldst guard my lady till thy death, surely my dear lady is in a
worse pass? I am Owen, who won her in the jousts, and by evil fortune
left her for more than a night and a day, and never have I been able to
find my way back to my beloved lady. Tell me, damsel, what evil hath
befallen her, and how I may avenge it instantly?'

'Glad I am, Sir Owen,' cried the maiden joyfully, 'to hear thou art
still in life, and that thou wert not faithless, as the evil Sir Dewin
said thou wert. 'Twas his evil magic that changed the landscape as thou
didst ride, and so hid the way from thee. Naught evil hath my lady
suffered yet, nor never will now if thou canst save me this night. But
he hath changed my brother, Decet of the Mound, into some monstrous
shape, and me he hath chained within this stone. Yet for seventy-seven
days my magic kept him from doing further ill to my lady and me; and
that space ends this midnight. Therefore am I glad that the good fate
hath led thee here. Now go thee and hide, until Sir Dewin and his two
evil sons come. And when they would make a fire whereon to burn me, do
thou cut them down and burn them, for so shall all their evil power be
stayed.'

Much as Sir Owen wished to ask how his countess had fared through the
time of his absence, he stole away, after he had stamped out his fire.

Towards midnight there came a great roaring wind, and a shower of

hailstones, and thunder and lightning, and he saw three great black
shapes descend from the sky. And he knew that these were the evil
wizard knights, Sir Dewin and his two sons. They alighted upon the hill
near the Tower of Stone, and took the shapes of men.
Instantly they began to gather wood and to make a huge heap. And Sir
Dewin made witchfire, and began to light the pile.

Then Sir Owen crept up in the dark, and the bear went with him. And as
the wizard bent to light the fire, Sir Owen raised his sword and
chopped off the wizard's head, so that it hopped into the fire.

The bear had gone behind the two sons and now clawed them together, and
though they struggled fiercely to get loose, the bear hugged them so
tightly that they could not move. And Sir Owen slew them both with his
sword.

Then together they heaped the three evil warlocks on the fire and saw
them burn. And when the last of them was consumed in the fierce heat of
the fire, Sir Owen felt a hand seize his, and, turning, he marvelled to
see Decet the Moundman smiling into his face.

'Good luck hath been thy guide, sir knight,' said the troll, 'and thou
hath released me from the evil dumb shape into which this wizard did
change me. But all the happiness that hath been thine and shall be
thine again, thou owest to thy constancy and thy devotion to the lady
thou lovest best.'

'Glad am I, good troll, to see thee again,' said Sir Owen, 'and glad
shall I be to see my dear lady again. Now let us release her faithful
handmaiden, thy sister.'

With the master words which move the living rock, the troll caused the
stone to open, and Elined stepped forth, exceeding glad to see Sir Owen
and her brother again, and to feel the free air upon her cheeks.

When it was morning they went on their way with great gladness. And
when they reached the City of the Fountain, the countess could not
speak for joy, and all her sadness fled, and in an hour her happiness
was greater than her misery had been for all the months of her sorrow.

The bells throughout the city were set ringing, and there was public
rejoicing through the length and breadth of the land, for all were glad
exceedingly that their dear lady was happy, and that their lord was
come to his own again.

Never again did Sir Owen leave his lady while she lived. Elined was
advanced to the place of Chief Lady of the Household, while Decet was
made Head Huntsman, because he loved the forest, and knew the ways of
every bird and beast that lived therein.

IX

OF SIR LANCELOT AND THE FAIR MAID OF ASTOLAT

It befell on a time that King Arthur made proclamation of a great joust

and tournament which should be holden at Camelot fifteen days after the
Feast of the Assumption. The noise of it went forth throughout all the
king's dominions, and knights and barons, and earls and kings, made
haste to get them ready to go thither.

Sir Lancelot had but lately been sore wounded, and told the king that
he could not hope to be at the joust, for fear that his wound might
break forth afresh. The king was much aggrieved thereat, and would fain
have made proclamation to put off the joust, but that many knights were
already set forth from distant places, and great would be the
disappointment.

Therefore, on the day that the king was to journey from London to
Camelot, he set forth with a heavy heart. For though he knew there
would be many a brave onfall and stout bickering, yet, as Sir Lancelot
had become the most valiant knight in all the island of Britain, the
king had greatly desired that the knight should show how he excelled
all the doughty warriors that would come from all parts.

When all the knights had gone from the king's palace in London, Sir
Lancelot pined in the great hall. The chatter of the ladies and the
tricks of the pages became irksome to him, and he began to think how
gay must be the company of the knights of the Round Table, as they rode
through the leafy country ways towards Camelot, with the great Arthur
at their head.

'I will see the king's leech,' he said to himself, 'and bid him give me
some medicament that shall strengthen my wound. For I cannot abide that
I stay here like some toothless old hound, while his fellows are gone
to the hunting.'

So Sir Lancelot betook him to the lodging of Morgan Todd, the king's
physician, but found that he too had gone with the king.

When Sir Lancelot was turning away, sore aggrieved and angry, the man
that had opened the door to him cried:

'Be not vexed, Sir Lancelot, for I wot well you would rather go with
the king than nurse that wound of thine. Come down, then, and let me
advise thee.'

Sir Lancelot, thinking this would be the chief disciple or pupil of

Morgan Todd, dismounted, and followed the man that had spoken, who was
old and thin and gnarled, with beady black eyes. When he had examined
Sir Lancelot's wound, the old man smiled strangely, and said:

'If ye take but common care of thy wound, 'twill not break out again,
but your heart was ever bigger than thy wit, sir knight. Thou wilt do
more than any other knight, and in thy strength ye may well maim
yourself.'

'Then I may go to Camelot, to the jousting?' asked Sir Lancelot.

'Ay, ye may go,' said the leech. 'But hearken. Stay not on thy way at
Astolat. If ye do so, ye shall leave so great a wound there on one that
will not harm thee, that the ill shall cause thee woe out of all
measure.'

'Keep thy counsel, good leech,' said Sir Lancelot with a laugh. 'I hurt
none that desire not my hurt. And, for the rest, I will take the
adventure that God will send me.'
Sir Lancelot set out forthwith, thinking naught of what the leech had
said. By eventide he came to Astolat, and, looking about for a lodging,
he suddenly remembered the words of the leech.

'I will beg a lodging outside the town,' he said, gravely smiling. 'So
I do not stay in the town, I may escape the ill which the old croaker
spoke of.'

He saw the manor-house of a baron beside the way, and begged a lodging
there for the night, which was freely and most courteously granted unto
him. The baron was an old man, of reverend aspect, named Sir Bernard,
and he welcomed Sir Lancelot warmly, though he knew him not.

At meat they were all very merry, and with Sir Bernard were his two
sons, handsome youths, but lately made knights. There was also a young
damsel, named Elaine the Fair, the daughter of Sir Bernard; but Sir
Lancelot, though he saw how sweet and gentle she was, noted her not
overmuch. Neither she nor Sir Lavaine, the younger son, could bear to
take their eyes from the face of Sir Lancelot; for there was so
magnificent yet gentle an air about the great knight, that they deemed
he must be some very brave and noble warrior.

Sir Lancelot told them it was in his mind to go to the jousts at

Camelot. Laughingly he turned to Sir Bernard, and said:

'Fair sir, I would pray you to lend me a shield that may not be greatly
known, for mine has been too much seen by warriors.'

'Sir,' replied the old baron, 'I will gladly give you your desire, for
I am sure you are one of the likeliest knights of the world. This, my
eldest son, Sir Tirre, whom you see hath yet the pallor of sickness,
was hurt on the day on which the great Sir Tristram of Lyones gave him
knighthood, and as he cannot now ride, ye shall have his shield.'

'Sir, I thank you,' replied Sir Lancelot, 'for showing me such

friendship.'

'And I would crave a service of you,' went on Sir Bernard. 'My younger
son here, Sir Lavaine, is eager to go out with some knight of proved
valour and prowess; and as my heart goeth unto you, and believeth ye to
be a knight of great nobility, I beseech you that you let him ride with
you to-morrow.'

'I shall be pleased, indeed, to have the young knight to ride with me,'
replied Sir Lancelot.

'Would it please you, sir,' asked Sir Bernard, 'to tell us your name?'

'Not at this time, sir,' replied Sir Lancelot, 'but if God give me
grace at the jousts, and I win honour there, I will of a surety return
and tell you.'

Sir Lancelot, with his nobleness and courtesy, and his tales of fair
ladies and brave knights, so won upon them all, that it was late ere
they each departed to their beds. The maiden Elaine thought that she
had never seen or heard of a knight so full of gentleness, yet withal
so martial of mien, as this stranger who would not tell his name.

In the morning Sir Lancelot made himself ready to depart, and the maid
Elaine lingered long about her brother, and would never say that she
had really buckled the last strap of his armour. Then, when at length
she could keep them no longer, she came up to Sir Lancelot, with a face
all pale and red by turns, yet striving to laugh away her fear.

'Sir,' she said, 'I wish you noble deeds at the jousts and much fame.
Sir, I have never had a knight wear favour of mine. Therefore, lord,
will you wear a token of mine in your helm for good fortune?'

Lancelot looked down into the lovely face and smiled:

'Fair damsel,' he said gently, 'if I granted you that, I should do more
for you than ever I have done for any dame or damsel living.'

At that she thought he refused, and the tears sprang like jewels into
her blue eyes, and she turned away.

Sir Lancelot was grieved to think his refusal hurt one that seemed so
sweet and gentle. Then he remembered that he desired to go to the
jousts disguised, and he bethought him that if he wore a lady's token
in his helm, no one would recognise him, for all knew that never would
he consent to wear such things in joust or tournament, as was the
custom of many knights.

'Stay, fair damsel,' he said kindly, 'I will grant you to wear a token
of yours upon my helm. Therefore, bring it me.'

Instantly the face of Elaine shone with joy and pride as she looked up
quickly at the great steel-clad figure on the horse beside her. Then,
quickly running, she brought what she had in her mind he should wear.

'See,' she said, giving it into his hand, 'it is a sleeve of mine, of
scarlet samite, embroidered with great pearls.'

'I will wear it at the jousts, fair maiden,' said he, 'for the sake of
the kindness you and yours have shown me. And will you keep the shield
which is mine own against the time when I shall return? For I will take
thy brother's.'

'I will keep it in my own room,' said Elaine, 'and will see that it
doth not tarnish.'

Then Sir Lancelot and young Sir Lavaine rode forth, each bearing a
white shield, as if both were young knights who had not yet done some
deed, in memory whereof they could blazon a device upon their shields.

So they rode to Camelot, where they found the narrow streets of the
little town packed with the press of knights, dukes, earls and barons
come to take part in the jousts. Sir Lancelot got them lodgings with a
rich burgess, and so privily and closely did they keep the house that
none knew that they were there.

On the day of the jousts the trumpets began to blow in the field where
they should be held. King Arthur sat on a great scaffold which was
raised at one end, to judge who did best in the jousting. So great was
the press of folk, both noble and common, earls and chiefs, that many
did marvel to think that the realm of Britain held so many people.

The knights held themselves in two parties and went to either end of
the lists. Some called themselves the band of Arthur, and would fight
all comers; and among them was Sir Palomides, Sir Conn of Ireland, Sir
Sagramore, Sir Kay the seneschal, Sir Griflet, Sir Mordred, Sir
Gallernon, and Sir Saffre, all knights of the Round Table. On the other
side were the King of Northgales, the King of Swordlands, Sir Galahalt
the Proud, and other knights of the north. These were the smaller
party, yet were they very valiant knights.

Sir Lancelot made him ready with the others, and fashioned the red
sleeve upon his helm. But it was in his mind to see which party fared
the worse before he would choose his part; for ever Sir Lancelot liked
a task which was not easy.

So he rode forth with Sir Lavaine into a little wood upon a knoll,
whence they could look into the lists and see the knights hurtle and
crash together. Soon they saw the knights of King Arthur's band come
against the northern knights, and many of the latter were smitten down.
Then he saw how the King of the Northgales and the King of Swordlands
with a few knights made a bold and brave stand against the many knights
of King Arthur's Round Table.

'See,' said Sir Lancelot to Sir Lavaine, 'how that company of knights
hold out against that great press! They are like brave boars in the
midst of the hounds.'

'Ye say truth,' said Sir Lavaine; 'they are indeed brave souls.'

'Now,' said Sir Lancelot, 'if you will help me a little, you may see
that great company go back more quickly than they came forward.'

'Sir, spare not,' said the young knight, 'and I will do what I may.'

Sir Lancelot spurred forward into the lists, and so fierce was his
onslaught and so hard was his blow that with one spear he overthrew Sir
Sagramore, Sir Kay, Sir Griflet and Sir Saffre, and with another spear
he smote down five others. Thereupon the northern knights were much
comforted, and greeted the strange knight full courteously, though they
wondered that he had but a white shield.

Then the band of Arthur's knights took counsel and gathered together
Sir Bors, Sir Ector de Maris, Sir Lionel, Sir Blamore and five others.
These were all mighty knights and all were great fighters and close kin
to Sir Lancelot. They resolved to rebuke the two stranger knights with
white shields whom they knew not; and chiefly him with the lady's
sleeve upon his helm did they seek to bring to the dust.

Again the knights hurtled mightily together, and Sir Bors, Sir Ector,
and Sir Lionel drove at Sir Lancelot, and so great was their force that
they smote Sir Lancelot's horse to the ground. By ill hap, the spear of
Sir Bors pierced through his cousin's shield into his side, and the
head of the lance broke off and remained in the wound.

Then Sir Lavaine, seeing his friend prone, did mightily assault Sir
Mordred, who was on the other side, and hurled him to the ground; and,
bringing Sir Mordred's horse to Sir Lancelot, he helped him to mount.

Sir Lancelot was exceeding wroth, and took a great strong spear, and
smote Sir Bors, both horse and knight, to the ground; and likewise he
served Sir Ector and Sir Lionel, and four other knights. The others
retreated, for they feared his great strength.

'I marvel who is that knight that hath the red sleeve in his helm?'
said King Arthur to Sir Gawaine, who sat with him.

'Sir,' said the other, 'he will be known ere he depart.'

When the king caused the trumpet to sound the end of the day's
jousting, the heralds cried that the prize was to go to the knight with
the red sleeve. But when the northern knights came to Sir Lancelot and
would have him go to the king and take the prize, he said:

'Fair lords, let me depart, I pray you. For I have bought my victory
with my life; and now I would rather have quiet than all the wealth of
the world.'

Forthwith he galloped away with Sir Lavaine until they came to a great
forest; and then Sir Lancelot groaned and said he could no further go,
and forthwith he fell from his horse in a great swoon. Sir Lavaine went
to find water in the wood, and had to go far ere he found it. But
presently he saw a clearing, and there was a little hermitage and a
stream running by. Sir Lavaine called the hermit, who was a man full
reverend and noble of aspect, and told him how his friend lay in a
deathly swoon.

In a little while they had brought Sir Lancelot to the hermitage, where
the hermit took out the head of the spear and bound up the wound and
gave to the knight a strong cordial. Anon he was refreshed and came to
his senses again.

At the lodging of the king in Camelot, men spoke of the jousts, and
wondered who might be the knight who had won the prize and who had been
injured, as the northern knights had reported. Though King Arthur had
it in his mind that it had been Sir Lancelot, he hoped it was not, for
it grieved him much to think that Sir Lancelot was so badly wounded.

Next day the court journeyed towards London, and rested for the night
at Astolat; and the town being full, it chanced that Sir Gawaine went
to the manor of Sir Bernard, which lay just outside the city. When he
had dined, the old knight Sir Bernard began to speak to him, and to ask
who had done the best at the jousts at Camelot.

Ever since he had arrived, Sir Gawaine had seen how the fair girl, the
daughter of the knight, who had attended upon him, was pale and
thoughtful; and now she looked white and red by turns as he began to
speak.

'There were two knights,' said Sir Gawaine, 'who each bore a white
shield, and one had a red sleeve upon his helmet.'

Sir Gawaine saw how the damsel clasped her hands together, and her face
lit up with a great light and her eyes were bright and proud.

'And I swear that never saw I so valiant and stout a knight as he,'
said Sir Gawaine. 'For I dare swear that he beat down twenty knights of
the Round Table, and his fellow also did well.'

'Now, blessed be God,' said the fair maid of Astolat, with a great cry
of joy, 'that the good knight sped so well; for he is the one man in
the world whom I have ever loved, and truly he shall be the last man
that ever after I shall love.'

'Then do ye know his name?' asked Sir Gawaine.

'Nay, I know it not,' said Elaine, 'nor whence he came. But I know that
I love him and none other.'

Then they told Sir Gawaine how they had first had knowledge of the
strange knight; and the damsel said that he had left her his shield in
place of the white one he had taken, so that none should know him. Sir
Gawaine begged that she would fetch it from her chamber.

Elaine brought it and drew it from the case of leather in which she had
wrapped it, and said, 'See, there is no spot of rust upon it, for I
have cleaned it with my own hands every day.'

'Alas,' said Sir Gawaine, when he saw the device upon the shield, 'now
is my heart full heavier than it hath ever been.'

'Why, oh why?' cried Elaine, and stood pale and breathless.

'Is the knight that owneth that shield your love?' asked Gawaine.

'Yes, truly,' said the maiden, 'I love him'; and then sadly she said,
'but would that he should tell me that I was also his love.'

'How ever that be,' said Sir Gawaine, 'you should know that you love
the noblest knight in all the world, the most honourable and one of the
most worth.'

'So thought me ever,' said the maid of Astolat, proudly smiling; 'for
never have I seen a knight that I could love but that one.'

'And never hath he borne token or sign of any lady or gentlewoman

before he bore thine,' said Sir Gawaine.

At these words the maid Elaine could have swooned for very joy, for she
deemed that Sir Lancelot had borne her token for love of her.
Therefore, she was cast more deeply in love with him than ever.

'But I dread me,' went on Sir Gawaine, 'for I fear we may never see him
in this life again.'

'Alas! alas!' cried Elaine, throwing herself at the feet of the knight,
and clutching his arm tightly, while she gazed with terror into his
face. 'How may this be? oh, say not--say not that he is--is----'

She could not say the word, but Sir Gawaine made answer.

'I say not so, but wit ye well that he is grievously wounded.'

'Alas!' cried Elaine, 'what is his hurt? Where is he? Oh, I will go to
him instantly.'

She rose, wildly ringing her slender hands.

'Truly,' said Sir Gawaine, who, though a great warrior, was a slow
talker, and had no thought of the sorrow of the poor maid, 'the man
that hurt him was one that would least have hurt him had he known. And
when he shall know it, that will be the most sorrow that he hath ever
had.'

'Ah, but say,' cried Elaine, 'where doth my lord lie wounded?'

'Truly,' replied Gawaine, 'no man knoweth where he may lie. For he went
off at a great gallop, and though I and others of King Arthur's knights
did seek him within six or seven miles of Camelot, we could not come
upon him.'

'Now, dear father,' said the maid Elaine, and the tears welled from her
eyes, 'I require you give me leave to ride and seek him that I love, or
else I know well that I shall go out of my mind, for I may never rest
until I learn of him and find him and my brother Sir Lavaine.'

So the maid Elaine made her ready, weeping sorely, and her father bade
two men-at-arms go with her to guard and guide her on her quest.

When she came to Camelot, for two days was her seeking in vain, and
hardly could she eat or sleep for her trouble. It happened that on the
third day, as she crossed a plain, she saw a knight with two horses,
riding as if he exercised them; and by his gestures she recognised him
at length, and it was her brother. She spurred her horse eagerly, and
rode towards Sir Lavaine, crying with a loud voice:

'Lavaine, Lavaine, tell me how is my lord, Sir Lancelot?'

Her brother came forward, rejoicing to see her, but he asked how she
had learned that the stranger knight was Sir Lancelot, and she told
him.

'My lord hath never told me who he was,' said Lavaine, 'but the holy
hermit who hath harboured him knew him and told me. And for days my
lord has been wandering and distraught in his fever. But now he is
better.'

'It pleaseth me greatly to hear that,' said Elaine.

When Sir Lavaine took her into the room where lay Sir Lancelot so sick
and pale in his bed, she could not speak, but suddenly fell in a swoon.
And when she came to her senses again she sighed and said:

'My lord, Sir Lancelot, alas, why are ye in so sad a plight?'

Therewith she almost swooned again. But Sir Lancelot prayed Sir Lavaine
to take her up and bring her to him. And she came to herself again, and
Sir Lancelot kissed her, and said:

'Fair maid, why fare ye thus? It hurts me to see your sorrow, for this
hurt of mine is of little account to cause you to grieve in this wise.
If ye come to minister to me, why, ye are truly welcome, and ye shall
quickly heal me, by the grace of God, and make me whole again.'

'I would gladly serve you till you are well again,' said the maid.

'I thank you, fair Elaine,' replied the knight, 'but I marvel how ye
knew my name?'
'It was by Sir Gawaine, fair lord,' said the damsel, 'for he lodged at
my father's house and saw your shield.'

Sir Lancelot's heart was heavy at these words, for he foreboded sorrow
from this adventure.

Afterwards the maid Elaine never went from Sir Lancelot, but watched
him day and night, and gave such comfort to him that never woman did
more kindly nurse a wounded man than she.

Sir Lancelot was full courteous and kindly in his turn, never giving
more trouble than he could avoid; both were of good cheer and merry
together, for Sir Lancelot deemed not as yet that the maid loved him
deeply, and the maid was glad to be with him and to do him all the
service that she could.

Then in a little while came Sir Bors, the knight who had wounded Sir
Lancelot, who was also his cousin, and Sir Bors lamented sorely that
his had been the arm that had given his kinsman so sore a wound. But
Sir Lancelot prayed him not to grieve, and said:

'I have that which I deserved, for in my pride I was nigh slain, for
had I given thee, my cousin, warning of my being there, I had not been
hurt. Therefore, let us leave off speaking thereof, and let us find
some remedy so that I may soon be whole.'

'Fair cousin,' said Sir Bors, as he leaned on the bed, speaking in a

low voice, 'there is one nigh thee, or I am much in error, that will
not know whether to be glad or sorry when thou shalt be hale enough to
ride away.'

'What dost thou mean?' asked Sir Lancelot.

'Is this she that is so busy about thee--is she the lady that men call
the Lily Maid of Astolat?'

'She it is,' replied Sir Lancelot, 'and kindlier nurse hath never man
found.'

'It is easy to see she loveth her task,' said Sir Bors, and he was full
of pity and kindness for the fair meek maid, 'seeing that she loveth
thee.'

'Nay, man, nay, that cannot be,' said Sir Lancelot, half angry, half
denying. 'She hath come to me because I was sick, and because I wore
her token in my helm, that's all.'

'Wise art thou in all knightly prowess, Sir Lancelot,' said Sir Bors,
'and full courteous and kindly art thou to all ladies and damsels. But
I fear thou knowest not the heart of this fair maid. For it hath been
easy for me to see by her looks this way how she is jealous of my
talking to thee, and I know from her diligence about thee that she
loveth thee with all her heart.'

'If that be so, then, by Heaven, I sorrow it is so,' said Sir Lancelot
heavily. 'And I must send her from me forthwith.'

'Why shouldst thou do that, fair cousin?' said Sir Bors. 'She is a
passing fair damsel and well taught, and I would that thou couldst love
her in return. But as to that, I may not nor dare not counsel thee. For
I know that love blows where it listeth and will be forced by none.'

'It repenteth me sorely,' said Sir Lancelot, and he was heavy in spirit
thereafter, and was eager to get whole again and to go away.

In four or five days he made a plot with Sir Bors, that he should rise
and clothe himself in his armour and get upon his horse, and in this
way show to the hermit and to the maid Elaine that indeed and in truth
he was strong enough to ride forth. Therefore they made excuses and
sent both the hermit and the maid away into the forest to gather herbs.

Sir Lancelot rose from his bed, and Sir Bors helped him to put on his
armour and to mount his horse. And so eager was the knight to feel that
he was hale again that he put his lance in rest and spurred his horse,
and so furiously did he ride across the mead, as if he rode at a
knight, that of a sudden his wound broke out again, and he swooned and
fell from his horse to the ground.

Sir Bors and Sir Lavaine made great sorrow and dole as they raised him
and carried him back to the hermitage. It befell that Elaine, who had
not gone far, heard their cries and came running swiftly, and seeing
Sir Lancelot borne between them pale as with death, she cried and wept
and kneeled beside him, and put her arms about his neck and kissed him
many times, and called to him to wake him.

'O traitors that ye are,' she cried to her brother and to Sir Bors,
'why have ye let him go from his bed? Oh, if ye have slain him I will
denounce you for his murderers.'

Therewith came the holy hermit and was right wroth, and they put Sir
Lancelot to bed again, and the hermit stanched the wound and gave the
knight a cordial, so that he awoke out of his swoon.

'Why have you put your life in jeopardy thus?' asked the hermit.

'For that I weary of being here,' said Sir Lancelot, 'and I would ride
forth again.'

'Ah, Sir Lancelot,' said the hermit, 'your heart and your courage will
never be done till your last day. But now ye must do as I command, and
stay till I say ye are hale again.'

Soon after this Sir Bors departed, and the hermit promised that if he
came back in a month, Sir Lancelot would be ready to depart with him.
Thus Sir Lancelot stayed in the hermitage, and ever did the fair maid
Elaine labour with diligence day and night to heal and comfort him, and
to keep the time from wearying him. And never was child meeker to her
parent, nor wife kinder to her husband, nor mother sweeter and more
tender to her child, than Elaine was to Sir Lancelot.

The knight sorrowed that this was so; and he ever bore himself
courteous, but not familiar in speech, for it grieved him that he had
no love in his heart for her, however deep might be her love for him.

When the month was over, Sir Bors returned and found Sir Lancelot
walking about the forest, hale and strong again and eager to be riding.

In a day they all made them ready to depart from the hermit, and to go
to King Arthur's court, which was then in London. The Lily Maid went
with them, sad that all her loving care was now ending, but glad to see
the noble air with which Sir Lancelot bestrode his horse, and thankful
that sometimes, as they rode upon their way, he turned to her smiling
gravely, and spoke of the bright sunlight, the birds and trees they
saw, and the company and travellers they passed.

Then they came to Astolat, and Sir Bernard gave them all great welcome,
and they were well feasted and well lodged.

On the morrow, when they should depart, the maid Elaine was pale and
very quiet, until Sir Lancelot came into the hall to say farewell. Then
the maid, bringing her father and her two brothers with her, went up to
Sir Lancelot and said:

'My lord, now I see that ye will depart. But oh, do thou have mercy
upon me, for I must say that which damsels and gentlewomen are not used
to say.'

Sir Lancelot with grave sad face looked at her and knew what she would
say, and in very heaviness of spirit replied:

'Lady, it grieves me that I have unwittingly put such grief upon you.'

'O fair and gracious knight, suffer me not to die for love of you,'
cried Elaine, and looked most piteously and wanly upon him. 'Oh, I
would have none but you to be my husband.'

'Fair damsel,' replied Sir Lancelot, 'heavy is my grief to refuse you,

but I have not turned my mind to marriage.'

'Alas,' said Elaine, and smiled sadly, 'then there is no more to be

said.'

'Fair maid, I would that you will seek some knight more worthy of you,'
said Sir Lancelot. 'When I am gone, do you set your heart upon some
friend or kinsman; and for all the kindness ye have shown me, I will
settle upon you a thousand pounds yearly.'

'Oh, of all this,' said the Lily Maid, 'I will have none; for if ye
will not love me, wit ye well, Sir Lancelot, my happy days are done.'

'Say it not, fair maid,' said the knight, 'for many years and much love
should be yours.'

But with a cry Elaine fell to the ground in a swoon, and her
gentlewomen bore her into her chamber and sorrowed over her.

In great heaviness Sir Lancelot would depart, and went to his horse to
mount it; and Sir Lavaine went with him.

'What would you do?' asked Sir Lancelot of him.

'What should I do,' said Sir Lavaine, 'but follow you, unless you drive
me from you?'

'I cannot do that, so come with me,' said Sir Lancelot.

Then came Sir Bernard unto the knight and said, lifting his grey head
and wrinkled and reverend face to Sir Lancelot as he bestrode his
horse:

'Sir, I think my daughter Elaine will die for your sake. For ever was
she quiet, but strong in mood and of a very fond heart.'

'It must not be,' said Sir Lancelot, 'but do thou cheer her, and when I
am gone she will forget me. Never did I do or say aught but what a good
knight should, and never made as if I cared for her. But I am right
sorry for her distress, for she is a full fair maid, good and gentle,
and sweet of voice and mood.'

'Father,' said Sir Lavaine, 'my sister Elaine doeth as I do. For since
I first saw my lord Lancelot, I could never depart from him, nor never
will if I may follow him.'

Night and day did the fair maid Elaine sorrow in silence, so that she
never slept, ate or drank. At the end of ten days her ghostly father
bade her leave such grief and change her thoughts.

'Nay,' she said, 'I may not, and I would not if I could. And I do no
sin to love the most peerless knight in all the world, the most gentle
and courteous of men, and the greatest in all nobility. Therefore, as I
know I may not live, do thou shrive me, good father, for I must needs
pass out of this world.'

Then she confessed her sins and was shriven. And anon she called her
father and her brother, Sir Tirre, and begged that they would do as she
desired as to her burial, and they promised.

In a little while she died, and a letter was put into her cold hand,
and she was placed in a fair bed, with all the richest clothes she had
about her. Then they carried her on the bed in a chariot, slowly, with
many prayers and with much weeping, to the Thames, and there they put
her and the bed in a barge.

Over all the bed and the barge, except her fair face, was placed a
cloak of black samite, and an old and faithful servant of the house
stepped into the barge to guide it.

They let it go from them with great grief, and the aged man steered it
down the river towards London, where was the court of Arthur.

It happened that, as the king and his queen were looking from a window
of the palace which looked upon the Thames, they saw the black barge,
and marvelled what it might mean.

The king made the barge to be held fast, and took the queen's hand, and
with many knights went down to the water's edge, and there they saw a
fair gentlewoman lying on a rich bed, and she lay as if she slept.

The king took the letter gently from the fair hand which held it, and
went into his court, and ordered all his knights to assemble, and then
opened the letter and read what was written. The words were these:

'Most noble knight, my lord Sir Lancelot du Lake, now hath death come
to me, seeing that you would not give me your love. Yet do thou do this
little thing I ask, now that I am dead, for I ask thee to pray for my
soul and to bury me, and think of me sometimes. Pray for my soul and
think of me, as thou art a knight peerless and most gentle.'

Sir Lancelot heard it word by word and went pale as ashes, so that men
marvelled to see his sorrow. When it was finished, he said:

'My lord, King Arthur, wit ye well that I am right heavy for the death
of this fair damsel. God knoweth that I was never causer of her death
by my will, as her brother Sir Lavaine here will avouch for me. She was
both fair and good, and exceeding kind to me when I was wounded; but
she loved me out of all measure, and of that I was sore heavy.'

'Ye might have loved her,' said the queen, weeping for sorrow at the
hapless fate of one so fair and fond.

'Madam,' said Sir Lancelot, 'I could not be constrained to love her,
but I sorrow for her death exceedingly.'

'Truth it is,' said the king, 'that love is free and never will be
forced, for all the prayers that may be said to it. But thou wilt of
thy worship bury this fair maid, Sir Lancelot?'

'That will I do,' said the knight, 'and in all richness and solemnity.'

Thus was it done, and all the knights of the Round Table sorrowfully
followed the body of the fair Elaine to the grave.

On her tomb in letters of gold both thick and deep were set the words:

'Here lieth the body of Elaine, the Lily Maid of Astolat, who died of a
passing great love'

HOW THE THREE GOOD KNIGHTS ACHIEVED THE HOLY GRAAL

Now the time drew nigh which had been foretold by Merlin, before he had
been snared by a greater wizardry than his, and buried alive beneath
the great stone in the forest of Broceliande.

He had prophesied that, with the coming of King Arthur, the island of
Britain should grow in strength and fame, and her knights should be
more valiant and more pure in word and deed than the knights of any
other land. But that, in a little while, they would become proud, and
finding that none could withstand them, they would use their strength
evilly.

To the court of King Arthur, as he sat in London, came tidings of how

his barons warred with each other in remoter parts of his dominions,
seizing the strong castles of each other, putting one another to death,
and forsaking the ways of the Holy Church of Christ and turning to the
idolatry of the old British pagans, some of whom still lurked and
performed their evil rites in the desolate and secret places of the
forests and the hills.

The heart of the king was heavy as he sat thinking, and he wondered why
this evil was entering into the hearts of his knights and barons. He
resolved to take good counsel, and therefore commanded his clerk to
come to him and bade him write down all his thoughts.

Then he gave the letter to a trusty knight, named Sir Brewis, and bade
him take it to the Archbishop of Britain, where he sat, an old and
feeble man, in his great cathedral of St. Asaph, far on the verge of
the western sea. He was the king's kinsman, and already known for his
great sanctity as St. David. In a month the knight brought back the
answer, which was in these words:

'The time draws nigh for the trial and testing of Britain. Three good
knights shall come to you, and you must pray that their spirit shall
spread like fire in the hearts of all your knights. You shall have all
my prayers, dear kinsman, and I bid you say to all your knights, "Watch
and Pray."'

A few days later, when the king sat in hall before the great fire, for
it was passing cold and the wintry wind snarled at the windows, the
great door was flung open, and into the hall came three men bearing a
wounded knight in armour upon his shield. When they had set him down,
the knights that were with the king knew him for Sir Kay the seneschal,
and Sir Kay looked sourly about him, and bade those that carried him
take him to his pallet and fetch a leech, and not stand gaping like
fools.

'How now,' said Sir Gawaine, 'who hath tumbled thee, Sir Kay?'

'A fool whose head I will rase from his shoulders when I am hale
again,' snapped Sir Kay, as he was borne away to his bed.

Then into the hall came a troll, and after the troll came a knight
dressed all in white armour, who, going towards the king, knelt at his
feet.

'Sir,' the knight said, 'I would that ye make me a knight.'

'Of what lineage have ye come?' asked the king.

'I am the only son left to my mother,' replied the knight, 'and she is
the widow of Earl Evroc of the Wolds.'

'Ah,' said the king, and frowned, 'was he one of those turbulent lords
of the north that now slay and war as if they were kin to the pagans,
and threaten to bring ruin into my kingdom?'

'Nay, lord,' said the young knight, 'my father hath been dead these
twenty years.'

'Then what is your name? What have ye done to deserve knighthood?'

asked the king, who was angry at the hurt his old friend and
foster-brother Kay had received.

'Sir, I am Perceval who slew the Dragon Knight, and I am not yet made a
knight.'

All those that stood there cried out in joy, and King Arthur raised the
young knight from his knees and kissed him on both cheeks.
'Fair young warrior, I knew ye not,' said the king, 'and I repent me my
churlish speech. We all have heard your great deeds, and much have I
longed to see ye, and many reproaches gave I to Sir Kay, whose churlish
manner thrust you from my hall.'

'Sir,' said Perceval, when he had clasped the hands of the knights, all
of whom were eager to know him, 'I vowed that I would not come to you
until that I had avenged the blow which Sir Kay had given to my good
friend Tod, who is my squire, and good fortune brought Sir Kay to me,
or perhaps it was the will of Heaven. For as I came riding hitherwards
this morning, I saw in the snow where a hawk had torn a thrush, and the
blood lay on the whiteness of the ground. I stopped and gazed upon it,
for I thought of the white life of Christ who gave His blood to save us
all. Then I wondered whether the blood that He had shed upon the cruel
Cross would ever be so pitiful a thing in men's minds that this dear
Britain of ours would be rid of the evil which seems to be creeping
into it, and in place thereof would turn as white as the sheets of snow
that now lay over all the fields and ways. As I thought thus, I sank
deeper and deeper in my thoughts. Suddenly I felt one strike me on the
arm with the flat of his sword. I turned and saw a knight, who asked me
why I gaped like a mooncalf at the torn bird. I told him it was my
pleasure so to do. He asked if it was my pleasure to have to do with
him, but I said I would liefer pursue my thoughts again. Nevertheless,
he would not let me in quiet, and I drew my sword and beat him in my
anger to the ground. When my squire unlaced his helm he knew him for
Sir Kay, and told some passing men to bear him unto the court.

'So have I punished him both for the insult to my friend and squire and
to myself.'

Men marvelled at the quiet speech and gentle looks and manners of one
whose fame for great deeds was in all men's mouths; and Sir Gawaine
said:

'Of a truth, young chieftain, it had served Sir Kay rightly if ye had
slain him, and he should thank thee for sparing him.'

The other knights agreed that Sir Kay had done most unknightly in thus
picking a quarrel with one who had not offended, and he had merited
defeat.

Thereupon King Arthur knighted Perceval, and they made him great cheer
and welcome; and the king knew in his heart that this was one of the
three good knights whom St. David had spoken of, and he wondered who
were the other two.

It chanced that seven nights before, the good Sir Bors had fared forth
from the court of Arthur to seek knightly adventures. And his spirit
was joyful as he rode, for he felt that some great adventure was to
come to him, howbeit he knew not why he felt this was to be.

Northward he fared through the land, and the snow had not yet fallen,
but so mild was the season that men's thoughts had stirred towards
spring. For many days he journeyed and the ways were more lonely, the
country more desolate, the rocky hills more bare. He wondered why it
was that the land seemed so forsaken, as if the folk had long since
left the fields to become solitary wastes.

At length it befell that one evening he could find no place wherein to

shelter for the night; there was no hermit's cell nor castle nor
knight's hold through all the way by which he had come that day.
Towards twilight he came upon a wide moor, and the cold moon peered at
him over the distant mountains. Far in the midst of the waste he saw a
great pile, as of a castle, and pricked his horse towards it.

It was indeed a castle, but its walls were broken and mossy, as if long
years had passed since it housed fire and gay company. He rode over the
drawbridge into the great courtyard, and the echo of his horse's
hoofbeats was the only sound that greeted him.

He sought the upper chambers, and found in one a rough bed of fern
leaves, and, having supped from the scrip he carried with him, he
composed himself to sleep, glad that at least a roof and thick walls
shielded him from the freezing cold which now swept over the land.

Forthwith he slept; but at midnight he awoke and found it was deeply

dark, and looking to the arrow slit in the wall he sought some friendly
star. As he looked, a great red light burst through, and with that
there came, thrusting fiercely, a great spear like a long flame, which
darted at him, and then stayed just before him. The point of it burned
blue and dazzling.

As he lay marvelling, the spear went back a space; then he grasped his
sword that lay beside him, but before he could defend himself the
flaming spear dashed forward again and smote him in the shoulder.

Then the spear went back and the chamber was deep dark again, and for
very pain Sir Bors lay and groaned. Nor could he sleep more that night.
When it was dawn he arose, thinking to ride forth, but when he went
down into the courtyard to saddle his horse in the stable, he marvelled
to see that where there had been an open ruined gateway the night
before, was now a great black oaken door, spiked and bolted.

For a long time he essayed by every means to get himself out of that
castle, but he could not find a way. Yet never did he hear or see aught
that showed that any one lived there. Many times he went throughout the
place, but never found aught but ruin and emptiness, and the dust and
darkness of long neglect everywhere.

When three days had gone, Sir Bors was faint with the pain of his wound
and the hunger with which he suffered. Then, as he sat beside his horse
in its stall, he suddenly heard the clank of armour, and going forth
into the courtyard saw a knight all armed, with his shield on his
shoulder and his sword naked in his hand.

Without a word the stranger darted at him, and hardly did Sir Bors have
time to dress his shield; and then they lashed mightily at each other,
and thrust and hewed sorely. Thus for half the day they fought, and so
fiercely that soon Sir Bors had many wounds, so that blood oozed from
the joints of his armour. But the other knight seemed to be unharmed,
and never seemed to breathe heavily. Then Sir Bors became extremely
wroth, and beat so fiercely upon the other that he pressed him always
backward until the stranger was nigh to the door of a chamber which
opened into the courtyard; and suddenly he dashed backwards into the
chamber and shut the door.

Nor would he come forth, for all that Sir Bors called him coward and
recreant. Nor would he answer one word, nor had he said one word since
Sir Bors had seen him.

After some time Sir Bors resolved to go back and rest himself beside
his horse, for his great wounds burned him sorely; but as he turned,
suddenly, without a sound, the stranger knight dashed forth, and struck
a felon blow at the good knight's neck. But Sir Bors was aware of him
in time and defended himself full well.

So fiercely did Sir Bors lay on, that soon the other was beaten to his
knees, and then the good knight rushed at him to hurl him headlong and
to slay him. Suddenly the other knight seemed to fall together as if
dead; but the armour sounded hollow as it fell, and Sir Bors marvelled.

Swiftly he hacked the fastenings of the helm and tore it from the neck
armour. Then a great fear seized and shook him. The armour was empty!

He knew then that he had fought with a demon. He crossed himself and
prayed, and weak with deadly fear and his wounds, he went into the
stall and sat beside his horse, and marvelled how he could win with
life from the fell power that seemed to hold him prisoner.

Suddenly, from a dark cavernous hole in the dungeons, came a great

boar, with curving tusks keen as sword-blades, and rushed at Sir Bors
full fiercely. Hardily did the knight defend himself from the strength
and the fierce rushes of the great beast. The boar with its long tusks
tore the shield from the grasp of Sir Bors, and slashed his shield arm
sorely, and then Sir Bors was wroth, and with a very fierce blow he
smote off the boar's head. Immediately thereupon, with the pain of his
many wounds and the weakness of his famine, Sir Bors fainted, and lay
upon the frozen snow as one dead. For long he stayed thus ere he
revived, and then he rose and dragged himself into the stall where lay
his horse, half dead with hunger, before an empty manger.

All that night Sir Bors lay in a sad pass, for he thought that now he
would never see dawn again in life. He prayed and commended his soul to
God, and confessed his sins and prepared himself for death as behoved a
good knight; and thereafter he slept sweetly.

At the dawn he awoke, exceeding hungry, and looking forth into the
court he had it in his mind to carve meat from the dead boar. But he
was astounded beyond measure to find that it was not there. In its
place was a great trencher of steaming hot collops of meat, and toasted
bread, with hot milk in great plenty.

Sir Bors ran towards the food, and so ravenous was his hunger that he
would have devoured it instantly. But he bethought him before he had
placed any of it to his lips, and dropping it he crossed himself and
ran back into the stall and tried not to look forth. He knew that the
food was placed there by some fell fiend or demon to tempt him, and if
he ate of that unholy food, his soul would be for ever lost.

Anon sweet voices sounded in the courtyard as if to attract him forth,

and the smell of the hot food was wafted strongly into the stable. The
fiends themselves could not enter, for there was a horse-shoe hung in
the proper way upon the lintel of the door, and, moreover, Sir Bors had
stuck his sword-point in the ground, and the holy sign of the cross
prevented the evil things from crossing the threshold.

All that day did Sir Bors lie half dying, while the fiends tempted him,
but the knight was too strong and manful of soul to yield, and would
liefer die than become the slave of the powers of the Netherworld.

Then in the twilight he commended his soul to God, for he felt near to
death. When he had finished his prayer, he heard great and horrible
cries in the court as of rage and disappointment. Then came an old man
at the door of the stable, white of hair and very reverend; and he came
and put his hand upon Sir Bors' head and spoke mildly and said:

'Good and faithful knight, sorely tried have ye been, and now you shall
have no more adventures here. Full worshipfully have ye done and better
shall ye do hereafter. And now your wounds shall be healed and ye shall
have good cheer until to-morrow.'

Therewith there was all manner of sweetness and savour in the place,
and Sir Bors saw as in a mist a shining vessel borne by a wondrous
maiden. He knew that this was the Holy Graal; and he bowed his head,
and forthwith he was whole of his wounds.

On the morrow he departed after a night's sweet sleep, and rode to

Arthur's court and told of his adventures.

The king and queen and all the fellowship of the Round Table were
passing glad to see Sir Bors whole and well, and they made much of him,
for they felt that he would do things of great renown.

Then at the feast of Pentecost went all the court to the minster to
hear their service; and when they returned to the palace the king
ordered that dinner should be prepared in the hall of the Round Table,
for this was one of the days when he was wont to assemble all his
knights at a great feast of knighthood.

While they waited for the horn to sound, warning them that the meal was
ready, one came running to the king, saying that a thing of marvel had
happened. And Arthur went to the hall of the Round Table with his
knights, and there in the seats about the great circular board they
found letters of gold written, which said, 'Here should sit Sir
Bedevere,' or 'Here should sit Sir Gawaine,' and thus was the name of a
knight written in every seat.

In the Siege, or Seat, Perilous, where twice or thrice a reckless

knight had dared to sit, but only to be struck dead by a sudden
flashing blow of mystery, there were written the words, 'In the four
hundredth and fourth and fiftieth year after the passion of our Lord,
shall he that shall fill this seat come among ye.'

All the knights marvelled and looked each at the other.

'It seemeth me,' said Lancelot, 'that this is the very day on which
this seat shall be filled by him for whom it is appointed, for this is
the four hundred and fifty-fourth winter since Christ died on the
rood.'

It was seen that on each side of the Siege Perilous was written, on the
right one, the name of Sir Perceval, and on the left one, the name of
Sir Bors.

Then the horn was sounded to dinner, and each knight took the seat
appointed for him, and young knights served them. All the sieges round
the table were filled except the Siege Perilous.

Men ate and drank soberly, for they felt that an adventure strange and
marvellous should happen that day, and so indeed it befell.

For when they had eaten, and the priest was saying in a great silence
the grace after meat, suddenly a shrill wind sounded without, and all
the doors and windows shut fast. Men looked at each other in the
twilight thus caused, and many a face was white with fear.

Then the door opened and an old and reverend man entered, white of
beard and head, and clothed also in white; and Sir Bors knew him for
the same who had come to him at the Castle of Fiends. By the right hand
the ancient man brought a young knight, clad in red armour, with a
sword at his side, but with no shield.

'Peace be with you, fair lords,' said the old man. Then turning to the
king he said:

'Sir, I bring here a young knight, the which is of king's lineage,

whereby the marvels of this court shall be accomplished, and the trial
of this thy kingdom shall be brought to a happy end, if that may be.
And the name of him is Galahad.'

'Sir,' said the king, 'ye be right welcome and the young knight with
you.'

The old man made the young knight unarm him, and he was in a coat of
red sendal, and bare a mantle that was furred with ermine. Then was the
young man led by the reverend man to the Siege Perilous, and sat him
thereon, and men marvelled to see that the death-stroke did not flash
like lightning and slay him.

[Illustration: SIR GALAHAD IS BROUGHT TO THE COURT OF KING ARTHUR]

'Sir,' said the old man to him, 'wit ye well that that is your seat.
For you are he that shall surely achieve the Holy Graal, and such of
these your fellows as are pure in heart and humble shall achieve it
with you.'

'Sir,' said the king, 'if it may be that ye know, will ye tell us what
my knights must do to achieve the Holy Vessel, and thus bring peace
into my kingdom in place of war? For many of those that are kings and
barons under me are warring with each other, and threaten to rend this
island of Britain, and some are forsaking Christ and are turning to the
evil faith and cruel worship of the pagan gods of Britain. And it goeth
to my heart to know this, and I have much dread.'

'Sir king,' said the old white man, 'none may tell you what shall be
the end of this quest of the Holy Graal, but I can tell you and these
your knights what they must do to save this land from the ruin which
doth threaten it. Ye know that the Holy Vessel was that wherein Christ
ate the lamb on the Thursday before he was hung upon the Cross. And
Joseph of Arimathea did bring it here to Britain, and here hath it been
for more than four hundred and fifty winters. And while ye and your
kingdom did love Christ and did do His word, the Sangreal stayed within
your borders. But now ye war with each other, and are evil livers and
full of pride and mastery, and if ye do not repent and stay your
dishonour, then shall the Holy Vessel pass from Britain, and ruin and
death and civil war shall stalk through the land and leave it
desolate.'

Having spoken thus, the old man went from the hall, and none stayed
him; for too many there were who knew that they had been the evil
livers at whom his words had pointed.

Then uprose Sir Gawaine, who was a faithful knight and true man to his
king, though a proud one and a hasty. He was filled with sorrow for the
ruin that threatened his fair land.

'Now I do here avow,' he said, 'that to-morrow, without fail, I shall

set forth, and I shall labour with all the strength of my body and my
soul to go in quest of the Holy Graal, so that if I be fit to see it
and to bring it hither, this dear land may be saved from woe.'

So hot were his words that many of the better knights rose also, and
raising their right hands did make a like avowal; and those that cared
not for the quest felt that they must seem to do as the others did, and
so made avowal also, though in their hearts they thought more of pride
and earthly power.

'Gawaine, Gawaine,' cried the king, and the great tears stood in his
eyes, 'I know ye do right to avow this and to cause these others to
avow also; but a great dread is upon me, for I have great doubt that
this my fellowship shall never meet again.'

'Fear not,' said Lancelot, 'for bethink ye, my lord, in no better

adventure can we find death than in this quest, and of death we are all
sure.'

On the morrow the knights armed themselves, and bade farewell to King
Arthur and his queen, and there was much weeping and great sorrow. And
as the knights rode through the streets of Camelot the crowds stood and
wept, both rich and poor. All were full of dread to see so many brave
knights depart that never more would return.

Having passed through the gates of the town, every knight took the way
that he liked best.

Now Sir Galahad was without a shield, and he rode four days without
adventure. At evensong on the fourth day he came to an abbey of white
monks, and there was given great cheer. He found two other knights of
the Round Table at that abbey, the one King Bagdemagus and the other
Sir Ulfin; and the three had supper together, and made great cheer one
of the other, and spoke of the adventures each would desire to have.

'There is within this abbey, as men tell me, a shield,' said King
Bagdemagus, 'which no man may bear about his neck, but he is injured or
slain within three days. Yet to-morrow I will adventure to win it.'

In the morning, therefore, after they had heard mass, King Bagdemagus
asked the abbot to show him where was the shield. Then was he led to
the high altar in the church, and behind it was hung a shield which
glowed with shining whiteness, and in the middle thereof was a red
cross which seemed to quiver as if it were living.

'Sir,' said the abbot, 'this shield ought not to hang about any
knight's neck unless he be one of the three best knights of the world,
and I counsel you to beware.'

'No matter,' said King Bagdemagus, 'I will essay it, for though I am
not Sir Lancelot, yet I am a good knight enough.'

This he said in his pride, and took the shield and put the strap about
his neck, and bade good-bye to the other twain, and so went forth with
his squire.

They had not ridden but two miles or more, when at the opening to a
wood Sir Bagdemagus saw a knight in white armour on a horse, riding up
and down as if to do battle with any that should venture to go into the
forest drive.

When the white knight saw him he called out:

'Who art thou? Thou bearest the shield of a knight peerless, but not
the armour.'

'Who am I?' replied King Bagdemagus scornfully. 'I am he that shall

give a good account of myself with thee.'

With that he levelled his lance and ran furiously upon the knight. But
the other stood still, and when the spear-head was nigh his shield, he
lightly turned it aside, and as Sir Bagdemagus swept by, the knight,
with a quick fierce stroke of his sword, smote him so hard that the
blade bit through the mail even to the shoulder-bone; whereby Sir
Bagdemagus fell to the ground in a swoon.

The white knight called the squire to him and said:

'Bear ye this shield to the young knight, Sir Galahad, who is at the
white abbey. Greet him from me, and say that it is for him to wear this
shield, and none other. And tell him that I shall meet him erelong, if
God wills, and that we shall fare together to that which is appointed
for us.'

The squire did as he was bidden, and told Sir Galahad of the white
knight's words. Sir Galahad asked him what was the device upon the
shield of the white knight, and he answered, 'A red heart.' Then said
the young knight, 'It shall be even as he saith.'

Sir Galahad mounted his horse and rode alone, ever northward, for he
knew that the Holy Graal was hidden in a castle somewhere in the north
among the warring barons. Many days he rode without adventure, until on
a day he came to an old and venerable wood, dark and thick and close,
where the moss hung like thick beards from the hoary branches.

There, in a laund or glade in the midmost part of the forest, he found

an old and white dame, kneeling before a green cross beside the path,
weeping piteously as she prayed and beat her breast.

'What ails ye, lady?' asked Sir Galahad.

'Ah, good knight,' said the old dame, and as she rose it was well seen
she was of gentle birth, I weep for that I have lived to see the day
when sons of mine shall slay each the other. I have three sons, and all
are of the worshipful company of the Round Table. But two are wasteful
livers, and have taken from me all that whereby I lived; and ever hath
my youngest boy, Sir Hewlin, withstood their evil ways. Wherefore they
hated him. And yesterday did Sir Nulloth and Sir Dew, my elder sons,
return, and did quarrel with my dear lad Hewlin. And now I fear they go
about to slay him. Oh, if that they kill him, who is the prop and
comfort of my old age, I shall surely die.'

'Sad it is, lady,' said Sir Galahad, and mournful was his mind, 'to
think that in this dear land of Britain there should be knights that
are given to such thoughts of evil as to slay their own kin. Lead me to
them, I pray ye.'

He set the dame upon his saddle before him, and she led the way through
the forest. When they had gone but a mile she started, and stopped the
horse, and then they heard the sound of clashing steel. Sadly did that
poor lady shriek and cry:

'Ah! they slay him now! My dear son! My dear boy!'

Swiftly Sir Galahad made his horse to leap forward, and in a little
while they came upon a great meadow, where two knights on foot were
together fighting another single knight with swords. Forthwith Sir
Galahad cried with a loud and a stern voice, 'Hold, put up your swords,
ye evil brothers, that would slay each other!'

All turned at the cry. Then, seeing his mother, the young knight Sir
Hewlin threw down his sword. And leaping from Sir Galahad's horse the
reverend lady tottered to her youngest son and threw herself upon his
breast, and he clasped his mother in his arms.

But the two evil brothers laughed scornfully at Sir Galahad.

'Who art thou, thou knight in red?' they cried. 'Thinkest thou to
frighten us with thy big words?'

Quickly they mounted their horses and ran upon Sir Galahad together.
But the lance of one he received upon his shield, and the weapon
snapped in twain; and that of the other he thrust aside and, as the
knight thundered by, he brought down his sword, with so fierce and
wrathful a stroke, that the head of the knight flew from his shoulders.

Seeing this, the other, who was Sir Nulloth, made haste to throw
himself from his horse, and came and kneeled before Sir Galahad,
praying mercy.

'I know who ye are,' he said. 'You are Sir Galahad, the stainless
knight, who shall prevail in all thy deeds, and whom no weapon may
wound until ye have fulfilled your high destiny. And I will do
faithfully any behest ye may lay upon me.'

'I will then,' said Sir Galahad sternly, 'that thou makest peace with
thy mother and thy brother here instantly; that thou seekest naught of
them till thy dying day, which shall not be far from thee; and that
thou goest this day and place thyself in the service of Sir Bedevere,
or Sir Uriens upon the coasts, and help to thrust forth the hateful
pagan from the land.'

The knight swore to do all this, and after he had made his peace with
his kindred, he set forth to do Sir Galahad's bidding. And it was as
the stainless knight had foretold, for in seven days Sir Nulloth had
found death, bravely fighting the pagan pirates.

Sir Galahad went forward, sore of heart to think that such evil was in
the land and in men's minds, that any could be found to wish the death
of a brother and to care naught for the sorrow of an old mother.

Thus for many months Sir Galahad rode about the land, seeking out the
knights who, with their bands of soldiers, fought to wrest from each
other land and castles. And ever he strove to make peace between them,
and to show them how, while they fought with each other, Christian
against Christian, the pagan hordes were let unhindered into the land,
ravening, burning, and slaying.

Some of the battling knights did forsake their evil ways, and went to
Sir Bedevere and Sir Uriens, with whom they strove to push back the
fierce pagans into their long black ships. But many others, so lost to
honour and knightliness were they, performed not their promises, and
continued to fight each with the other.

So fierce, indeed, was the fighting through all that land, that the
peasants forsook the fields and hid themselves; and the pagans from the
northern wilderness came over the walls and wandered, killing and
burning and robbing. And thus in many parts the crops were not sown or
reaped, the wheat stood unharvested and wild, and the grass and weeds
grew tall on the very hearths of the poor peasants and husbandmen.

The heart of Sir Galahad grew sick, seeing the evil which was come into
the land, and he feared that soon the Holy Graal would be taken from
the island of Britain, and that then ruin would stalk throughout the
length and breadth of the realm.

Once, at the dawning, Sir Galahad looked from the door of a little
hermitage where he had passed the night, and was aware of a great
company of men coming over the moor. They were all horsed, and were
going towards the sea, which was on the right hand, where steep and
fearful cliffs fell sheer to the thundering surf beneath. And in their
midst he saw they held captive a full noble knight, who seemed wounded,
and whose armour was all broken and cracked, as if he had fought
valiantly before he had been overcome. Him they were going to hurl
headlong down the cliffs.

Sir Galahad began to arm himself full hastily to meet them. But as he
dressed his armour he was aware of a knight coming swiftly from a
little wood that lay towards the sea-edge. Then was the heart of Sir
Galahad exceeding joyful when he saw that the knight was all in white
armour, and that on his shield was the device of a heart; for he knew
that this was Sir Perceval.

Sir Perceval spurred towards the band of knights, and in a loud voice
called on them to release their captive.

'Who art thou?' they cried.

'I am a knight of the Pendragon of these islands, King Arthur,'

answered Perceval, 'and thy captive is my friend, Sir Bors of
Brittany.'

'Ha! ha!' the others laughed, and spurred furiously towards him. 'Slay
him!' they shouted. 'We own no Arthur here. We are our own lords.'
With spears in rest, seven of the knights thundered against Sir
Perceval. But by this time Sir Galahad was upon his horse, and, making
no outcry, he spurred upon the others.

Three knights he dashed to the ground with one lance-thrust; but then
the spear broke. Therewith he drew his sword, and smote in the thick of
them so furiously on the left and on the right that they could not
abide him, but fled from about Sir Bors, who, wresting a sword from one
of them, rode after the seven that were fighting Sir Perceval.

So valiantly and hardily did the three knights lay about them that in a
little while their enemies had fled, leaving more than half their
number slain.

Then did the three knights make great cheer and welcome of each other,
and told each their adventures, and promised that now they were
together they would never more part till death should summon them.

So, together, they fared thereafter many months, doing noble deeds, and
seeking earnestly to bring men's hearts to turn to friendship and
union, so that, united, the lords of the northern lands should turn
upon the pagans and destroy them utterly.

It befell that, on a morn, they came to a castle on a great cliff that

was in the marches of Scotland; and they heard a horn sound in that
castle and much shouting. On the walls thereof were men of a savage
aspect, peering and looking down at them. And those men had fair hair,
with steel helms which had great horns or wings upon them. On their
tall bodies were leather jerkins, with gold chains and many ornaments.

Then Sir Galahad and his friends were aware that on the topmost
pinnacle of the castle was a banner, floating and flapping in the
morning wind. Black was that banner, and in the midmost part thereof
was a golden raven, with beaks open as if it croaked, and its wings
were wide thrown, as if it flew over a field of slain men.

They knew that this was a horde of pagans who had wrested this castle
from its rightful lord, and that full fierce would be the battle.

Then from a hole or cave beneath a tree near by came a maiden, richly
dressed, but sad and pitiable of face and thin of form, as if from long
pining.

'Fair lords,' said she, 'for God His love turn again if ye may, or else
here ye will come unto your death.'

'Nay,' said Sir Galahad, 'we will not turn again, for He shall help us
in whose service we be entered in. Who are ye, fair damsel, in such
painful guise?'

'Fair lords, I am Issyllt,' said the maiden, and the tears filled her
eyes. 'My father is Earl Hernox, the lord of this castle. And whether
he be dead by torture at the hands of his hateful enemies and these
fiends, or whether he be still alive against a time when they have more
leisure to torture him, I know not. But three nights ago came certain
knights with a horde of these evil pagans, and stormed this castle, and
for all my dear father's valiant deeds, and the prowess of my three
dear brothers, they overcame our people, and my three brothers I saw
slain before my eyes. When they rushed upon my father, my nurse dragged
me away, and we fled hither. But I cannot go away, not knowing whether
my father is dead. And if he be dead I care not whether the pagan
fiends catch and slay me.'

'Fair maiden,' said Sir Galahad, 'be of good heart, for your father may
yet be delivered unto you.'

'Ha, fair lord, I know not how that may be,' said the maiden. Then,
glancing at the castle, she saw the portcullis yawn, and some ten
knights rush forth, with pagans besides on foot. Whereat she clasped
her hands in terror.

'Now God be with ye, fair lords,' she cried. 'You have my prayers, and
may Heaven grant ye victory. But dread is on me for your deaths, brave
knights.'

Full wrathful were the three good knights to hear the girl's sad tale,
and hard was their rage to hear that Christian knights had leagued
themselves with the heathen Saxons so as to get their aid in a private
quarrel with the Earl Hernox. Therefore, very joyously did Galahad and
Perceval leap forward, lances in rest, against the traitorous knights
that rushed towards them from the castle.

Marvellous indeed was it to see the deeds of those three stainless

knights that day; for when their lances were broken, they drew their
swords, and their wrath, their fierceness and their valour, none could
withstand.

While Sir Bors smote with deadly blows the pagans that swarmed about
him, Sir Galahad and Sir Perceval dealt death among the traitorous
knights, so that not one was left alive. And seeing this, the
fair-haired fierce pagans lost heart. Turning, they wished to flee into
the castle and pull down the portcullis.

But swiftly on their heels dashed the three brave knights, and the
pagans, never stopping, heard the hoofs of their horses thunder over
the drawbridge close behind them. The horde of Saxons took flight into
the hall, and there they stood and got breath. But the knights, leaping
from their horses, rushed in on foot, and back to back they met the
onslaught of the yelling heathens.

Very fierce was the anger in the hearts of the three knights, so that
they stayed not their hands even when the pirates gave way and fled
from the dreadful place of slaughter. But the knights pursued them
wheresoever they tried to hide, and hither and thither about the castle
they ran, and in and out the chambers, up and down the stairs, until
for very weariness they had perforce to cease.

Then when they beheld the great multitude of pagans they had slain,
they were sobered and sad, thinking themselves great sinners.

'Certes,' said Sir Bors, 'I ween that God willed that we should slay so
many, for they must have done great evil.'

'They are indeed foul pagans,' said Sir Galahad, 'and have done great
wrong and cruelty in their time to women and little children through
this fair land of Britain. But I doubt we have been mad this little
while to slay so many mothers' sons as these.'
Then from out a secret chamber came a priest, white with great age, and
with a countenance that shone marvellously bright; and when he saw how
many were slain in that hall, he was abashed. Sir Galahad put off his
helm, and the two knights with him, and all three kneeled down and
confessed the madness of their sin which had slain even those that
craved for quarter.

'Ye have done more than ye wist, brave knights,' said the priest, when
he had absolved them; 'for the evil knights that led these pagan
thieves had plotted to gain this castle because of the great and holy
treasures that are hidden here. And by a prophecy I know that ye are
the three good knights, peerless among all, who should achieve this
deed. Therefore, when ye have ordered these slain to be removed, and
when the hall shall be garnished and your harness shall be cleaned of
the signs of battle, ye shall see that which hath been ordained for
ye.'

When all had been done as they had commanded, and the place well
cleansed and fresh rushes laid along the floor, the three knights sat
on a bench, and the Earl Hernox and the maid Issyllt with them, and
there was much cheer and rejoicing between them all.

Then the old priest called the earl and his daughter from the room, and
left the three knights together. Suddenly, as they sat talking, the
doors were shut and the windows were darkened, and a great wind arose
with a sad sound, wailing and piping. Then the darkness suddenly went
away, and they saw a great light shining in the midmost part of the
hall, so bright and strong that hardly could their eyes suffer it. Soon
through the light they could see a table of silver, whereon was a wide
dish also of silver, marvellously and delicately wrought.

Then the doors opened and they saw angels entering; and two bare
candles of wax, and the third held a towel, and in the hand of the
fourth was a spear which bled marvellously from the point thereof.
Going to the table the angels set the candles and the towel upon it,
and the spear was placed beside the shining vessel.

Of a sudden the knights were aware that there sat one beside the table
who was marvellously old and white; and he was dressed in the habit of
a bishop, and his face was very winning, and a great brightness flowed
from it.

On the breast of his robe were words in the Latin tongue, which said,
'Lo, I am Joseph, the first bishop of Christendom, who did take our
Lord's body down from the cruel rood.'

The three marvelled greatly, for that bishop had been dead more than
four hundred years. Seeing their looks of perplexity, the bishop smiled
sweetly upon them, and said:

'Marvel not, O knights, for though I am now a spirit, I know thy

weakness, and have come to aid thee.'

Then the bishop took up the shining vessel from the table, and came to
Galahad; and the knight kneeled down and took of the food that was
within the holy dish. And after that the other two received it. Of
marvellous savour was the food, and like none that they had ever eaten
or thought of at any time before.
Then the bishop said to Galahad:

'Son, knowest thou what is this vessel I hold in my hands?'

'Nay, holy man, I know not,' replied Galahad.

'It is the holy vessel which men call the Sangreal, out of which our
Lord ate the lamb at the feast before He was betrayed to that death
upon the rood whereby He redeemed the world, if men would but choose
His gentle law.'

'It is what we have most desired to see, holy father,' said Sir
Galahad.

'And it is what, alas, no others in this realm shall ever see,' said
the bishop; and his countenance, which before had been sweet and
gentle, now saddened and was dark. 'For this night it shall depart from
this land of Logris, so that it shall never more be seen here.

'Alas,' cried Galahad and Perceval, 'that is great sorrow to hear. O

holy bishop and spirit, say not that it means that this land shall be
rent in ruin and given up to heathendom again?'

'It must be so,' said the bishop sadly. 'Christ is not served in
gentleness, nor is His law worshipped in this land, where men slay
their brothers, rob their kindred, and make treaties with the pagans.
And its knights are turned to evil livers, desiring mastery and proud
power. Therefore hath Christ sent me to disinherit this land of this
holy thing with which He hath honoured it since that time when I
brought it here four hundred and fifty-five winters ago.'

Hearing these words of doom, Sir Galahad and Sir Perceval wept full
piteously for the fate of their country. When they had mourned greatly,
they asked if there was no hope of turning the land from its evil ways.

'There is none,' said the bishop sorrowfully. 'Have ye three not tried
manfully these last two years since ye have sought that which ye now
see? And all thy labours, thy battling, thy griefs, have they availed
aught? No, it is the will of God that in due time this land and this
people shall be put into the melting-pot. And when the season appointed
shall come, sorrow and death, rebellion and treachery shall stalk
through the land, and naught shall stand of its present kingdoms; the
pagans shall blot out the holy memory of God and Christ, and shall turn
the fanes of prayer into the lairs of wolves, and owls shall rest where
hymns of praise have been sung. And no wars of goodly knights may
hinder these things of dreadful doom. But I have this message for ye
two, Galahad and Perceval; that inasmuch as ye have seen this which you
craved to see, and have lived purely and unspotted from pride or evil,
thy souls shall go with me when I shall depart. But you, my son,' he
said, looking at Sir Bors, 'still find in your heart the love of kin,
and a longing for battle, and so you shall remain, to fight for Christ
while yet you are alive.'

Suddenly a fierce light came where
as one blinded for a time. When it
Sir Galahad and Sir Perceval still
if in prayer. But there was naught
spear, nor was Joseph there.
they sat, so that Sir Bors kneeled
had passed, he looked and saw where
kneeled, with their hands lifted as
to see of the holy vessel or the
Then, going to the two knights, he found that they were dead.

Sir Bors knew then that their souls had gone with Joseph and the holy
vessel, and had been borne to the heaven for which their pure and
humble hearts had yearned while yet they lived.

Then Sir Bors made great sorrow for his two fellows, and knew that
never more would he be as joyful or as careless as he had been. With
right heavy mood he craved of Earl Hernox to have a grave dug deep in
the living rock whereon the castle was builded. This the earl gladly
did, and very solemnly the two good knights were buried, and long did
Sir Bors mourn over the grave.

In a little while thereafter Sir Bors armed himself, and departed, and
after many adventures, rode southwards till he came to Camelot. And
there he told the king and such knights as there were, how the two
stainless knights had achieved the Holy Graal, and how their souls had
been taken up with the sacred vessel.

All the court mourned for the two knights, and the king commanded a
history to be written of what Sir Bors had told. It was so done, and
the book richly adorned with many coloured letters, was kept in the
great treasure-chest in the castle of Sarum.

Ever after Sir Bors was a silent man, for he could not forget the holy
and terrible sight he had seen. Of the doom which was coming in due
time upon the dear and fair land of Britain, as was prophesied by St.
Joseph, he told no man, but kept the words fast locked in his heart.

XI

OF THE PLOTS OF SIR MORDRED; AND HOW SIR LANCELOT SAVED THE QUEEN

After the quest of the Sangreal was completed, and all the knights that
were left alive had returned to the court of King Arthur, there was
great joy among the people, and the king and Queen Gwenevere were
passing glad of the remnant that had come home again.

Especially did the queen make much of Sir Lancelot and of Sir Bors his
cousin, for they were the two most noble and courteous knights of the
Round Table, and none thought of them but as men peerless and beyond
compare.

Sir Mordred, who was the king's nephew, was jealous of the two knights,
and went about privily among such knights as were his familiars, and
spoke sneering words concerning Sir Lancelot and the queen and Sir
Bors. Once Sir Mordred said such words in the hearing of his brother
Sir Gawaine; but that knight so heavily and wrathfully took him to
task, that Sir Mordred knew that Sir Gawaine envied not the two
knights, and could never be brought to think other than friendly
thoughts of them.

Therefore Sir Mordred hated the two knights more than ever. Of a slight
frame was Mordred, but tall, with dark hair, sallow face, and deep-set
grey eyes beside a thin long nose. Few loved him, for he was never
cheery nor very friendly, and ever seemed to sneer with his thin lips
and his cold wolfish eyes.

In a little while strange dark rumours began to go about the court, and
it was whispered that so proud had Sir Lancelot become of his fame and
prowess, that he harboured evil thoughts against the king, and that he
aimed to make a kingdom for himself out of the countries that lay about
his own lands of Joyous Gard in the northern marches.

Then fresh rumours went about, and these were the most evil of all. It
was said that he sought to slay the king, and wished to make Gwenevere
his own queen, and with her he would rule over all Britain.

First, men laughed and passed the rumours with a shrug and a gesture of
scorn; but when they were repeated again and again, some began half to
believe them. Many said that there must be some truth therein, for Sir
Lancelot was ever wending his way to the north country, and fought
there many battles and overcame many knights.

But others said this was because many ladies
lands and homes and been evilly oppressed by
those parts, had heard of his great fame for
manners, and came beseeching him to be their
had robbed them.
and damsels, who had lost
the warring barons in
knightly deeds and noble
champion against those who

Others said that it was but natural that when he was at the court he
should speak much to the queen, for he had from the first vowed himself
to be her knight, and many deeds of daring and prowess had he done for
her.

Yet others there were who believed that what rumour said might be true;
and others, who were good and noble knights, sorrowed to think that
such evil thoughts should be spread about by some treacherous tongues.

When men came to ask who had set these evil tongues to wag, it was
always found that a certain mean knight, named Sir Pinel, had first
spoken wrong of Lancelot and Sir Bors and the queen. And men noticed
that it was not long before the queen began to look coldly at Sir
Pinel, and then they knew that his rumours had reached her ears.

'What profit doth Sir Pinel think to gain from those false tales of
her?' said Sir Brastias one day, as he and Sir Gareth came from the
hawking together. 'For none ever reckoned him as a knight of any merit,
and all good men will now think less of him.'

'I fear me,' said Sir Gareth, 'that there is more beneath it all than
we wot of. Sir Pinel is a bosom friend of Sir Mordred's. Often have I
seen their heads together in places apart. And though he is my brother,
Sir Mordred is one I cannot love.'

'What fear you, Gareth?' asked Sir Brastias.

'I fear naught that he may do,' said Gareth, 'but I think he hates Sir
Lancelot and he hates Gawaine also, the chief of our party, because he
hath roundly told Mordred that he is a traitor, and that he will not be
drawn from his firm friendship with Sir Lancelot and his kinsmen. I
think Sir Mordred would do much to cause some ill to Gawaine or Sir
Lancelot, so long as his own evil body was not hurt.'
'Sad it is,' said Brastias full gloomily, 'to think a man of such great
kin should harbour hatred and murder against the chief of his kin. And
that such should be, methinks, betokens that evil is about to fall upon
our famous brotherhood of the Round Table, and on this dear land of
Britain.'

Now it befell that the poor queen had heard, through her maidens, of
the rumours concerning herself and Sir Lancelot, and, taking counsel of
no one, she bethought how she could prove to the remnant of the Round
Table that she was free of any plots against the king or the fair
kingdom of Britain.

She resolved that she would invite the knights to a privy dinner, and
when they had eaten she would throw herself upon their knightly pity
and honour, telling them how the evil rumours wronged and hurt her
bitterly. And she doubted not that thus their manly sympathy and
worship of her, their queen, would, by her words, cast out the evil
effects of the slanderous tales.

Therefore, at that dinner, she had Sir Gawaine and his brethren, that
is to say, Sir Gareth, Sir Agravaine, Sir Gaheris and Sir Mordred. Also
there were the kin of Sir Lancelot, to wit, Sir Bors, Sir Blamore, Sir
Bleobaris, Sir Ector de Maris, and Sir Lionel. But Sir Lancelot had
gone into the Scottish marches, to do battle with a notable robber and
oppressor there. There were other knights, making in all the number of
twenty-four. And these were all the remnant of the one hundred and
fifty that had gone forth in the Quest of the Sangreal.

Among the guests were Sir Pinel and his cousin, Sir Mador.

Now Sir Gawaine had a custom of eating apples which he used daily at
dinner and at supper. He loved all manner of fruit, and in especial a
certain brown or russet apple, which was called Afal Coch. Every one
knew of this fondness of Sir Gawaine's, and whoever dined or feasted
him took care to provide such apples for his pleasure.

The queen had known this, and among the fruit for the table she had
ordered such apples to be placed.

Now Sir Mordred, as Sir Gareth had suspected, hated Sir Gawaine with a
deep hatred, and therefore he had, by crafty dealing, taken all the
russet apples from the dish except one, and into this he had thrust a
deadly poison. He guessed that, as every one knew of Sir Gawaine's
fondness for that sort of fruit, no one would take it, but would leave
it for Sir Gawaine, who would eat it and die thereof.

When the feast was near an end, and men laughed and jested together,
the dish of fruit was handed round, and Sir Pinel, the mean knight,
noticed that there was but one of the apples which Sir Gawaine loved;
and to spite that knight, whom he hated, he took that apple, ere the
dish went to Sir Gawaine.

Sir Mordred saw him take it, yet would not cry out to warn his
fellow-traitor, for this would have revealed himself. He saw Sir
Pinel's teeth sink into the brown apple, and Sir Pinel's sneering look
as he glanced across at Sir Gawaine, who was searching vainly in the
dish for his favourite fruit.
Then Sir Mordred saw Sir Pinel's face go red, and then deadly white.
And as the poison gripped him, Sir Pinel rose shrieking from the table,
crying out that some enemy had poisoned him.

Then he sank writhing to the ground, shrieking and moaning, clutching

at the ground and at the legs of the chairs. Suddenly, with a great
groan, he lay still and was dead.

Every knight leaped from the table, ashamed, full of rage and fear,
nigh out of their wits, but dumb. They looked at each other and then at
the dead Sir Pinel, and all their eyes kept from the face of the queen,
where she sat on the high seat, with two of her ladies beside her.

The reason they could not speak was that they knew the queen had heard
of the evil tales which Sir Pinel had spread about her, and that she
must have hated him bitterly. And she had made this feast, and had
invited him thereto, and now he was dead at the board, by means of
deadly poison placed in the food which she had set before him.

Then for very shame some began to leave the chamber; and others could
not bear to look upon the queen, who sat with a face that went now
pale, now red. She had seen what happened, and who it was had been
slain, and she had read the suspicion in men's gestures.

Then the voice of Sir Mador rang out, and checked men from going from
the room, and drew all eyes to where he stood, a tall and burly man,
red and angry of face, and fierce of eyes.

'Look!' he cried, and held between his fingers and high above his head
the apple which Sir Pinel had bitten, 'this is the thing whereof my
kinsman, Sir Pinel, hath lost his life. The matter shall not end here,
for I have lost a noble knight of my blood, and I will be revenged to
the uttermost.'

Then, turning, he savagely looked at the queen, and with fierce rolling
eyes he roared out:

'Thou art the murderess! Thou--the queen! Hear me, knights and
chieftains. I charge the queen with the murder of my kinsman, Sir
Pinel, and justice upon her will I have.'

Every one in the hall stood still as if they were of stone. None could
gainsay him, none could utter a word on behalf of the queen, for all
had suspicion that she had slain Sir Pinel for his slanders of her.

Then suddenly the queen rose, white and trembling.

'My lords and knights, I did not cause it!' she cried in a broken
voice. 'I am innocent! I know not how it came!'

And therewith she fell down in a swoon.

Sir Mordred's pale face smiled with a bitter sneer. He knew not then
whether what had happened would help his evil plots or no; but he
resolved to say naught, and so went out with all the other silent
knights, whilst the ladies of the queen took her up lamenting, and bore
her to her chamber.

With the noise and the sorrow that was in the court, King Arthur came
and craved to know what was the matter; but none of the silent knights
would speak until he met Sir Gawaine, who replied, and said:

'Sir, the queen did invite us to a privy feast with her. And one of the
knights did eat of the fruit on the table, and he is dead by poison.
Therefore, I dread lest the queen will be shamed for this.'

King Arthur was passing heavy at the hearing of these words, and went
unto the queen to comfort her.

On the next day, when the king sat in hall with his two court judges,
as was his wont daily, to hear any causes or charges which might be
brought before him, all men stood with gloomy faces, and there was no
laughing and jesting talk, as was usual at this time.

Sir Mador came forward and charged the queen of murder, and required
that justice should be done upon her.

The king heard him with a sad face and in silence. Then he said:

'Fair lords and noble knights, heavy is my grief for this, and rather
would I give my life for my queen at this moment than that my tongue
should frame so evil a charge against my dear wife and your noble
queen. But I am here to see that law is done, as justly to the highest
as to the lowest. I doubt not that God will soon clear her of this
seeming evil.'

'I know not how that may be,' said Sir Mador angrily, 'for the evil
deed is clear to any man's eyes.'

'I deem this deed was never done by my queen, nor by her desire,' said
the king sternly, 'but by some traitor that would do her evil and
wishes to see her die. But as I am her judge, I may not be her champion
and fight against you for her fair fame. I doubt not, however, that
some good knight will take this charge upon himself, and put his body
in jeopardy for my queen. For if this be not done, dost thou know what
is the penalty?'

'She must be burnt,' said Mador sullenly. 'But she hath done the deed
and will merit the doom.'

'Cease, hasty man,' said King Arthur sternly; 'it goeth to my heart to
hear ye pronounce the doom thou wouldst visit upon that fair lady. Fear
not, Sir Mador, she shall find some good knight to do combat for her.
Therefore do thou name thy day of battle.'

'But hark ye, lord,' said Sir Mador, 'there is none of the
four-and-twenty knights that were bidden to this dinner that hath not
suspicion of the queen for this deed. Therefore, no knight can take
this charge upon him in her behalf. What say ye, my lords?'

He turned to the silent, moody men about the dais.

The knights looked troubled, and were dumb for some moments; but at the
last Sir Gawaine said:

'We cannot excuse the queen, for she gave the feast. And either the
poison came by her will or by her servants.'
But most of the knights were silent, and Sir Bors and his kindred were
very sorrowful. King Arthur was heavy at the words of Sir Gawaine.

'Now, king,' cried Sir Mador triumphantly, 'I require ye, as ye be a

righteous king, give me a day that I may have justice.'

'That will I do,' said the king, 'as I must do, that am a just king. I
give you this day fifteen days, that ye be ready armed on horseback in
the meadow beside the wall at London; and if it so fall out that there
be a knight to encounter with you, then God speed the right; and if
there be no knight to take arms for my queen, then must she suffer by
fire.'

So sorrowful were the king's words that many knights had much ado to
keep from weeping.

'And meanwhile,' said Sir Mador, 'I do require that ye keep the queen
in close ward and prison, lest any try a rescue, and thus defeat the
justice that is my due.'

Though it went to the king's heart to have to order this, he gave the
queen into the keeping of Sir Kay, who kept her in her chamber, guarded
by three knights, to the great grief of her women and all the court.

Then the queen sent for Sir Bors, and when he was come she threw
herself on her knees full piteously before him, and wept sorely, and
begged that he would save her from this dreadful death.

'For by my confession unto Heaven,' she cried, 'I know naught of this
wicked deed how it was brought about. And will ye not take this combat
upon ye for my sake? For I am sure if your kinsman, Sir Lancelot, was
here, he would not suffer this evil suspicion to lie against me. For he
hath ever been my most faithful knight, but now am I without friend in
this great pass.'

'Madam,' replied Sir Bors, 'what can I do? For if I take this charge
upon me for your sake, men will say I was your aider in this crime that
they charge upon you. And I see not how I may fight for you except by
endangering my own life without saving yours. But I tell ye, madam,
what I will do. I will hasten with all speed to the north, trusting in
God to get news of Sir Lancelot, so that I may tell him and bring him
here within the time appointed.'

'Ah, good Sir Bors,' cried the queen, and clasped his hands. 'Do ye do
that, for I know that Sir Lancelot will never believe me guilty of so
great a crime. And I will pray hourly that ye find him and bring him to
me in time, so that my poor body be not unjustly given to the dreadful
flames.'

Forthwith Sir Bors armed himself, and with two squires set forth
instantly; and sent his men in different ways, so that among the three
they should not fail to hear where, in the northern marches, a knight
so famous as Sir Lancelot might be found.

No rest did the good Sir Bors give to himself, but swiftly did he ride
hither and thither questioning all knights whom he met, and inquiring
of every hermitage and abbey and at every harbourage. Finally, when
eleven days had passed of the fifteen, he found Sir Lancelot lying
wounded at a broken abbey, from which, in a fierce fight, he had but
two days before thrust out a band of pagans, who would have murdered
the nuns and robbed the church of its holy relics.

Full wroth was Sir Lancelot when, having lovingly greeted each other,
Sir Bors told him all that had passed with the queen.

'The foul traitors!' he cried, and, getting fiercely from the pallet on
which he lay, he strode up and down the chamber clenching his hands and
gnashing his teeth. 'Do any dare to suspect her--do any think in cold
blood to see that peerless lady bound to the stake, the flames
devouring her noble person? That men should think such things, and move
not a hand in noble wrath, shows how evil are the days in which we
live!'

Then he rushed from the room,
wrath, he ordered his arms to
And to the gentle persuasions
he must stay a wrong that, if
unquenchable shame and ruin.'
wounded as he was; and, full of a cold
be brought and his horse to be saddled.
of the nuns he said he must be gone, 'for
suffered, would sink the kingdom in

Then with Sir Bors he rode southwards, full fiercely, and never resting
to eat, but taking food as he rode. At night he would not doff his
armour, but slept beside his horse; and seldom spoke, but was consumed
as by a great fire of anger.

And on the fourteenth day they rode into London.

'Go beg the queen to see me,' he said to Sir Bors.

Sir Bors went, and Sir Lancelot strode unto an hostelry to wash from
himself the stains of travel, and to don a fitting robe in which to
appear before the queen.

Now it had befallen, while Sir Bors had been absent from the court
seeking for Sir Lancelot, that Sir Mordred and Sir Agravaine had made a
plot with each other against him and against Sir Lancelot. And they
caused it to be noised in all the court that Sir Bors had gone to seek
Sir Lancelot, and that Sir Bors was privy to the plots which Sir
Lancelot and the queen had made to wrest the kingdom from King Arthur
and to reign together in his stead. They said that Sir Bors had gone to
warn Sir Lancelot that the time was ripe to strike.

Wherefore many knights were greatly displeased to hear this news, but
some would not believe it, and said that Sir Bors had gone to tell Sir
Lancelot of the jeopardy in which the queen's life was placed, and to
ask him to do battle for her.

'But,' said some, 'if he do not find Sir Lancelot, it is his intention
to do combat for the queen himself, and that is great wrong in Sir
Bors, for he was with us at the feast, and none but she could have
caused that poison.'

Daily the party which inclined to Sir Mordred and Sir Agravaine gained
power, and some were for going to tell the king of the evil designs
which Sir Lancelot and Sir Bors and the queen had against his person
and the kingdom. But Sir Mordred said, 'No, the time is not yet ripe.
Wait a while.'

The guard that was set about the queen's chamber was doubled, and all
were knights that were well-willers to the plots of Sir Mordred and Sir
Agravaine.

When, therefore, Sir Bors came and asked to see the queen, they let him
go to her; but Sir Agravaine hid himself and listened to all that
passed between Sir Bors and the queen. Then he went and told the others
that Sir Lancelot was waiting to speak to the queen, and he counselled
that they should let him come, and then when he came forth again, as he
would be unarmed, they could fall upon him and capture him, and take
him before the king and charge him with his treason and his plots.

And with the consent of Sir Mordred this was so agreed; and he advised
that most of them should hide from before the door, so that Sir
Lancelot should not think the guard was strong.

'For,' said Sir Mordred, 'if he sees there is no great watch kept, he
may strive to free the queen, and when we take him it will be blacker
against him.'

When, therefore, Sir Bors came forth from his audience with the queen,
he found but one knight at the door, and that was Sir Petipace of
Winchelsea, a young man. Sir Bors wondered why the guard of ten or
twelve that had been there before was now gone, and he was uneasy in
his mind.

Going to Sir Lancelot, he told him that the queen would see him at
once; 'but,' added Sir Bors, 'ye shall not go this night by my counsel,
nor should you go before there are more of our kinsmen near us to aid
us in case of need.'

'Why?' said Sir Lancelot.

'Sir,' said Sir Bors, 'I misdoubt me of Sir Agravaine and Sir Mordred.
There was a great watch before the door of the queen's room when I
entered; but when I came hence there was but one. And I mistrust them
that stood there. For all were of Sir Mordred's evil company, and
peradventure they lay some snare for you, and I dread me sore of
treachery.'

'Have ye no doubt,' said Sir Lancelot, 'for I shall go and come again
and make no tarrying.'

'Sir,' replied his cousin, 'that me sore repenteth. But if you will, I
will go and seek some of our kinsmen to meet us near by. And do you not
go until I have found them.'

'Nay, I will not stay,' said Sir Lancelot, 'and I marvel me much why ye
say this, for they dare do naught against me.'

'God speed you well,' said Sir Bors, 'if that is your will, and send
you safe and sound again.'

Sir Lancelot departed, taking his sword underneath his arm, while Sir
Bors went forth to find some of their kin. He learned, however, that
many of them had gone forth with the king to punish a bandit lord in
the forest of the Weald, and would not return before the morrow, when
the combat should be held for the queen.

Sir Lancelot came to the door of the queen's prison, and found Sir
Petipace there, and demanded to be let in to see the queen.

'We thought you were in the north, Sir Lancelot,' said the young
knight, with a laugh, 'and surely it will pleasure our lady queen to
see you.'

He unlocked the door of the queen's antechamber, and told her

waiting-woman that Sir Lancelot would see the queen, and in a few
moments Sir Lancelot was let in. The sorrowing queen told him all that
had happened, and how, and he was wroth to think that any one should
suspect her of so great a crime. He promised that on the day appointed
he would fight for her with all his strength, as a true knight should,
and God would defend the right.

Suddenly, as they spoke together, there came loud voices crying outside
the chamber door:

'Traitor knight, Sir Lancelot du Lake, now art thou taken in thy
treachery!'

Sir Lancelot knew that the voices were those of Sir Agravaine, who had
ever been envious of him, and of Sir Mordred, whom no one loved. He
went quickly to the door and barred it with the beam, and bade the
terrified queen not to be alarmed. He asked her whether there was any
armour in the room, which he could put on to defend himself.

'I have none,' she said, weeping sorely, 'wherefore I dread me sore
that evil will come to you, my true and valiant knight, for I hear by
their noise there be many strong knights, wherefore ye are like to be
slain soon, and then shall I surely burn.'

'Alas!' said Sir Lancelot, 'in all my life was I never in such a pass,
to be slain for lack of my armour.'

'Traitor knight,' cried those that were hammering at the door with the
handles of their swords, 'come out at once and skulk there no more, for
know ye well thou art so beset that thou shalt not escape.'

Sir Lancelot went to the queen and, kneeling to her, took her hand and
kissed it, saying:

'Madam, I beseech you to pray for my soul if I be slain. I have been

your true knight with all my power up to this time, and now I will not
fail you if I may; but if I be slain, I am assured that my kinsman Sir
Bors and all the others of my kin will not suffer you to go to the
fire.'

Then Sir Lancelot, leaving the weeping queen, wrapped his mantle round
his left arm as if it were a shield, and prepared to sell his life
dearly. By this time the knights outside had got a bench from the hall,
and using it as a battering-ram, were dashing it against the door to
beat it in.

'Leave your noise, fair lords,' rang out the voice of Lancelot, 'and I
will open the door to ye, and then ye may do to me what ye will.'

'Do it then,' they cried, 'and we will give you your life until we take
thee to King Arthur, to be judged for your treason.'
Sir Lancelot unbarred the door and held it open a little way, so that
one knight only might enter at a time. One entered, a big slow man,
named Sir Colgreve, and swiftly Sir Lancelot slammed the door and
fastened it, to keep the others out.

Sir Colgreve turned and struck at Sir Lancelot; but the latter put the
stroke lightly aside with his sword, and gave so swift and keen a blow
upon the other's helm that Sir Colgreve fell down dead.

Then, while the others hammered and yelled outside the door, Sir
Lancelot swiftly took off the armour of the dead knight, and with the
help of the queen and her waiting-women was armed in it.

Again the knights outside had begun to dash at the door to beat it
down. Sir Lancelot, when he was armed, strode to it and cried out:

'Let be your noise, and go away, for ye shall not prison me this night.
And I promise ye, by my knighthood, that I will appear to-morrow before
the king, and then such of ye as dare may accuse me of treason, and I
will then prove that I am a true man and no traitor.'

'Fie on thee, false traitor,' cried Sir Agravaine and Sir Mordred, 'but
we will have thee this night and slay thee.'

'Then, sirs,' replied Sir Lancelot, 'if ye will not take my counsel,
look well to yourselves.'

With that Sir Lancelot threw the door open suddenly, and while the
others struggled and tripped over the bench between them he had run two
of them through.

Then in that narrow antechamber there was as fierce a fight as ever

brave knight might wish to see. Sir Mordred from behind urged on the
others with evil words, telling them to slay Sir Lancelot; while he
launched at that knight all manner of foul names.

Fiercely did Sir Lancelot fight, for he was full of rage; and as in the
narrow place in which he stood, no more than two could come at him at
once, he could not be overwhelmed by their numbers. There were ten of
them, and so full of force were his blows and so skilful his thrusts,
that in a little while seven lay slain, two were badly wounded, and the
last, who was Sir Mordred, barely escaped with his life, and bore a
deep wound with him.

Sir Lancelot, sorely wounded, returned to the queen, and said:

'Madam, I know not what is this treason with which they charge me; but
I doubt not it will go ill with me, for I have killed many of the kin
of the king and of Sir Gawaine this night. And I misdoubt me that the
king himself will be my foe also. Nevertheless, I will save you, if it
is in my power, from the danger that threatens you.'

'Go ye, Sir Lancelot,' the queen besought him, 'ere the men-at-arms
come, which are so many ye may never hope to escape them. I dread me
sorely that much ill will come of this, and of the evil plots which our
enemies weave about us.'

Then, kneeling, Sir Lancelot kissed the queen's hand, and went from the
prison; and the people who had assembled outside at the noise of the
fighting wondered to see only one knight issue forth, his armour dented
and broken, and dabbled here and there with the blood of his wounds.

Sir Lancelot took his way to the lodging of Sir Bors, who showed his
great gladness to see him again. And when he had been unarmed and his
wounds stanched and bound, Sir Lancelot told him what had befallen him.

'And now I beseech you,' said Sir Lancelot, 'be of good heart, in
whatever great need we stand, for now I fear war must come of it all.
But what is the treason they would charge me with I know not; yet I
dread it meaneth much evil plotting against me and the peace of this
fair kingdom.'

'Sir,' said Sir Bors, 'your enemies and those that envy your great fame
have spread many evil reports about you. They say that you plot to slay
the king and to take Queen Gwenevere to wife, to reign over this
kingdom with you.'

With that Sir Lancelot was so astounded that for some moments he could
not speak. Then he said:

'By my confession unto Heaven, this is as foul a plot against me as

ever fiend could fashion. And it showeth how far they will go to pull
me down and dishonour me. And doth the king know of these evil
rumours?'

'I know not,' replied Sir Bors, 'but I doubt not that Sir Mordred will
not rest his horse till he hath found the king and poisoned his mind
against thee.'

'Had I known of this,' said Sir Lancelot, 'I would have brought the
queen away with me and put her in a safe place, for now I know that her
enemies and mine will not rest until she and I be slain.'

But Sir Bors counselled him not to attempt a rescue then, for day was
breaking, the town was awake, and the court would be full of the armed
retainers of the slain knights.

Then, while Sir Lancelot rested himself, Sir Bors went out to the
lodgings of such of his kinsmen as might not be gone with the king, and
he found that now all had returned to London with the king, that Sir
Mordred had met them on their way, and had told King Arthur of the
fight, and had, moreover, charged Sir Lancelot and the queen with
conspiring together to gain the crown.

Sad indeed was Sir Bors to hear this; but, going about the town, he got
together the kinsmen of Sir Lancelot and such of his friends as would
cast in their lot with him in so weighty and terrible a thing as civil
war. By seven of the clock he had got together good and valiant knights
to the number of fourscore, all horsed and armed.

Then he told them to betake themselves to a privy place in a wood

beyond the city walls to the north, and there in a little while came
Sir Lancelot with Sir Bors, and held counsel with them. He told them
all that had befallen him in the fight with the twelve knights, and
they in their turn related how Sir Mordred had met them and had told
his evil tales against the queen and Lancelot, and how for long the
king was too wroth and too sad to listen. But afterwards, when Sir
Mordred told how Sir Pinel, who had spoken of these things, had been
poisoned at the feast given by the queen, King Arthur had wept, and
then was very stern and quiet and said no word more.

'Now, my lords,' said Sir Lancelot, when they had done speaking, 'ye
know well how evil are these plots, how baseless are these foul rumours
against me. But now they have been launched against me, and I have
slain men on account of them, I fear we shall be hard put to it to get
peace again. Those men were set on to betray me; and I doubt not mine
enemies will have the queen burnt, to revenge themselves upon her and
upon me. Therefore, fair lords, what counsel do ye give?'

'Sir,' said Sir Bors, when they had spoken together a little, 'we think
there is but one thing to be done first: that ye knightly rescue the
queen, if your enemies force the king to put her to the stake. For if
she be burnt, then it would be to your shame, seeing that you vowed
yourself her true knight when she came, a young fair bride, to our
king, twenty years agone. And in whatsoever way ye would rescue her, ye
may count upon us to our last breath.'

With a great shout all the other knights raised their right hands in
the air and cried: 'Yea! yea!'

Then, by the advice of Sir Lancelot, they kept hidden in the little
wood, while one went into the city to learn what was being done, and in
what manner the queen was to be treated.

Meanwhile, in the hall of the palace of King Arthur, men sat or stood
with anxious looks, glancing in silence at the king, as he walked up
and down apart, with a stern look on his face.

Then Sir Mador strode forward and said:

'Lord, I do require you to perform your promise to me, to wit, that the
queen be brought to the stake, unless one be found to do combat on her
behalf.'

'What I have promised I will fulfil,' said the king; and men sorrowed
to see how heavy of anguish were his looks, and full of sorrow his
words.

'Lord king,' said Sir Mordred, 'we have shamefully suffered much wrong
at the hands of Sir Lancelot. I appeal to thee that he be seized, so
that the kin of those whom he slew this last night may have vengeance
upon him.'

Then came Sir Gawaine forward quickly, and his face was dark with anger
and his words hot.

'Lord,' he cried, 'listen not to such tales, for I doubt not it was
only by evil plots that Sir Lancelot was forced to slay those whom he
slew. For I trust not Sir Mordred.'

'So God us help,' said Sir Gareth and Sir Gaheris, 'we too will not be
known to be of the same mind as our brother Sir Mordred.'

'Then will I do as I deem it best, to gain what I deem right,' replied

Sir Mordred.

'I believe that thou wilt do it in thine own hidden ways,' said Sir
Gawaine, and looked fiercely at his brother, 'for in all unhappiness
and evil thou art to be found, if men but seek in the darkest place and
look for the most secret foe.'

'I appeal to you, lord,' said Sir Mordred to the king, 'to proclaim Sir
Lancelot a false traitor to you and to your realm.'

'And I,' said Sir Gawaine, 'will bid ye remember, lord king, that if ye
will make war between us and Sir Lancelot, there will be many kings and
great lords hold with him. And I would ask you, how many times hath Sir
Lancelot done noble deeds on our behalf and proved himself the best
knight of us all? Did he not rescue twenty of us from the dungeons of
Sir Turquine? Hath he not avenged shame upon the king and the queen,
and the fame of the Round Table many a time? Methinketh, my uncle, that
such kind deeds should be well remembered.'

'Think ye,' said the king, 'that I am not loath to begin so evil and
terrible a thing as civil war? Man, it rendeth my heart to think it.
And I tell thee, Sir Mordred, I will not begin it, except I have proofs
of what ye charge upon Sir Lancelot. And as he is the best knight of ye
all, and the most valiant, I will not judge him before I hear him. If I
know him well, he will come hither and challenge the knight to combat
that doth bring these charges against him, and in that will I trust,
for God shall surely defend the right. Therefore, let a messenger be
sent to Sir Lancelot requiring him, by his knighthood, to appear before
me here, and make answer to the charges thou hast against him.'

This was not as Sir Mordred desired; for he did not doubt that if Sir
Lancelot came he would have little trouble to persuade the king that he
was innocent. When the messenger was gone, therefore, Sir Mordred sent
a servant after him, who slew him in a wood and hid his body under a
bush.

Meanwhile, Sir Mordred counselled Sir Mador to repeat his demand that
the king should cause the queen to be led to the stake, since no knight
had come forward and offered to fight for her.

For a time the king put him off, hoping that as soon as Sir Lancelot
received his commands he would come instantly. Very anxiously did the
king look to the door, hoping to see the tall form of his best knight
come towering through the hall.

Instead thereof came the crafty servant of Sir Mordred, throwing

himself at the feet of the king.

'Gracious lord,' cried he, panting as if from swift running, 'I have
even now come from the place where Sir Lancelot and his friends are
hiding. I am one of their servants, but I hate their treason against
ye, and therefore I am come to tell you of this greatest treason of
all. They have slain your messenger, my lord, him that came requiring
Sir Lancelot to appear before thee. Sir Lancelot ran upon him when he
gave his message and slew him, saying, "Thus do I answer the saucy
words of him who shall not much longer be king."'

The king looked at the face of the messenger long and sadly. The pain
which the king suffered would have softened any ordinary heart; but the
murderer was a hard and callous wretch, and his brazen eyes outlooked
the king.
'Then is Sir Lancelot changed indeed,' said the king, and walked away
with bowed head and moist eyes.

Sir Mador pushed forward again, repeating his demand.

'Have it as ye will,' said the king heavily, and went quickly into his
private chamber.

'Alas!' said Sir Gawaine and Sir Gareth, 'now is the whole realm
falling to ruin, and the noble fellowship of the Round Table shall be
scattered in civil war.'

Soon a page came to Sir Gawaine, telling him that the king would speak
to him.

'Gawaine,' said the king, when the knight went to him, 'I have been too
easy with this knight, Sir Lancelot. He hath slain eleven knights of
the Round Table and my messenger. The pride and ambition of that man
shall have a check. His great fame for valiant deeds hath made him mad,
until it would seem that nothing but this realm will content him. Now,
therefore, as justice demands, and Sir Mador requires, do ye lead the
queen to the fire. She shall have the law as is right. Afterwards we
will seize Sir Lancelot; and know ye, he shall have a hard and shameful
death.'

'Heaven forbid,' said Sir Gawaine, 'that ever I should see either of
these things. For I will believe not these reports of Sir Lancelot.'

'How now?' said the king, 'truly ye have little cause to love him. This
night last past he slew Sir Agravaine, your brother, and several of
your kindred with him; and also, Sir Gawaine, remember how he slew but
lately two sons of yours in battle against the oppressing lords of the
borders.'

'My lord,' said Sir Gawaine, 'I know these things, and for their deaths
I have grieved, but I warned them all, and as they sought their deaths
wilfully I will not avenge them, nor think worse of Sir Lancelot.'

'Nevertheless,' said the king, 'I pray you will make ready with your
brothers, Sir Gaheris and Sir Gareth, to take the queen to the fire,
there to have her judgment and receive her death.'

'Nay, most noble lord,' replied the knight sadly, 'that will I never
do. I will never stand by to see so noble a queen meet so shameful a
death.'

'Then,' said the king sadly, 'suffer your brothers, Sir Gareth and Sir
Gaheris, to be there.'

'They are younger than I,' replied Sir Gawaine, 'and they may not say
you nay.'

The king commanded the two brothers of Sir Gawaine to come to him, and
told them what he desired of them.

'Sir,' said Sir Gareth, 'it is in your power to command us to lead the
queen to her shameful end; but wit you well it is sore against our
will. We will go as ye bid, but it shall be in peaceable guise, for we
tell you straightway, we will not oppose a rescue, should any so
desire.'

'Alas!' said Sir Gawaine, and wept, 'that ever I should live to see
this woful day.'

Then the two knights went to the queen and sorrowfully bade her prepare
for her death. Very pale was the queen, but very quiet, for now that
this was come which she had dreaded night and day, she would bear
herself proudly like a queen, innocent as she knew she was of any
crime.

Her ladies dressed her in her meanest garments; a priest, her

confessor, was brought to her, and she was shriven of her sins. Then
arose a weeping and a wailing and a wringing of hands among the lords
and ladies.

Between the knights and the men-at-arms she was led through the streets
to the lists beyond the wall. Lamentation, cries of horror, and the
shrieks and sighs of women arose from the multitude which lined each
side of the narrow streets. Many were the prayers that rose from white
lips, praying God to send a miracle to rescue so sweet a lady from so
dreadful a doom.

The city apprentices, with stout sticks in their hands, stood in bands,
and in their stout young hearts was a great rage. It was in their minds
to dash upon the guard of armoured knights, to attempt a rescue, but
they knew how vain their sticks would be against the keen blades of
swords.

So stricken with horror were all those that looked on that they noticed
not how, when the queen and her guard issued from the gates of the
palace, a man in the coarse dress of a peasant, who was standing in the
crowd, strode swiftly away down a narrow lane. There he vaulted, with
an unpeasant-like deftness, upon a good steed that stood in the charge
of a young lad; and striking spurs in the horse's flanks, he dashed
away madly along the streets and through the northern gate into the
fields.

Amidst the sorrowing people, with women crying and men muttering and
looking darkly at the knights about her, the queen was led to the
tilting-ground beyond the northern wall, and in the midst thereof was a
stake. To this she was fastened with a rope, and faggots of wood were
piled about her feet up to her knees. Near her stood the priest of her
household, trying to cheer her with comforting words; but the queen,
pale and without tears, seemed to be dazed and as if she did not hear
him.

A hundred knights ranged themselves behind the queen, some on

horseback, but the most on foot. Many of them had followed the example
of Sir Gaheris and Sir Gareth and stood without arms; but Sir Mador was
on his horse, fully armed, and prepared for combat. Others of his
kindred rode beside him.

Then Sir Gaheris called upon the herald to proclaim what the king had
commanded.

'In the name of the king,' cried the herald, 'the queen hath been found
guilty of the death of a knight by treason and poison, and his kinsmen
have demanded due judgment upon her. But if any knight shall take upon
himself to do battle for her, let him appear instantly. If none do
appear, then shall she suffer the death by burning as the law doth
appoint.'

The herald ceased; the people in the seats, craning this way and that,
looked eagerly up and down the lists to see if any knight came.

They saw Sir Mador, in the forefront of the troop of mounted knights,
glance about him; but no armed man moved forward to do battle for the
innocence of the queen. Then he looked to where she stood, pale and
still, and men saw him smile faintly, as if his cruel heart already
rejoiced to think that she would surely burn.

A great stillness was on the multitude of people. The eyes of all the
citizens of London were bent upon that long wide space of sand within
the lists; many, blurred by tears, could not bear to look at the white
figure in the midst of the faggots.

Men and women held their breath. They saw Sir Mador look towards Sir
Gaheris, as if to ask him why he delayed giving the signal for the
executioner to go forward to do his duty.

Sir Gaheris stood looking down the lists towards the great entrance.
His brother, Sir Gareth, was beside him, and in the hearts of both were
prayers which asked that something might happen to prevent them doing
this dreadful deed upon their fair queen.

'I do call upon you, Sir Gaheris, to fulfil the law!'

Sir Mador's harsh voice rang out in the silence, startling all. With
the sound, Sir Gaheris threw up his hands in a gesture of despair. He
turned to the executioner, who stood beside a cauldron of fire, and
pointed to the queen.

Horror held the great multitude in silence, and all eyes watched the
man put his torch in the fire, and then carry it blazing towards the
faggots.

Suddenly men heard a strange throbbing sound, as if from a distance;

then quickly it changed into the fierce beat of horses' hoofs; and
before many could realise what it meant, through the great gate at the
end of the lists dashed knights in armour, on horses whose foam-flecked
trappings showed at what a speed they had come.

At the head of them rode a great knight; and as men caught the device
upon his shield a great roar of gladness burst from the throats of the
people, while women sobbed for joy.

'Sir Lancelot! Sir Lancelot to the rescue!' was the cry.

As the knights entered, Sir Mador's quick commands sounded, and the
knights about him ran forward and surrounded the queen. They had barely
reached the place when, with a great crashing sound, the party of Sir
Lancelot was upon them. Many of Sir Mador's people were at once thrown
headlong to the ground by the force of the shock; but the others fought
fiercely.

This way and that the battle swayed; Sir Mador trying to thrust the
others from the fire, and Sir Lancelot's kinsmen striving to reach the
queen. All was in confusion; the knights on foot were mingled with
those on horseback, and many were cut down who did not bear arms.

Full of a mad wrath was Sir Lancelot, as he raged among the knights
that stood about the faggots; nor could any withstand him. So blind was
he in his fury that he knew not whom he slew, except that they were men
who stood between him and the queen.

So, by great mischance, at this rushing and hurtling, he slew two

knights and knew not that they were unarmed, and that they were of
those he loved most. One was Sir Gareth, whom he had himself knighted,
and the other was Sir Gaheris. In very truth Sir Lancelot knew them
not; and afterwards they were found dead where the corpses lay
thickest.

Short but very fierce was that battle, for none could long withstand
the fury of Sir Lancelot and his kinsmen. Many were slain on both
sides; Sir Mador had his head sheared from his shoulders by a stroke of
Sir Lancelot's sword, and the remnant of his party fled.

Then Sir Lancelot rode to the queen, cut her bonds, and lifted her upon
his horse full tenderly. Her eyes streamed with tears as she returned
thanks to God for her deliverance, and hardly could she tell her
gratitude to Sir Lancelot.

Thus, with the continued praises of the people in his ears, Sir
Lancelot fared forth amidst his kinsmen, and taking the road northwards
he rode with the queen to his own castle of Joyous Gard.

'For,' said he, 'I will keep the queen in safety until I know that the
king is assured of our innocence of any treason against him. But I
doubt our enemies have poisoned his mind, for never else would he have
suffered her to go to the stake.'

But therein was Sir Lancelot in great error, as in much grief and
remorse he came later to see; for if instantly he had taken the queen
to the king, and had dared his enemies to prove his treason and the
queen's, they would have been instantly discountenanced, and King
Arthur would have known and loved him as he had ever done, for a true
knight and a peerless one.

Nevertheless, Sir Lancelot would ever have had the hatred of Sir
Gawaine, which was caused by his slaying, though unwittingly, the two
good knights, Sir Gaheris and Sir Gareth; whereof came great bale and
sorrow.

XII

OF SIR GAWAINE'S HATRED, AND THE WAR WITH SIR LANCELOT

King Arthur, in the hall of his palace in London, walked quickly up and
down, thinking in great grief of the death of his queen. A group of
pages stood quietly in the shadow by the door, and two or three knights
gazed silently at the moody king.
Suddenly there came the sound of running footsteps; a man dashed into
the hall, and threw himself at the feet of the king. It was a squire of
Sir Mordred's, and he craved leave to speak. 'Say on,' said the king.

'My lord,' said the man, 'Sir Lancelot hath rescued the queen from the
fire and hath slain some thirty of your knights, and he and his kin
have taken the queen among them away to some hiding-place.'

King Arthur stood for a little while dumb for pure sorrow; then,
turning away, he wrung his hands and cried with a voice whose sadness
pierced every heart:

'Alas, that ever I bare a crown, for now is the fairest fellowship of
knights that ever the world held, scattered and broken.'

'Further, my lord,' went on the man, as others came into the hall, 'Sir
Lancelot hath slain the brethren of Sir Gawaine, and they are Sir
Gaheris and Sir Gareth.'

The king looked from the man to the knights that now surrounded him, as
if that which he heard was past all belief.

'Is this truth?' he asked them, and all were moved at the sorrow on
his face and in his voice.

'Yea, lord,' said they.

'Then, fair fellows,' he said, very heavily, 'I charge you that no man
tell Sir Gawaine of the death of his two brothers; for I am sure that
when he heareth that his loved younger brother, Sir Gareth, is slain,
he will nigh go out of his mind for sorrow and anger.'

The king strode up and down the chamber, wringing his hands in the
grief he could not utter.

'Why, oh why, did he slay them?' he cried out at length. 'He himself
knighted Sir Gareth when he went to fight the oppressor of the Lady
Lyones, and Sir Gareth loved him above all others.'

'That is truth,' said some of the knights, and could not keep from
tears to see the king's grief, 'but they were slain in the hurtling
together of the knights, as Sir Lancelot dashed in the thick of the
press. He wist not whom he smote, so blind was his rage to get to the
queen at the stake.'

'Alas! alas!' said the king. 'The death of them will cause the
greatest woful war that ever was in this fair realm. I see ruin before
us all--rent and ruined shall we be, and all peace for ever at an end.'

Though the king had forbidden any of his knights to tell Sir Gawaine of
the death of his two brothers, Sir Mordred called his squire aside, and
bade him go and let Sir Gawaine know all that had happened.

'Do you see to it,' he told the man, 'that thou dost inflame his mind
against Sir Lancelot.'

The knave went to Sir Gawaine, and found him walking on the terrace of
the palace overlooking the broad quiet Thames, where the small trading
ships sailed up and down the river on their ways to and from Gaul and
the ports of the Kentish coast.

'Sir,' said the squire, doffing his cap and bowing, 'great and woful
deeds have been toward this day. The queen hath been rescued by Sir
Lancelot and his kin, and some thirty knights were slain in the mel�e
about the stake.'

'Heaven defend my brethren,' said Sir Gawaine, 'for they went unarmed.
But as for Sir Lancelot, I guessed he would try a rescue, and I had
deemed him no man of knightly worship if he had not. But, tell me, how
are my brethren. Where be they?'

'Alas, sir,' said the man, 'they be slain.'

The grim face of Sir Gawaine went pale, and with an iron hand he seized
the shoulder of the squire and shook him in his rage.

'Have a care, thou limb of Mordred's, if thou speakest lies,' he said.

'I would not have them dead for all this realm and its riches. Where is
my young brother, Sir Gareth?'

'Sir, I tell ye truth,' said the man, 'for I know how heavy would be
your anger if I lied in this. Sir Gareth and Sir Gaheris are slain, and
all good knights are mourning them, and in especial the king our
master.'

Sir Gawaine took a step backwards and his face went pale and then it
darkened with rage.

'Tell me who slew them?' he thundered.

'Sir,' replied the man, 'Sir Lancelot slew them both.'

'False knave!' cried Sir Gawaine, 'I knew thou didst lie.'

He struck the man a great buffet on the head, so that he fell half
dazed to the ground.

'Ha! ha! thou lying talebearer!' laughed Sir Gawaine, half relieved of
his fears, yet still half doubtful. 'To tell me that Sir Lancelot slew
them! Why, man, knowest thou of whom thou pratest? Sir Lancelot to slay
my dear young brother Gareth! Why, man, Gareth loved Sir Lancelot as he
loved me--not more than he loved me, but near as much; and Sir Lancelot
was ever proud of him. 'Twas he that knighted my young brother Gareth,
brave and hearty, noble of mind and goodly of look! He would have stood
with Lancelot against the king himself, so greatly he loved him. And
thou--thou foul-mouth!--thou tellest me that Lancelot hath slain him!
Begone from my sight, thou split-tongue!'

'Nevertheless, Sir Gawaine,' said the man, rising, 'Sir Lancelot slew
them both in his rage. As he would--saving your presence--have slain
you had you stood between him and the queen at the stake.'

At these words, stubbornly spoken in spite of the furious looks of Sir

Gawaine, the knight realised that the man was speaking the truth.

His look was fixed on the face of the knave, and rage and grief filled
his eyes as he grasped the fact that his beloved brother was really
slain. Then the blood surged into his face, and he dashed away.
Men started to see the wild figure of Sir Gawaine rushing through the
passages, his eyes bloodshot, his face white. At length he dashed into
the presence of the king. Arthur stood sorrowing amidst his knights,
but Sir Gawaine rushed through them and faced the king.

'Ha! King Arthur!' he cried, half breathless, but in a great wild

voice, 'my good brother, Sir Gareth, is slain, and also Sir Gaheris! I
cannot bear the thought of them slain. It cannot be true! I cannot
believe it!'

'Nay, nor can any think upon it,' said the king, 'and keep from
weeping.'

'Ay, ay,' said Sir Gawaine in a terrible voice, 'there shall be

weeping, I trow, and that erelong. Sir, I will go see my dead brothers.
I would kiss them ere they be laid in earth.'

'Nay, that may not be,' said the king gently. 'I knew how great would
be thy sorrow, and that sight of them would drive thee mad. And I have
caused them to be interred instantly.'

'Tell me,' said Gawaine, and men marvelled to see the wild look in his
eyes and to hear the fierce voice, 'is it truth that Sir Lancelot slew
them both?'

'It is thus told me,' said the King, 'that in his fury Sir Lancelot
knew not whom he smote.'

'But, man,' thundered Sir Gawaine, 'they bare no arms against him!
Their hearts were with him, and young Gareth loved him as if--as if
Lancelot was his own brother.'

'I know it, I know it,' replied King Arthur. 'But men say they were
mingled in the thick press of the fight, and Lancelot knew not friend
from foe, but struck down all that stood between him and the queen.'

For a space Sir Gawaine was silent, and men looked upon him with awe
and compassion. His mane of hair, grizzled and wild, was thrown back
upon his shoulders, and his eyes flamed with a glowing light as of
fire. Suddenly he stepped up to the king, and lifting his right hand
said, in a voice that trembled With rage:

'My lord, my king, and mine uncle, wit you well that now I make oath by
my knighthood, that from this day I will seek Sir Lancelot and never
rest till he be slain or he slay me. Therefore, my lord king, and you,
my fellow knights and lords, I require you all to prepare yourselves
for war; for, know you, though I ravage this land and all the lands of
Christendom, I will not rest me nor slake my revenge until I come up to
Lancelot and drive my sword into his evil heart.'

With that Sir Gawaine strode from the room, and for a space all men
were silent, so fierce and full of hatred had been his words.

'I see well,' said the king, 'that the death of these twain knights
will cause the deadliest war that hath ever raged, and never shall we
have rest until Gawaine do slay Lancelot or is slain by him. O
Lancelot! Lancelot! my peerless knight, that ever thou shouldst be the
cause of the ruin of this my fair kingdom!'
None that heard the king could keep from tears; and many felt that in
this quarrel the king's heart was not set, except for the sake of Sir
Gawaine, his nephew, and all his kin.

Then there were made great preparations in London and all the lands
south of Trent, with sharpening of swords and spears, making of harness
and beating of smiths' hammers on anvils.

Men's minds were in sore distress, and the faces of the citizens were
long and white with dismay. Daily the quarrel caused other quarrels.
Many a group of knights came to high words, some taking the side of
Lancelot and the queen, and others that of the king and Sir Gawaine.
Often they came to blows, and one or other of their number would be
left writhing and groaning on the ground.

Families broke up in bad blood by reason of it, for the sons would avow
their intent to go and enlist with Lancelot, while the fathers, in high
anger at such disloyalty to Arthur, would send their tall sons away,
bidding them never to look upon their faces again.

Women sorrowed and wept, for whichever side they took, it meant that
one or other of their dear ones was opposed to them, and would go to
battle, fighting against those of their own kin and of their own
hearths.

Towards midsummer the host was ready, and took the road to the north.
The quarrel had been noised abroad throughout Britain, and many kings,
dukes and barons came to the help of Arthur, so that his army was a
great multitude. Yet many others had gone to Lancelot, where he lay in
his castle of Joyous Gard, not far from Carlisle.

Thither, in the month of July, when the husbandmen were looking to

their ripening fields and thinking of harvest, King Arthur and Sir
Gawaine drew with their army and laid a siege against the castle of
Joyous Gard, and against the walled town which it protected. But for
all their engines of war, catapults which threw great stones, and
ramming irons which battered the walls, they could not make a way into
the place, and so lay about it until harvest time.

One day, as Queen Gwenevere stood at a window of the castle, she looked
down at the tents of the besieging host, and her gaze lingered on the
purple tent of King Arthur, with the banner of the red dragon on the
pole above it. As she looked, she saw her husband issue from the tent
and begin to walk up and down alone in a place apart. Very moody did he
seem, as he strode to and fro with bent head. Sometimes he looked
towards Joyous Gard, and then his face had a sad expression upon it
which went to the queen's heart.

She went to Sir Lancelot, and said:

'Sir Lancelot, I would that this dreadful war were done, and that thou
wert again friends and in peace with my dear lord. Something tells me
that he sorrows to be at enmity with thee. Thou wert his most famous
knight and brought most worship to the fellowship of the Round Table.
Wilt thou not try to speak to my lord? Tell him how evil were the false
reports of the conspiracy against him, and that we are innocent of any
treason against him and this dear land.'
'Lady,' said Sir Lancelot, 'on my knighthood I will try to accord with
my lord. If our enemies have not quite poisoned his thoughts of us, he
may listen and believe.'

Thereupon Sir Lancelot caused his trumpeter to sound from the walls,
and ask that King Arthur would hold a parley with him. This was done,
and Sir Pentred, a knight of King Arthur's, took the message to the
king.

In a little while King Arthur, with Sir Gawaine and a company of his
counsellors and knights, came beneath the walls, and the trumpeters
blew a truce, and the bowmen ceased from letting fly their arrows and
the men-at-arms from throwing spears.

Then Sir Lancelot came down to a narrow window in the gate-tower, and
cried out to the king:

'Most noble king, I think that neither of us may get honour from this
war. Cannot we make an end of it?'

'Ay,' cried Sir Gawaine, his face red with anger, and shaking his
mailed fist at Lancelot, 'come thou forth, thou traitor, and we will
make an end of thee.'

'Come forth,' said the king, 'and I will meet thee on the field. Thou
hast slain thirty of my good knights, taken my queen from me, and
plunged this realm in ruin.'

'Nay, lord, it was not I that caused this war,' said Sir Lancelot. 'I
had been but a base knight to have suffered the noble lady my queen to
be burned at the stake. And it passes me, my lord king, how thou
couldst ever think to suffer her to be burned.'

'She was charged with poisoning a knight who slandered her,' said the
king. 'I must see justice done on high and low, and though it grieved
me to condemn her, I could do naught else. Moreover, if Sir Pinel spoke
true, both you and she were conspiring to slay me and to rule this
kingdom in my stead.'

'A foul lie, a black calumny!' cried Sir Lancelot fiercely. 'And I
would answer for it with the strength which God might give me on any
six of your knights that may say I am so black a traitor. I tell you,
my lord king, and I swear it on my knighthood, and may death strike me
now if I lie, that neither I nor the queen have ever had evil thoughts
against your person, nor had designs upon your crown.'

At so solemn an oath men stood still and waited, for few doubted in
those days that if a man who took so great an oath was speaking
falsely, fire from heaven would instantly descend and consume him.

The moments passed and nothing happened, and men breathed again.

Sir Lancelot looked at the face of King Arthur, and saw by the light
upon it that the king believed him; and Sir Lancelot rejoiced in his
heart.

He saw the king turn to Sir Gawaine with a questioning air, as if he

would ask what more his nephew wanted. But next moment, with a harsh
laugh, Sir Gawaine spoke.
'Hark ye, Sir Lancelot, thou mayest swear to Heaven as to some things,
and there are those that may be moved by thy round oaths. But this I
charge upon thee, thou false, proud knight, that thou didst slay two
unarmed men--men that loved thee and worshipped thee! Forsooth, thou
boastful braggart and mouthing hero, thou wilt not dare to deny it!'

Sad was the face and voice of Sir Lancelot as he made reply.

'I cannot hope to find excuse from you,' he said, 'for I cannot and
never will forgive myself. I would as lief have slain my nephew, Sir
Bors, as slay young Sir Gareth whom I loved, and Gaheris his brother.
Sorrow is on me for that! I was mad in my rage and did not see them.
Only I knew that many knights stood between me and the queen, and I
slew all that seemed to bar my passage.'

'Thou liest, false, recreant knight!' cried Sir Gawaine, whose grief by
now had made him mad with the lust for revenge; 'thou slewest them in
thy pride, to despite me and the king, because we had permitted the
queen to go to the stake. Thou coward and traitor! Therefore, wit thee
well, Sir Lancelot, I will not quit this quest until I feel my sword
thrusting into thy evil heart.'

'Sorrow is on me,' said Sir Lancelot, 'to know that thou dost so
hatefully pursue me. If thou didst not, I think my lord the king would
give me his good grace again, and receive back his queen and believe us
innocent.'

'I believe it well, false, recreant knight!' cried Sir Gawaine, full of
rage to know that the king verily wished to have peace; 'but know ye
that while I live, my good uncle will make war upon thee, and at last
we will have thee in spite of thy castle walls and thy skill in battle.
And then I will have thy head.'

'I trust ye for that,' said Sir Lancelot, 'for I see that thy hatred
hath crazed thee. So, if ye may get me, I shall expect no mercy.'

Then, seeing how useless it was to keep up the parley any longer, Sir
Lancelot withdrew. Next day spies brought in word to Sir Lancelot that,
at a council of his chief men, the king had said he would take back his
queen and make peace with Sir Lancelot; but that Sir Gawaine had
fiercely told him that if he did not keep up the war until Sir Lancelot
was taken or slain, he and all the kin of Lot would break away from the
realm and their allegiance. Indeed, it was rumoured that Sir Gawaine
would have made the king prisoner had he not yielded; and so powerful
was Sir Gawaine and the lords that followed him, that none could have
been strong enough to withstand them.

Sir Gawaine, yearning, by reason of his hatred, to get Sir Lancelot out
of his castle to fight with him, now sent knights to cry out shame upon
him under his walls. Thus they marched up and down, calling out
insulting names and charging him with dishonourable deeds.

Until at length the very men-at-arms that kept watch upon Sir
Lancelot's walls reddened for shame, and hurled down spears and stones
at the foul mouths. Sir Bors, Sir Ector de Maris and Sir Lionel, they
also heard the words, and going to the other knights of Sir Lancelot,
took counsel with them, and decided that this could no longer be
suffered.
Together they went to Sir Lancelot and said to him:

'Wit ye well, my lord, that we feel great scorn of the evil words which
Sir Gawaine spoke unto you when that ye parleyed with him, and also of
these shameful names which men call upon ye for all the citizens to
hear. Wherefore, we charge you and beseech you, if ye will to keep our
service, hold us no longer behind these walls, but let us out, in the
name of Heaven and your fair name, and have at these rascals.'

'Fair friends,' replied Sir Lancelot, 'I am full loth to fight against
my dear lord, King Arthur.'

'But if ye will not,' said Sir Lionel, his brother, 'all men will say
ye fear to stir from these walls, and hearing the shameful words they
cry, will say that there must be truth in them if ye seek not to
silence them.'

They spoke long with Sir Lancelot, and at length he was persuaded; and
he sent a message to the king telling him that he would come out and do
battle; but that, for the love he bore the king, he prayed he would not
expose his person in the fight.

But Sir Gawaine returned answer that this was the king's quarrel, and
that the king would fight against a traitor knight with all his power.

On the morrow, at nine in the morning, King Arthur drew forth his host,
and Sir Lancelot brought forth his array. When they stood facing each
other, Sir Lancelot addressed his men and charged all his knights to
save King Arthur from death or wounds, and for the sake of their old
friendship with Sir Gawaine, to avoid battle with him also.

Then, with a great hurtling and crashing, the knights ran together, and
much people were there slain. The knights of Sir Lancelot did great
damage among the king's people, for they were fierce knights, and
burned to revenge themselves for the evil names they had heard.

Sir Gawaine raged like a lion through the field, seeking Sir Lancelot,
and many knights did he slay or overthrow. Once, indeed, King Arthur,
dashing through the fight, came upon Sir Lancelot.

'Now, Sir Lancelot,' he cried, 'defend thee, for thou art the causer of
this civil war.'

At these words he struck at Sir Lancelot with his sword; but Sir
Lancelot took no means to defend himself, and put down his own sword
and shield, as if he could not put up arms against his king. At this
the king was abashed and put down his sword, and looked sorrowfully
upon Sir Lancelot.

Then the surging tide of battle poured between them and separated them,
until it happened that Sir Bors saw King Arthur at a little distance.
With a spear the knight rushed at the king, and so fierce was his
stroke and hardy his blow that the king was stricken to the ground.

Whereupon Sir Bors leapt from his horse and drew his sword and ran
towards the king. But some one called upon him, and looking up he saw
Sir Lancelot riding swiftly towards him.
Sir Bors held the king down upon the ground by the nose-piece of his
helm, and in his other hand he held his naked sword.

Looking up to Sir Lancelot, he cried in a fierce voice:

'Cousin, shall I make an end of this war? 'Twere easy done.'

He meant that, if the king were slain, Sir Gawaine would lose half his
forces, and could not hope to keep up the war against Sir Lancelot
singlehanded.

'Nay, nay,' said Sir Lancelot, 'on peril of thy head touch not the
king. Let him rise, man. I will not see that most noble king, who made
me knight and once loved me, either slain or shamed.'

Sir Lancelot, leaping from his horse, went and raised the king, and
held the stirrup of his horse while the king mounted again.

'My lord Arthur,' said Lancelot, looking up at the king, 'I would in
the name of Heaven that ye cause this war to cease, for none of us
shall get honour by it. And though I forbear to strike you and I try to
avoid my former brothers and friends of the Round Table, they do
continually seek to slay me and will not avoid me.'

King Arthur looked upon Lancelot, and thought how nobly courteous was
he more than any other knight. The tears burst from the king's eyes and
he could not speak, and sorrowfully he rode away and would fight no
more, but commanded the trumpets to cease battle. Whereupon Sir
Lancelot also drew off his forces, and the dead were buried and the
wounded were tended.

Next morning the battle was joined again. Very fiercely fought the
king's party, for Sir Gawaine had commanded that no quarter should be
given, and that whoever slew a knight of Sir Lancelot's should have his
helm filled with gold. Sir Gawaine himself raged like a lion about the
field, his spear in rest. He sought for Sir Lancelot; but that knight
always avoided him, and great was Gawaine's rage and scorn.

At length Sir Bors saw Sir Gawaine from afar, and spurred across the
field towards him.

'Ha! Sir Bors,' cried the other mockingly, 'if ye will find that
cowardly cousin of thine, and bring him here to face me, I will love
thee.'

''Twere well I should not take thy words seriously,' mocked Sir Bors in
his turn. 'For if I were to bring him to thee, thou wouldst sure repent
it. Never yet hath he failed to give thee thy fall, for all thy pride
and fierceness.'

This was truth. Often in the jousting of earlier days, when Sir
Lancelot had come in disguise and had been compelled to fight Sir
Gawaine, the latter had had the worst. But Sir Lancelot, loving his old
brother-in-arms as he did, had in later years avoided the assault with
Sir Gawaine; yet the greater prowess and skill of Sir Lancelot were
doubted by none.

Sir Gawaine raged greatly at the words of Sir Bors, for he knew they
were true, though he had wished they were not.
'Thy vaunting of thy recreant kinsman's might will not avail thee,' he
cried furiously. 'Defend thyself!'

'I came to have to do with thee,' replied Sir Bors fiercely. 'Yesterday
thou didst slay my cousin Lionel. To-day, if God wills it, thou thyself
shall have a fall.'

Then they set spurs to their horses and met together so furiously that
the lance of either bore a great hole in the other's armour, and both
were borne backwards off their horses, sorely wounded. Their friends
came and took them up and tended them, but for many days neither of the
knights could move from their beds.

When the knights of Sir Lancelot saw that Sir Bors was grievously
wounded, they were wroth with their leader. Going to him, they charged
him with injuring his own cause.

'You will not exert yourself to slay these braggart foes of yours,'
they said to him. 'What does it profit us that you avoid slaying
knights because, though they are now your bitter foes, they were once
brothers of the Round Table? Do they avoid ye, and seek not to slay you
and us your kindred and friends? Sir Lionel is dead, and he is your
brother; and Sir Galk, Sir Griffith, Sir Saffre and Sir Conan--all good
and mighty knights--are wounded sorely. Ye were ever courteous and
kindly, Sir Lancelot,' they ended, 'but have a care lest now your
courtesy ruin not your cause and us.'

Seeing by these words that he was like to chill the hearts of his
friends if he continued to avoid slaying his enemies, Sir Lancelot
sorrowfully promised that henceforth he would not stay his hand. After
that he avoided none that came against him, though for very sorrow he
could have wept when some knight, with whom in happier times he had
drunk wine and jested at the board in Camelot, rushed at him with
shrewd strokes to slay him.

As the fight went on, the lust of battle grew in Sir Lancelot's heart,
and manfully he fought, and with all his strength and skill he lay
about him. By the time of evensong his party stood very well, and the
king's side seemed dispirited and as if they would avoid the fierce
rushes with which Sir Lancelot's knights attacked them.

Staying his horse, Sir Lancelot looked over the field, and sorrowed to
see how many dead there were--dead of whom many may have been slain by
their own kindred. He saw how the horses of his knights were splashed
with the blood that lay in pools here and there, and grief was heavy
upon him.

Sir Palom, a very valiant knight, came up to him.

'See, lord,' he cried, 'how our foes flinch from the fierce hurtling of
our knights. They are dispirited by the wounding of Sir Gawaine. Sir
Kay is also wounded, and Sir Torre is slain. Now, if ye will take my
advice, this day should cease this war once for all. Do ye gather all
your forces, lord, and I think with one great dash together ye should
scatter their wavering knights, and this field would be won.'

'Alas!' said Sir Lancelot, 'I would not have it so. It cuts me to my
heart to war as I do against my lord Arthur, and to trample him and his
people in the mire of defeat--nay, I should suffer remorse till my last
day.'

'My lord,' said Sir Palom, 'I think ye are unwise. Ye spare them thus
to come again against ye. They will give ye no thanks, and if they
could get you and yours at so great a disadvantage, wit you well they
would not spare you.'

But Sir Lancelot would not be moved, and in pity he ordered the
trumpeters to sound the retreat. King Arthur did likewise, and each
party retired in the twilight from the field, where the wounded lay
groaning till death or succour came; and the dead lay still and pale,
until the kindly earth was thrown over them.

Some weeks passed in which the armies did not meet; for the host of
King Arthur was not now so proud as they had been, seeing that they had
lost many good knights; and Sir Lancelot would not of his own will
sally out from his castle to fall upon the king.

But ever Sir Gawaine tried to inflame the mind of King Arthur and his
kinsmen against Sir Lancelot, and he advised them to join battle with
their enemy. Moreover, from the lands of his kingdom of Lothian, of
which Sir Gawaine was now king in the place of his dead father, King
Lot, a great body of young knights and men-at-arms came; and the king's
party began to recover their courage.

Many began daily to ride to the walls of Joyous Gard, and by insult and
evil names endeavoured to tempt forth the men of Sir Lancelot. Soon the
young knights clamoured to King Arthur and Sir Gawaine to permit them
to attack the walls, and reluctantly the king consented to call his
council for next day to devise some means of breaking down the castle.

Headstrong was the counsel given by the young knights at that meeting,
and greatly did King Arthur sorrow to feel that, for love of his
nephew, Sir Gawaine, he would be compelled to yield to their wild
demands for further battle.

Suddenly the door of the hall where sate the council was opened, and
the porter of the gate appeared and approached the king.

'My lord,' he said, 'the holy Bishop of London and King Geraint of
Devon crave audience of you.'

Some of the fierce young knights scowled at the names and uttered cries
of disgust.

The king's face brightened, and before any could advise him against his
will, he said:

'Bid them enter instantly.'

'The meddling priest and the petty king that knoweth not his mind!'
sneered Sir Gawaine, looking fiercely about the room. 'I pray thee,
uncle,' he said to the king, 'listen not to their womanish persuasions,
if thou lovest me.'

King Arthur did not answer, but looked towards the door impatiently.

Through this there came first three priests and three armed men, and
behind them stepped an old and reverend man, the hair beside his
tonsure white as driven snow, and falling over his white robe edged
with red, that showed his rank as bishop. Then, towering above him, a
noble knightly figure, came Geraint of Devon, grown nobler still since
those noble days when he had proved himself to be a strong leader
indeed, while men had thought him soft and foolish.

All rose to their feet in reverence to the bishop, and fondly did King
Arthur welcome Geraint, for this wise knight had from the first opposed
Sir Gawaine in this war, and had refused to fight against Sir Lancelot
and the queen, though he abated not his service to the king.

Dark was the look which Gawaine darted at Geraint, but quiet yet
fearless was Geraint's answering gaze.

'What ye have to say,' said Gawaine angrily, 'say it quickly and

begone. If ye are still of two minds, there seems no need to speak, and
there is no need to bring a bishop to your aid.'

'Gawaine,' said King Geraint, and his voice was quiet, yet with a ring
of menace in it, 'I think grief hath made you a little mad. Let the
bishop speak, I pray ye. He hath a message for the king.'

'My lord,' said the bishop, 'I come from his Holiness the Pope.'

At these words Sir Gawaine started forward, his hand upon his sword, as
if he would willingly in his madness slay the holy priest.

'And,' went on the bishop, his grave voice and his quiet look not
bating for all the wrathful fire in Sir Gawaine's eyes, 'I bear with me
the bull of his Holiness--see, here it is--by which his Highness doth
charge King Arthur of Britain, as he is a Christian king, to take back
Queen Gwenevere unto his love and worship, and to make peace with Sir
Lancelot.'

The murmurs of the wild young knights rose in a sudden storm, while Sir
Gawaine glared with looks of hatred at King Geraint and the bishop.

'And if ye do not this command,' rang out the voice of the bishop (and
there was sorrow in its tone, and silence sank on all), 'if ye do not,
then will his Holiness excommunicate this land. None of ye here have
seen so terrible a thing as a land laid under the interdict of the Holy
Church, and rarely doth she find her children so stubbornly evil as to
merit it. But the Father of the Church, seeing how this land is torn
and rent by this bitter war between brothers, and fearful lest, while
ye tear at each others' lives, the fierce and evil pagan will gain upon
ye and beat the lives from both of ye, and possess this fair island and
drive Christ and His religion from it utterly--seeing all this, his
Holiness would pronounce the doom if ye are too stiffnecked to obey
him. Then will ye see this land lie as if a curse were upon it. Your
churches will be shut, and the relics of the holy saints will be laid
in ashes, the priests will not give prayers nor the Church its holy
offices; and the dead shall lie uncoffined, for no prayers may be said
over them. Say, then, King Arthur of Britain, what shall be the answer
to the command of his Holiness which here I lay before thee.'

With these words the bishop held a parchment rolled out between his
hands before the eyes of the king. Men craned forward and saw the black
writing on the white skin, and the great seals, or bulls, hanging from
it whereon those who could read saw the device of the Pope of Rome.

'Say, is this thy doing?' cried Sir Gawaine fiercely, looking at King
Geraint. 'Didst thou send this meddling priest to Rome to get this?'

'That did I,' replied Geraint.

'Then now I make this vow,' thundered Sir Gawaine, 'that though thou
hast balked me of my vengeance now, I will mark thee, thou king of two
minds, and be thou sure that erelong I will avenge me of this
treachery, and that upon thy body and in thy blood.'

'I mark thy words, Sir Gawaine,' said Geraint, whose eyes flashed
fiercely, though his voice was calm, 'and I say again thou art mad. I
will tell thee and the king, our lord and master, why I did advise the
holy bishop to go to Rome and get the Pope's command. First, as ye all
know, I did think this war a wicked one beyond all measure, and ever
have I raised my voice against it. And what I foresaw has come to pass.
As the good priest saith, while ye tore at each other's throats here in
the furthest marches of the north, the sly, fierce pagan, learning how
all the land was rent and weakened by this evil war, has crept up in
his longships, he has landed at many solitary places on the coast, and
has spread far and wide throughout the land, burning and slaughtering.
The long files of his captives, our kinsmen, go day by day, even as ye
fight here, brother with brother, down to the black ships, and ye do
naught to save them or avenge them. Already have I, in my office as
Count of the Saxon Shore, battered them back to their ships at Lemanis,
Llongporth and Rutupi�; but here in the north, for all that the old
lion, Uriens of Reged, worn with war and full of age, hath taken the
field against them, here, behind your backs as ye battle, kin with kin,
a great and a stubborn pagan, whom men call Hyring the Land-waster,
hath entered the land and still prevails. Crafty he is and strong, for
he hath made treaties with some of our weaker kin, and their women he
hath taken in marriage for his leaders, and thus in our very midst
there is treachery, hand-in-hand with the brutal invaders. Yet still
you, Gawaine, are so mad, so lost to all care for your nation's weal,
that you would see your people ruined and your land possessed by the
savage boars of Saxons, while ye slake your vengeance for a private
wrong. If still you so would do, I call you traitor, and, by the grace
of God, I will make good my words upon your body, when we have thrust
the pagan from the land and peace is within our borders once again.'

While the thunder of his noble anger still rolled through the wide
hall, King Arthur arose, and men marked the resolution in his eyes.

'I will that there be no more war,' he said, and he looked sternly at
Gawaine. 'Geraint hath spoken the truth, and the truth shall prevail. I
repent me that I have so long forgotten the needs of my kingdom. Do
thou now, good bishop, go to Sir Lancelot, tell him that I will make
peace with him and that I will receive back my queen. And do thou, good
Geraint, fare south again. I thank thee from my heart for what thou
hast done. Would to Heaven that all my knights were as clean-souled and
as single-minded in devotion unto me as thou art. Do thou go and fulfil
thy great office. Watch thou the coasts as hitherto thou hast watched
them; and soon I will follow to aid thee, should the foul and savage
pagans strive again to break into my realm.'

But, after all, Sir Gawaine had his way in part. The bishop took the
king's assurance, sealed with his great seal, whereby he promised Sir
Lancelot that he should come and go safe from murder or sudden onset,
and desiring him to bring the queen to the king at his hall at
Carlisle. But in that parchment was no word of reconciliation with Sir
Lancelot. Sir Gawaine fiercely told the king that the day on which he,
the king, should clasp the hand of Lancelot in friendship, he, Sir
Gawaine, with all his vassals and his men, would leave the kingdom. So
deep and burning was the hatred which Gawaine bore Sir Lancelot that he
even threatened that, if his will was not granted, he would join the
pagans and fight against the king.

So shamed and saddened was the king at these words that, to put an end
to his nephew's rage, he consented to do as he desired. Therefore,
though the bishop strove to persuade the king to make his peace with
Sir Lancelot, Sir Gawaine's will was done, and the bishop went sadly to
Joyous Gard.

He showed his writings to Sir Lancelot and the queen, and both were
sorrowful in that no word of reconciliation was said.

'I will do my lord's desire,' said the knight, 'but I see that Sir
Gawaine's hatred of me is in no way abated. Nevertheless, do thou ride,
my lord bishop, to the king. Commend me unto his good grace, and say to
him that in five days I will myself bring my lady, Queen Gwenevere,
unto him as he doth desire.'

On the day appointed, as the king sat in hall at Carlisle, surrounded

by his knights and their ladies, with Sir Gawaine standing on the high
seat beside him, there came the beat of many hoofs, and into the town
rode Sir Lancelot with the queen, knights and squires accompanying
them. They reined up at the wide door of the hall, and Sir Lancelot
alighted, and having helped the queen to dismount, he took her hand,
and led her through the ranks of knights and ladies to where sat King
Arthur.

Sir Lancelot kneeled upon the edge of the dais, and the queen with him;
and to see so noble a knight and so beautiful a lady, sad of
countenance as they were, forced many a tear to the eyes of the knights
and dames who looked on. Then, rising, and taking up the queen, Sir
Lancelot spoke:

'My most redoubted lord,' he said, 'you shall understand that by the
pope's commandment and yours I have brought unto you my lady your
queen, as right requireth; and if there be any knight here, of any
degree, who shall say that she or I have ever thought to plot treason
against your person or your crown, or the peace of this realm, then do
I say here and now that I, Lancelot du Lake, will make it good upon his
body, that he lies. And, my gracious lord, if this is all that there is
between you, my king, and myself, there need be naught of ill thought
between us, but only peace and goodwill. But I wist well that one that
hates me will not suffer ye to do what is in your good and kingly
heart.'

Sternly did Sir Lancelot look at Sir Gawaine, while the tears gushed
from King Arthur's eyes, and from the eyes of many that heard Sir
Lancelot's sad words.

Fierce and dark was the look which Sir Gawaine returned to Sir
Lancelot.
'The king may do as he will,' he said harshly and in a loud voice, 'but
wit thou well, Sir Lancelot, thou and I shall never be at peace till
one of us be slain; for thou didst slay my twain brothers, though they
bore no harness against thee nor any ill will. Yet traitorously thou
didst slay them!'

'Alas, my lord,' said Sir Lancelot, and the tears bedewed his face, 'I
cannot ask you for your forgiveness for that deed, unwitting though it
was done and in my madness. Would to Heaven they had worn harness! Wit
you well that ever will I bewail the death of my dear friend, Sir
Gareth. 'Twas I that made him knight, and ever did I delight to see
him, to hear his manly laugh ring out, and to see the light in his
brave eyes that never suffered a mean or evil action. I wot he loved me
above all other knights, and there was none of my kinsmen that I loved
so much as I loved him. Ever will the sorrow of the death of thy
brethren lie upon my soul; and to make some small amends I will, if my
lord will suffer it and it will please you, Sir Gawaine, I will walk in
my shirt and barefoot from Lemanis even unto this town, and at every
ten miles I will found a holy house, and endow it with monks to pray
for the souls of Sir Gareth and Sir Gaheris. Surely, Sir Gawaine, that
will do more good unto their souls than that my most noble lord and you
should war on me.'

Every cheek was wet and the tears of the king fell from his eyes, yet
made he no effort to restrain or hide them.

'Out upon such monkish deeds!' cried Sir Gawaine, and his scornful eyes
surveyed the weeping knights and dames. 'Know thee, once for all, that
never shalt thou wipe away the treacherous murder of my brothers but by
thy blood. Ye are safe now for a season, for the pope hath given you
safety, but in this land--whatever comes of it I care not--thou shalt
not abide above fifteen days, or else I shall have thy head. So make ye
no more ado; but deliver the queen from thee, and get thee quickly out
of this court and out of this realm.'

'Well,' said Sir Lancelot, and laughed grimly, 'if I had known I should
have so short an answer to my proffers of peace, I had thought twice
ere I had come hither. But now, madam,' he said, turning to the weeping
queen beside him, 'I must say farewell to ye, for now do I depart from
this noble fellowship and this dear realm for ever. Pray for me, and
send me word if any lying tongues speak evil of you, and if any
knight's hand may deliver you by battle, believe me mine shall so
deliver you.'

With these words Sir Lancelot bent and kissed the queen's hand, and so
turned away and departed. There was neither king, baron, knight nor
squire of all that great company who did not weep, nor think that Sir
Gawaine had been of most evil mind to refuse the noble proffers of Sir
Lancelot.

Heavy was King Arthur ever thereafter, and never might man see his face
brighten nor hear his laugh; and the better of his knights sorrowed
with him, and knew what was in his heart.

'In this realm will be no more quiet,' said Sir Owen of the Fountain to
his fellows as they stood upon the walls of Carlisle and saw the band
of Sir Lancelot riding southwards, the sunlight flashing from their
helms and armour. 'The pagans have gathered strength daily while we
have fought with each other, and that which would have given us the
strength and the union which would hurl them from our coasts is
shattered and broken. By the noble fellowship of the Round Table was
King Arthur and his realm borne up, and by their nobleness the king and
all his realm was in quietness and in peace. And a great part,' he
ended, 'was because of the noble nature of Sir Lancelot, whom Sir
Gawaine's mad rage hath driven from the kingdom. Nor is all the evil
ended yet.'

XIII

OF THE REBELLION OF MORDRED AND THE DEATH OF KING ARTHUR

When Sir Lancelot and all his men had left the realm of Britain and had
betaken themselves to Brittany, where Sir Lancelot had a kingdom of his
own, the Saxons began to increase in Britain, both in strength and
numbers. Almost daily a long black ship, crammed with pagans, was
sighted from some part of the coast; and the British, praying that the
fierce pirates would not visit their homes, would watch the terrible
warship till it passed; or else, caught unawares, would have to flee
inland in a breathless panic when the dragon-headed prow loomed through
the sea-mist, and the barbarous warriors swarmed over the sides and ran
knee-deep in the water, their eyes gleaming with the joy of killing and
their hands eager for the looting.

Then King Arthur made ready a great host, and for two years he fought
in the northern parts against the bands of the pirates. Swift were the
blows he struck, for the great wide Roman roads were still open, not
grass-grown and deserted, and with his mounted knights and men he could
ride quickly from place to place, striking fiercely and scattering the
foul pagans.

Ten was the number of these battles which he fought in the north, six
against the Saxon pirates and four against the wild cats of Caledonia,
whom men call Picts and Scots, and who had ventured south in greater
numbers as soon as they heard how the king warred with his lords and
the rich land was open to plunder. Two others he fought in the south,
one against an insolent band of pirates who dared even to attack his
palace-city of Caerleon-upon-Usk. But so heavy and deadly a blow did he
strike at them then, that from that battle barely a dozen pagans were
left to flee like fire to their ships.

Not without loss of many of his brave warriors did Arthur win these
battles, for the pagans were good men of their hands and not easily
were they beaten. Saddest of all was the loss of the noble Geraint,
who, thrusting back the pirates once again from the harbour of
Llongporth, got his death there with many of his valiant men.

When the fame of King Arthur's prowess and the might of his knights had
gone abroad among the pagans, they were afraid and would not venture in
great numbers to invade the land again, and there was peace and rest in
Britain for a space.

Then Sir Gawaine, remembering his hatred of Sir Lancelot, persuaded the
king to make him ready another host, with which to invade the land of
Brittany where Sir Lancelot ruled his kingdom. For a long time the king
would not listen to his advice, and the queen, with all her power,
strove against Sir Gawaine. But that knight and his large following of
knights and men-at-arms had been of great service in the recent wars
against the pagans, and the king could not wholly refuse to listen to
Sir Gawaine's demands.

Also Sir Mordred added his words to those of his brother, and said that
men who came from Brittany said that Sir Lancelot was getting him ready
a large army, and training many men, although he was at peace with his
neighbours in Gaul. But the rumour went, as Sir Mordred reported, that
Sir Lancelot was only waiting his time, and when King Arthur should be
more than usually pressed by his pagan foes, Sir Lancelot and his great
host would sail swiftly across the sea and seize the kingdom of
Britain, when Arthur, exhausted by war, would be unable to withstand
the fresh warriors of Sir Lancelot, and would lose both his queen and
his crown.

For a time the king would not suffer these evil rumours to be mentioned
in his presence, but many of his counsellors thought there was much
truth in them. At length, so persistent was Sir Mordred and those whom
he craftily persuaded to believe him, that for sheer weariness the king
consented to take an army across to Brittany, and to demand that Sir
Lancelot should own that the king was his overlord, and that he should
do homage to King Arthur for his kingdom.

The host was prepared, therefore, and at a meeting of his council King
Arthur made his nephew, Sir Mordred, Regent of Britain, to rule in the
king's place while he should be abroad; and Queen Gwenevere he placed
under the governance of Sir Mordred, as well as the officers of the
court.

When they had passed the sea and landed in the coasts of Sir Lancelot's
country, Sir Gawaine ordered his knights to go through the nearer
parts, burning the houses of the people and wasting their lands. This
he did in order to enrage Sir Lancelot against the king, so that he
would not listen quietly to any demand which the king might make of
him.

Word was brought to Sir Lancelot of the landing of King Arthur and the
plundering and wasting of the land, but for some days he would do
naught; for he was loath to take up arms against the king he loved, who
had made him a knight.

At length Sir Bors came to him, and with that knight were others, as
Sir Lunel of the Brake, Sir Magus of Pol, and Sir Alan of the Stones
with his six mighty brothers.

'My lord, Sir Lancelot,' said Sir Bors, 'it is great shame that we
suffer them to ride over our lands, burning the homes of our folk and
destroying the crops in the fields.'

Sir Alan also, who with his brothers were seven as noble knights as a
man might seek in seven lands ere he might find a brotherhood as
valiant and withal as courteous, spoke to the like purport, saying:

'Sir Lancelot, for the love of our land, let us ride out and meet these
invaders in the field, for we have never been wont to cower in castles
nor in towns.'
Then spoke Sir Lancelot, who was lord of them all.

'My fair lords,' he said, 'ye wit well that I am loath to raise my hand
against my own dear lord and to shed the blood of Christian men. Yet I
understand how it chafes you to stand by and see your fair land ruined
by those that hate me. Therefore I will send a messenger to my lord
Arthur, desiring him to make treaty with me. Then when we have his
reply, we will consider the matter further.'

A damsel was therefore sent to the camp of King Arthur, and she bore a
message from Sir Lancelot. She was brought to Sir Lucan, who was the
king's butler, and she told him whence she had come and why.

'Alas!' said Sir Lucan, 'I fear ye have made your journey in vain, fair
damsel. My lord, King Arthur, would quickly accord with Sir Lancelot,
whom he loves, but Sir Gawaine will not suffer him.'

Just then Sir Gawaine happened to pass by, and saw the maiden, and knew
that she was not one of their party. He turned towards her, and his
fierce eyes looked at her, grimly sour.

'Whence come ye?' he said harshly.

'I come hither to speak with King Arthur,' said the maiden, 'for I
bear a message from my lord, Sir Lancelot.'

With an angry gesture Sir Gawaine seized her bridle and led her palfrey
swiftly to the edge of the camp.

'Depart!' he cried harshly, 'and tell your master that it is idle for
him to send to mine uncle. Tell him from me, Sir Gawaine, that by the
vow of my knighthood, I will never leave this land till I or he be
slain. Now go!'

When this message was told to Sir Lancelot, the tears stood in his eyes
and he went apart, and for that day the knights his comrades held their
counsel. But they resolved that next day they would prevail upon Sir
Lancelot to issue forth and give battle.

But in the morning, when they looked from the walls of the castle, they
saw that Sir Gawaine had crept up in the dawn, and now was the place
besieged. Thereupon there was fierce fighting, for Sir Gawaine caused
ladders to be reared, and his knights strove to climb over the Wall,
but were mightily beaten back by Sir Lancelot's party.

Then the attackers drew off for a space, and Sir Gawaine, well armed,
came before the chief gate, upon a stout steed. He shook his lance at
the men over the gate, and cried:

'Where art thou, false traitor, Sir Lancelot? Why dost thou hide
thyself within holes and walls like a coward? Look out now, thou timid
soul, for when I may get at thee I will revenge upon thy evil body the
death of my brothers twain.'

These shameful words were heard by Sir Lancelot, and all his knights
and kin that stood about him, and they said:

'Sir Lancelot, now ye must be done with thy courtesy and go forth and
beat back those evil words upon his foul mouth.'
'It is even so,' said Sir Lancelot; 'but sorry I am and heavy of spirit
thus to fight with him, who hath been my dear brother-in-arms so long,
and whose brothers I did unwittingly slay. And much evil shall come of
this.'

Then he commanded his strongest horse to be saddled, and bade his

armour to be dressed upon him, and when he was fully armed he stood at
the top of the gate and cried upon the king.

'My lord Arthur,' he said, 'you that made me knight, wit you well that
I am right heavy that ever ye do pursue me thus; but now that Sir
Gawaine hath used villainous words about me, I must needs defend
myself.'

Sir Gawaine, seated upon his horse below, laughed grimly, and cried
upon the other.

'O Lancelot, Lancelot,' he said, 'what a man of words thou art! If thou
darest to battle with me, cease thy babbling, man, and come off, and
let us ease our hearts with strong blows.'

Then Sir Lancelot issued forth with many of his knights, and a covenant
was made between the hosts that there should be no fighting until Sir
Gawaine and Sir Lancelot had fought together, and one was either dead
or yielden.

Thereupon the two knights departed some way and then came together with
all the might of their horses, and each smote the other in the midst of
the shield. So strong were the knights and stout and big the spears,
that their horses could not stand the shock, and so fell to the ground.
Then the knights quickly avoided their horses and dressed their
shields, and fought fiercely together with their swords. So valiantly
did each give and receive blows, and so heavy and grim was their
fighting, that all the knights and lords that stood thereabout
marvelled thereat and were fain to say, in as many good words, that
never had they seen such sword-play.

In a little while, so shrewd and skilful were they, both were wounded
and the blood oozed from the joints of their armour, and it was great
marvel to see that they could still stand, dashing their shields upon
each other, and each beating upon the other with great slashes of their
swords.

And which was the stronger of the twain none might say.

Now Sir Gawaine had a magic power, which had been endowed upon him at
his birth by a great witch who was a friend of his mother, the
sorceress, Queen Morgan le Fay, wife of King Lot. No one knew of this
secret power except King Arthur, and often had it availed Sir Gawaine,
so that in dire perils of onfall, sudden ambush, or long battle, it had
given him the victory, when all about him had been slain or wounded or
taken captive.

The magic was that, from the hour of nine until high noon, the strength
of his body increased until it was three times his natural strength,
which itself was full great, though in that, for deep wind and breath
and might of arm, Sir Lancelot was the stronger.
Now while they fought together, Sir Lancelot felt that Sir Gawaine
seemed not to weaken as time went on, and he marvelled greatly. Then he
felt that indeed Sir Gawaine's strength was greater than it had been at
the beginning, and a fear came into his heart that Sir Gawaine was
possessed of a demon.

But Sir Lancelot was stout of heart as well as old in warcraft, and
knew that if he could tire Sir Gawaine he might, by one blow, get the
better of him when he saw a good chance. Therefore Sir Lancelot began
to husband his strength, and instead of spending it in feinting and
attacking, he bore his shield ever before him, covering himself from
the fierce blows of his enemy.

Thus he kept up his own strength; but hard put to it was he when,
towards midday, Sir Gawaine seemed to have the might of a very giant,
and the shield arm of Sir Lancelot was numbed by reason of the crashing
blows which Sir Gawaine's sword rained upon it.

Great travail indeed had Sir Lancelot to stand up and not to yield; and
while men marvelled how he could endure, none knew all he suffered.

Then, as the bell of the convent in the town boomed forth the hour of
noon, Sir Gawaine heaved up his sword for a final blow; but his sword
descended just as the last stroke of twelve had died away, and Sir
Lancelot marvelled to feel that what should have been so grievous a
blow that, belike, he could not have stood before it, fell upon his
shield with no more than the strength of the blow given by an ordinary
man.

When Sir Lancelot felt the might of Sir Gawaine so suddenly give way,
he drew himself up to his full height and said:

'Sir Gawaine, I know not by what evil power ye have fought, but now I
feel that ye have done. Now, my lord, Sir Gawaine, I must do my part,
for none may know the great and grievous strokes I have endured this
day with great pain.'

With that Sir Lancelot redoubled his blows, and the sword of Sir
Gawaine gave before the might of Sir Lancelot, and his shield was rent.
Then Sir Lancelot gave so great a buffet on the helm of the other that
Sir Gawaine staggered, and with yet another blow Sir Lancelot hurled
him headlong to the ground.

Men held their breath, for now, after so fierce and stubborn a
struggle, they felt sure that Sir Lancelot, hot and enraged against his
enemy, would rip off the other's helm and strike his head off
instantly.

But, instead, Sir Lancelot stood for a moment looking at his prostrate
enemy. Then men gasped to see him thrust his sword into its scabbard
with a clang, turn on his heel and begin to walk away.

They saw the prone knight raise his head and look as if in surprise at
the retreating figure of Sir Lancelot.

'Why dost thou depart?' cried Sir Gawaine, rage in his mocking voice.
'Turn again, false knight, and slay me! If ye leave me thus, thou shalt
gain nothing from it, for when I am whole I will slay thee when I may.'
Men marvelled to hear a fallen foe use such shameful and hateful words,
but they marvelled much more when Sir Lancelot, turning, cried:

'I shall endure you, sir, if God give me grace; but wit you well. Sir
Gawaine, I will never smite you to death.'

Many that before had hated Sir Lancelot were moved by these noble
words, and by the sight of his mercy; and they deemed that there was
hardly another man in all Christendom that would have shown such
nobility, save Sir Galahad and Sir Perceval, and they were dead.

So Sir Lancelot went into the city, and Sir Gawaine was borne into King
Arthur's tent and his wounds were cleaned and salved. Thus he lay for
three weeks, hard of mood and bitter in his hatred, and longing eagerly
to get well, so he might try again to slay Sir Lancelot. Meanwhile he
prayed the king to attack Sir Lancelot's walls, to try to draw him
forth, or to take the city by treachery.

But the king would do naught. He was sick for sorrow because of the war
that was between him and Sir Lancelot, and by reason of the wounds of
his nephew Sir Gawaine.

'Alas,' was ever his reply, 'neither you nor I, my nephew, will win
worship at these walls. For we make war for no reason, with as noble a
knight as ever drew breath, and one more merciful and courteous than
any that ever graced the court of any Christian king.'

'Nevertheless,' replied Sir Gawaine, raging at the king's love for Sir
Lancelot, 'neither his mercy nor courtesy would avail against my good
sword, once I could sink it in his treacherous heart.'

As soon as Sir Gawaine might walk and ride, he armed him at all points
and mounted a great courser, and with a long wide spear in his hand he
went spurring to the great gate of the town.

'Where art thou, Lancelot?' he cried in a fierce voice. 'Come thou

forth, traitor knight and recreant! I am here to revenge me on thy evil
body for thy treacherous slaughter of my twain brothers.'

All this language Sir Lancelot heard, and leaning from the tower he
thus spake:

'Sir Gawaine, it sorrows me that ye will not cease your foul speaking.
I know your might, and all that ye may do, and well ye wot ye may do me
great hurt or death.'

'Come down, then,' cried Sir Gawaine, 'for what my heart craves is to
slay thee. Thou didst get the better of me the other day, and I come
this day to get my revenge. And wit thee well I will lay thee as low as
thou didst lay me.'

'I will not keep ye waiting long,' said Sir Lancelot, 'for as ye charge
me of treachery ye shall have your hands full of me erelong, however
the battle between us may end.'

Then happened it even as before. The knights encountered first with

spears, but Sir Gawaine's broke into a hundred pieces on the shield of
Sir Lancelot. Then, dismounting, the knights fought on foot with
swords.
Sir Gawaine put forth all his strength, hoping, with the magic power
which he possessed, to dash Sir Lancelot to his knees. But Sir Lancelot
was more wary than before, and under cover of his shield he husbanded
his strength until the hour of noon, when, as before, he felt that Sir
Gawaine's might had strangely ebbed away.

When that had come to pass, Sir Lancelot said:

'Now once more have I proved that ye fight not with a man's fair
strength, Sir Gawaine, but with some evil power. And full grievously
was I put to it to withstand many of thy sad blows. Now ye have done
your great deeds, and I will do mine.'

Then with one stroke, of so marvellous a force that men marvelled, Sir
Lancelot beat down Sir Gawaine's guard, and struck him a full heavy
blow on the side of the helm, beating it in so that the old wound burst
again.

Sir Gawaine fell to the ground, and for some moments lay still as if he
were dead or in a swoon; but he was only dazed, and soon recovering, he
raved and foamed as he lay there, cursing Sir Lancelot for a traitorous
coward and a base knight, and even, in his madness, thrusting towards
him with his sword.

'Wit thou well, base knight,' he cried, 'that I am not slain yet. Come
thou near and lie here with me, and we will fight this battle until we
die.'

'I will do no more than I have done, my lord,' said Sir Lancelot, 'and
when thou art able to stand I will meet thee again. But to smite a
wounded man that may not stand, I will not.'

Then Sir Lancelot withdrew to the town, while Sir Gawaine still raved
and abused him, and men marvelled both at the exceeding madness of the
hatred of Sir Gawaine and the great restraint and nobleness of
Lancelot. Many said that had Sir Gawaine said half as many shameful
things to one of them, they would have instantly rased his evil head
from his shoulders.

For a month Sir Gawaine lay sick, but was always eager to be up and
able again. And at length the leech said that in three days he should
ride, whereat Sir Gawaine was joyful.

'Again,' said he to King Arthur, who sat beside him, 'again shall I
have to do with that base fellow, and ill attend me if I do not end the
matter this time.'

'Ye had ended it long ago, or been ended,' said the king, 'except for
the nobleness of Sir Lancelot that forbore to slay you.'

'Ay, we all know your love of the pestilent fool, uncle,' said Sir
Gawaine, 'but we will stay here until we have made an end of him and
his kingdom, if it take us all our lives.'

Even as he spoke there came the clear call of a trumpet outside in the
camp, and Sir Bedevere came to the door of the king's tent, his grim
old face pale, his grizzled hair unkempt, and every sign of haste and
travel upon his dress.
The king started up. 'Sir Bedevere, ye bring evil tidings from
Britain,' he cried. 'Can it be that more ruin and wrong is to come than
that I suffer now? What is your news?'

'O my king, it is that Mordred your nephew hath rebelled,' said Sir
Bedevere, 'and has gathered much people about him, and hath sent many
letters to all the lords and knights your vassals, promising them
wealth and lands if they make him king. And Gwenevere your queen he
hath imprisoned, saying that he will wed her when ye are slain.'

'Mordred! Mordred!' cried the king, 'him that I thought was a quiet,
strong man--turned so base a traitor!'

'Ay, he was ever the traitor, though brother of mine,' cried Sir
Gawaine in a voice of rage. 'A man that speaks in whispers, haunts dark
corners, and ever sneers with his lips.'

'Hardly with my life have I escaped to tell you this,' went on Sir
Bedevere, 'for he placed men to watch me after I had scorned his evil
offers to myself. But now, my lord, quickly ye must betake yourself and
all your army from this fruitless and wrongful War against Sir
Lancelot, and hasten to beat down the poisonous viper whom ye have
nourished in your bosom.'

Ere the day was done the army of King Arthur had raised the siege of
Sir Lancelot's town and were quickly marching to the sea, there to take
their boats across to Britain to punish the usurper and traitor, Sir
Mordred.

A fair wind carried them across the sea, but long ere they reached the
shallows of the beach at Dover they saw the sunlight flashing from
thousands of headpieces of knights and men-at-arms, set to oppose the
landing of their rightful lord. The king was fiercely angry, and he
commanded the masters of the ships to launch their small boats, and
into these the knights swarmed and were rowed towards the shore.

But the rebels of Mordred also launched boats and great pinnaces filled
with knights, and when the boats of the opposite parties met, then
there was fierce fighting and much slaughter of many good knights and
barons and other brave men. Then King Arthur and his chief knights drew
forth their horses from the holds of the ships, and leaped with them
into the sea, and fiercely did they throw themselves upon Sir Mordred
and his knights, and there was grievous fighting on horseback in the
shallow water, which soon was dyed with the blood of the slain.

So stubborn were the king and his fighting men that the army of Mordred
was forced to retreat towards the land, and then, when the king and
Gawaine had trimmed their own ranks, order was given for one concerted
rush against the enemy. The other side showed little fight now, and
made no stand, but fled inland.

When the battle was over, King Arthur let bury his people that were
dead, so far as they could be discovered in the waves; and the wounded
he caused to be carried into the town of Dover to be cared for.

A squire came to the king as he stood giving orders as to these things.

'My lord king,' said the squire, 'Sir Gawaine lies sore wounded in a
boat, and we know not whether he be alive or dead.'

'Alas!' cried the king, and the knights about him were full of pity at
the sudden grief that came into his voice and his looks, 'is this true?
Then is all my joy of life at an end.'

The squire led him to the boat in which Sir Gawaine lay, who stirred as
the king approached, and feebly smiled.

'My uncle,' said Sir Gawaine, 'wit you well that now is my death-day
come, for I know I shall not last this bout. For I am smitten upon the
wound which Sir Lancelot gave me, and I feel that now I shall die.'

'Alas, my sister's son,' cried the king, taking Sir Gawaine in his arms
and kissing him, while the tears flowed down his cheeks, 'this is the
wofullest day of all my life. For if ye depart, Gawaine, how solitary
am I! Gawaine! Gawaine! in Sir Lancelot and in thee had I most my love
and my joy, and now shall I lose ye both, and all my earthly joy is
gone from me.'

'Alas,' said Sir Gawaine, 'sorrow's on me now that I have caused you
such grief, mine uncle. I see now that I have been mad with rage
against that noble knight, Sir Lancelot, who slew my dear brothers
unwittingly. And now I repent me sorely. I would that I could live to
repair the evil that I have done to you and to Sir Lancelot. But my
time is come. I shall not live till evening.'

They wept together, and the knights that stood about them also wept for
pure grief, to think how much sorrow and ruin was caused by the mad
rage of Sir Gawaine, which had pushed the good king on to make war
against his will.

'I am the causer of this rebellion by my traitor brother,' said Sir

Gawaine, 'and my name shall be cursed for it. Had I not wilfully driven
thee, thou wouldst have accorded with Sir Lancelot, and he and his
brave kinsmen would have held your cankered enemies in subjection, or
else cut them utterly away. Lift me up, my lord, and let me have a
scribe, for I will send a letter to Sir Lancelot ere I die.'

Then Sir Gawaine was set up by the king, and a priest was brought, who
wrote at the dying man's dictation. And the purport of the letter was
in this wise:

'Unto Sir Lancelot, flower of all noble knights that ever I heard of or
saw, and once my dear friend, now do I, Sir Gawaine, King Lot's son of
Orkney and the Lothians, and sister's son to King Arthur, send thee
greeting and let thee know by these writings that I am this day done to
death, having been wounded at the landing against rebellious traitors,
and struck upon the wound which thou didst give me twice, before thy
city. Whereby I have got my death. But I will have thee to wit that I
sought my death of thee, and got that wound deservedly of thee, who
could have slain me twice, but for thy high nobility and great
courtesy. I, Gawaine, beseech of thee forgiveness for my madness, and
crave that thou wilt remember the dear friendly days we have had
together in times long past, and for all the love that was between us.
Come thou over the sea, and with thy knights do thou press to the help
of Arthur, our noble lord, who is beset by a traitorous villain, my
brother Mordred, who hath dared to rebel against his rightful lord, and
hath crowned himself king. Do thou hasten, good Sir Lancelot, when thou
shalt receive this letter, and follow the king. But ere thou goest from
this seashore do thou come to my tomb, and pray some prayer more or
less for my sinful soul, that in its madness did evilly entreat thee.'

Then was Sir Gawaine shriven, and in a little while he swooned, while
all stood uncovered round about him. When the rays of the afternoon sun
cast long shadows of the knights and fighting men who were hurrying up
and down the shore making ready to depart, Sir Gawaine awoke from his
swoon and looked up. For a moment he did not recognise King Arthur;
then he smiled at him very sweetly and said in a low voice:

'Kiss me--and forgive me!'

The king knelt down and kissed the pallid face of Sir Gawaine, and for
very sorrow he felt that the heart in his breast was nigh to bursting.

So in a little while, with the beat of the surf and the cry of the
seagulls upon his ears, the light of the sun in his eyes, and the free
air of heaven all about him, Sir Gawaine died. And his death was as he
had ever craved it to be, under the open sky, after battle, where he
had given good strokes and received them.

Now the letter which Sir Gawaine had written was given unto a young
squire of Sir Gawaine's, by name Tewder, and he was commanded to depart
forthwith back to Brittany, and deliver it into the hands of Sir
Lancelot. But, among the knights that had stood about the dying Sir
Gawaine, was a traitor, who was in the service of Sir Mordred the
rebel, and he knew that if Sir Lancelot should receive that letter, and
come to Britain with all his brave kin and their host, Sir Mordred
would have much ado to conquer King Arthur.

Therefore the traitor knight, whose name was Sir Fergus, did accost
Tewder the squire, and with fair seeming told him that he also was
bidden to go back to Brittany, to bring back certain jewels which the
king in his hasty departure had left in his lodging at the town of Dol.

Tewder, unsuspecting of all evil, went aboard a boat with Sir Fergus,
and together they bargained with the master to take them across when
the tide should rise again at dark. Together they crossed the sea that
night and took the road towards Sir Lancelot's town; and in a dark wood
Sir Fergus set upon the squire, who fought bravely, but was slain at
last, and the letter of Sir Gawaine was taken by the traitor.

Then, returning to the seashore, the wretch went aboard another boat,
and chaffered with the merchant to take him across the sea to the town
of Llongporth, whence he thought to get quickly to Mordred, to receive
from him the reward of his treachery and murder. But at night, as they
sailed over the dark sea, a fifty-oared longship, filled with Saxon
pirates, crept upon them; the pagans poured over the sides, slew men
almost in their sleep, and flung their bodies overboard. And though
Fergus fought well, his head was almost struck from his body by a great
sheering axe-blow. When the pirates had taken all the goods they
desired from the merchant vessel, they stove a hole in its side, and it
sank to the bottom of the sea. So that no man ever again saw the letter
which was meant for Sir Lancelot.

For some weeks Sir Lancelot lay quiet, knowing naught of the death of
Sir Gawaine or of the letter desiring him to go to the help of King
Arthur. Many rumours came to him, through the ship-folk, of the wicked
rebellion of Sir Mordred, and though Sir Lancelot longed to go across
to Britain and fight for King Arthur, his kinsmen would not consent,
but said it would be unseemly, unless the king craved his aid, and sued
for pardon for making war against Sir Lancelot in his own country.

Thus the precious weeks went by, and much ill fortune happened in
Britain, that had ended otherwise if Sir Lancelot had been by the king.

Three days after the battle upon the shore, the king's host came up
with the host of Sir Mordred on Barham down. Many folks had joined the
rebels' side, because they hated the king for making war upon Sir
Lancelot, and the king was sorely hurt in his mind to see a banner
borne by one part of the usurper's army, on which was the device of Sir
Lancelot's.

This the crafty Sir Mordred had commanded to be done, knowing that it
would damp the spirits of King Arthur and his men.

'Verily,' said King Arthur, 'my evil deeds have sprung up as armed men
against me. I fought unjustly with Sir Lancelot, and here are some that
loved him arrayed against me for that wicked war.'

'If ye would send for Sir Lancelot,' said Sir Owen of the Fountain, who
stood by him, 'ye would learn, I verily believe, that Sir Lancelot
loves and worships you as of old, and hath no mind to fight on the side
of this sly fox, Mordred. Send for Sir Lancelot, lord.'

'Nay, I will not--I may not,' said the king. 'If he cometh by the words
which Sir Gawaine wrote to him, I shall know that he loves me and
forgives me; but if he cometh not, I shall know he hates me, and I
shall merit his ill-favour. He owes naught to me since I used him so
evilly, and therefore I may not ask his aid.'

All day the battle raged upon the great green down, and many were the
fierce fights which took place upon the top thereof, where, behind
great earthworks freshly timbered, the main host of Sir Mordred stood,
the banner of the great red dragon in their midst.

But at the last, so fast and fierce did the blows of King Arthur's men
fall, and so stubbornly did they press on, that Sir Mordred's host gave
way. Pouring forth by the upper gate, they ran pell-mell northwards,
and the knights and fighting men of Arthur kept up with them for many
miles, and there was a running fight and much wounding and slaying all
through the fresh green countryside, where the hedges were laden with
May-blossoms, and in the sky the larks were trilling.

And that day many a wounded man crawled groaning into the thickets to
die, many a chalky cart-rut ran red with blood, and many a white face,
with wide-open, sightless eyes, stared up at the blue sky, where the
fleecy clouds sailed in the gentle wind.

For three weeks after this battle both sides rested, and like great
wrestlers gathered all their strength for one great struggle. Knights
and riders were sent by both sides into all parts, with letters to
lords and knights, charging them to take their sides in the war. Many
people from about London came to the banner of Mordred, and the parts
now called Kent, Sussex and Surrey, Essex and Suffolk held wholly with
him; but those in the west, as Wales, Devon, Cornwall and the middle
parts, thronged to the banner of the king.
Few came from the north, for there the pagan pirates stalked with fire
and sword through and through the land, and the British lords and
chiefs that were alive had little power to stay them now. King Uriens
was dead, slain by the dagger of a traitor, and so were two other great
chieftains; so that men south of Trent sorrowfully shook their heads
and said that now the north was no longer the land of the British folk,
but was given over to the savage heathen hordes.

Then, to meet the many that flocked together in his favour, King Arthur
drew him with his host westward beyond Sarum. There on the wide downs
beside the great standing-stones of the Old Princes, which men now call
Stonehenge, a great multitude of chiefs and knights and yeomen came to
his banner.

But Sir Mordred avoided a battle, and, instead, kept aloof with his
army, and began to burn and harry the country which was on the side of
Arthur. He took Calleva and Cunetio, and put the people to the sword,
and took much gear from those wealthy cities; then he stole through the
great forest by night and came to Palladun, which was a rich town
builded upon the top of a great hill. He thought to take this unawares,
but it was well watched and well armed, and he strove to break into it
and was kept about it for some days.

That delay was used well by King Arthur, for he made great haste to
pass through the wild country, filled with wide marshes and thick woods
as it was, which separated him from his enemy. Then Mordred, hearing
through the spies of the king's approach, got his host away and thought
to pass into the lands of Devon, which were those of King Dewer, son of
the dead Geraint, and held firmly for Arthur.

But in the wild waste-land beside the Endless Waters, King Arthur
caught up with him, and barred his further way. And the king remembered
that this was that same land, full of gaunt standing-stones and haunted
by trolls and witches, where Merlin had once led him, and where he had
gained the sword Excalibur.

It was late in the day when the two armies faced each other, and both
prepared to pass the night upon the field. Bitter was the wind that
evening, and the skies were dun and leaden of hue, as if spring had
been overcome by winter; and to shelter the king a tent had been put up
in a little dark wood of stunted firs, called the Wood of Drood. Just
in the deep dark before the dawn, when the blood in men's veins was
coldest, and the life in their hearts was weakest, a dreadful cry
wailed out through the dark wood, and there came the sound as of
leathery wings flapping heavily to and fro above where the king lay
sleeping. Men started up about their ashen fires, their faces blanching
at the terror that cried in the dark, and they heard the wailing twice
repeated, while none dared try to see the thing that wailed.

Then, while their blood chilled and their breath stayed, they heard the
heavy flapping pass over their heads and die away towards the camp of
Mordred; and there in the distance did the three cries sound again.

Men's hearts sickened as they turned and crept the nearer to each
other, but few dared to utter the words upon their lips.

Two knights slept in the tent with king, Sir Kay and Sir Owen; and they
lay in the dark, trembling at the cries of terrible import. When they
passed, the knights would not move, fearing to be the first to speak.

'My Lords,' came the quiet voice of King Arthur out of the dark, 'that
was the voice of the Hag of Warning. Men say it hath foretold the
deaths of many of my house, but I know not. Yet will I take the issue
as God shall give it me, trusting in His mercy and the blood of His Son
Jesus, and Him crucified.'

'Amen,' said the two knights, and said no more.

When, in a little while, the sun rose, flashing his warm rays into the
fearful eyes that greeted him, men's terror quickly vanished; and when
fires were lit and oaten cakes were browning on the irons, or collops
sputtered on their skewers, tongues were loosened and faces began to
smile. But few spoke of the cries which they had heard, for all loved
their king, and hoped that somehow they had dreamed an evil dream, or
had but heard the cries of some foul night-bird.

Breakfast being ended, the captains and knights began to trim their men
in army array, and talk was eager of the coming battle. Then were seen,
coming from Sir Mordred's camp, two bishops; and these were taken at
their desire to Arthur, where he stood surrounded by his knights and
chieftains.

'Lord,' said one of the bishops, he that was head of the great choir or
monastery of Amesbury, 'cannot we make accord between you and your
nephew? Sad it is to see so many great and valiant warriors ranged
against each other. Many are sisters' sons, and all are of one speech,
one kindred. If this unnatural war doth continue, how much sorrow there
will be, how many noble hearts be stilled in death or broken in grief
for him that shall never return! How many puissant bodies, now quick
and passionate and handsome, will be meat for snarling wolves and
carrion for foul birds!'

'What says my rebellious nephew?' asked the king sternly.

'My lord,' said the other bishop, a man of soft and silky speech, and
he was chief of the choir of Clovesho, 'he asks but little, and if ye
are willing to make treaty, he also is willing. Grant him but the
earldom of Kent and the Andred, with a seat at London, during your
days, and do thou appoint him king after your days. For now that Sir
Gawaine, Sir Gaheris and Sir Gareth are slain, he is the only sister's
son you have. If ye grant these things he will be your liege, faithful
in all things, and a strong arm against your enemies.'

Then some of King Arthur's knights would have him agree to these terms,
but others would not, and said the king should make no treaty with a
traitor, but that Mordred should come and throw himself upon the mercy
of his king and uncle.

At the last, after much counsel had been taken, King Arthur agreed to
meet Mordred, with fourteen of his chief men, in the space betwixt
their hosts, and the king should also take fourteen knights with him.
So the bishops went back with this message, and King Arthur called the
chieftains of his host about him.

'I go to see this traitor, my nephew,' he said to them, 'whether he

means falsely or truly with this talk of a treaty. But look ye, I in no
wise trust him. Hold ye your men warily, and if ye see any sword drawn
among us where we stand, do thou sound the horns of attack and come on
fiercely, and slay that rebel and all that hold with him.'

In like wise did Mordred warn his men, 'for,' said he, knowing how
greatly he had sinned against his generous and noble uncle, 'I know
well that King Arthur and his knights would be avenged on me if they
could.'

The party from each army went forward over the stony hillside, until
they met midway between the armies, and men watched them keenly. King
Arthur spoke chidingly to his nephew Mordred, who, sour and dark of
face, looked craftily at the faces of his uncle and his knights. And
the chiefs with Mordred, men for the most part of violent and ambitious
natures, looked haughtily at King Arthur's party. Nevertheless, there
was no bad blood shown, and the talk was continued, and Mordred
repeated the demands which the bishops had made.

'But I care not to give to thee Kent and London,' said the king. 'I
tell thee frankly, Mordred, I would not trust thee there. I fear me
thou wouldst try some crafty plot with the Saxon pagans if I gave them
thee, as that rebel Caros did, who for a time made himself emperor of
the Romans here in this land.'

'Ha' done, then, my father,' said Gorfalk, the son of Mordred, an

insolent young man. 'Let us cease this. I doubt not we be big enough to
get all the kingdom if we fight.'

The king looked sternly at the young man, and there was silence among
them all as men waited for Arthur's reply.

Then it happened that a young chieftain, standing near the king, felt
something bite his foot where the low leathern shoe left it naked. He
looked down and saw that he was treading on a viper, which had struck
him and was about to strike again. With a cry the knight stepped aside,
drew his sword, and cut the reptile in two.

As the blade flashed, silvery bright in the sunlight, a great hoarse

cry rose like thunder from the two masses of men watching them on
either side; trumpets blared and horns squealed, and shouts of command
rose sharp and keen.

Instantly the men standing with Arthur and Mordred looked about them,
saw where the young chieftain stood with drawn sword, and knew that now
nothing could avert the battle.

'The gods will have it so!' sneered Mordred.

Already the earth trembled and shook with the beat of ten thousand feet
of the armies rushing together. A knight of Mordred's, drawing his
sword, thrust it into the breast of one of Arthur's chieftains, with
the cry:

'This for thy land, Sir Digon, that marches with mine!'

Instantly others fell to fighting hand-to-hand, striking on targe and

helm; but Sir Owen, Sir Kay and Sir Bedevere surrounded the king, and
all hurried back to the army approaching them. So likewise did Sir
Mordred.
Then came the crash of battle, as line on line, with flashing swords
held high, the ranks of war closed. Blades rose again, stained red,
fierce strangled cries came from men in the death-grips, helms were
cracked, shields riven, dirks sank home, and men who once had drunk and
jested with laughing looks over the same mead-board, now met fierce eye
to eye, and never parted until one or both fell in the swaths of the
death-harvest.

All day the stubborn battle raged, and ever the king sought out the
rebel Mordred, but never reached him. Many valiant deeds he did,
wielding his sword Excalibur; and by his side were Owen and Kay, Lucan
and Bedevere. So spent were they at the last that hardly could they
lift their swords, and so sick of the slaying were they that gladly
would they have ceased. But ever some vicious band of Mordred's knights
would come upon them, and then they quitted them like men, and ceased
not till their enemies had fled or were slain.

Suddenly the king came to himself, and, standing still, looked upon the
field. In the morning it had been but a bare hillside of hungry,
stunted grass, through which the stones showed grey and sallow, like
ancient bones. Now, in the low light of the sinking orb, it was
red--red, with the pallid faces of the dead stained a lighter red in
the rays of the sun. Here and there bands still fought together, cries
of fury rose, and the groans of the dying mingled with them.

'Alas!' cried the king, and looked behind him, 'where are all my noble
knights?'

There were but two with him now, Lucan and his brother Bedevere.

'Where is Owen, and Kay?' he asked.

'Alas, lord,' said Bedevere, 'Sir Owen got his death-wound by the thorn
where we fought those five knights but now, and Sir Kay suddenly fell
as he walked. And when I knelt to speak to him, I found him dead.'

'Alas,' said the king, 'that ever I should see this doleful day, for
now is my end come. But would to Heaven that I wist where is that
traitor Mordred, that hath caused all this sorrow and ruin.'

Then, as he spoke, he looked towards the east, and saw where, by a tall
standing-stone, a man leaned as if spent with a wound. And he was aware
that this was Mordred.

'Now give me my spear,' said the king to Sir Lucan, 'for yonder is the
traitor, and he shall not escape me.'

'Lord,' said Sir Lucan in a weak voice, 'let him bide, for he hath none
with him, while we three are still alive.'

'Now, betide me death, betide me life,' said the king, 'now that I see
him yonder I will slay the serpent, lest he live to work more havoc on
this my poor kingdom.'

'God speed you well,' said Sir Bedevere, and gave the king his spear.

Then the king ran towards Sir Mordred, crying:

'Traitor, prepare, now is thy death-day come!'

When Sir Mordred heard King Arthur he raised his head, then came
towards the king with his sword in his hand.

And there, in the shadow of the great stone, King Arthur smote Sir
Mordred under the shield, with so keen a stroke of his spear that it
went through the body and out beyond. Sir Mordred, feeling that death
was upon him, thrust himself along the spear almost to the butt
thereof, nigh where King Arthur held it, and grasping his sword in both
his hands, he struck his uncle on the side of the head, with so keen
and fierce a blow that the sword pierced the helm and the skull.

With that stroke Sir Mordred fell stark dead to the earth, and the king
sank in a swoon upon his body.

Then Sir Bedevere and Sir Lucan, who were both sore wounded and weakly,
came up, and between them, with many rests upon the way, took the king
to a little combe beside the waters, and there they took off his helm
and bathed his wound and bound it. After which the king felt easier.

'We may do naught else with thee here, lord,' said Sir Lucan, 'and it
were best that we got thee to some town.'

'It would be better so,' said the king, 'but I fear me I have my
death-wound.'

When they had rested Sir Lucan tried to rise, so as to take up the
king.

'I may not rise,' he cried, his hands upon his head, 'my brain works
so.'

Nevertheless, the knight staggered to his feet and lifted up the feet
of the king. But the effort was too much for him, and with a deathly
groan he fell to the ground, and when he had twitched and struggled a
little he lay dead.

'Alas,' said the king, 'this is to me a full heavy sight, to see this
noble knight so die for my sake. He would not complain, so set was he
to help me, and now his heart has broken.'

Then Sir Bedevere went to his brother and kissed him, and closed his
eyes.

'Now,' said the king, 'come hither to me, Bedevere, for my time goeth
fast and I remember me of a promise. Therefore,' he bade Sir Bedevere,
'do thou take Excalibur, my good sword, and go with it beyond the combe
side there where a low thorn grows, and when thou comest there, I
charge thee, throw my sword in that water, and come again and tell me
what thou seest.'

So Sir Bedevere departed with the sword, and on the way he looked at
the sword, and saw how noble was the blade and how shining, and how the
pommel and haft were full of precious stones.

'If I throw this sword into the water,' said Sir Bedevere to himself,
'how great a sin 'twould be to waste so noble a weapon.'

Therefore he hid it in the branches of the thorn and returned to the

king.

'What sawest thou?' asked the king when Bedevere returned.

'Sir,' he said, 'I saw the wind beat on the waves.'

'Ye have not done as I bid thee,' said the king. 'Now, therefore, do
thou go again and do as I bid thee; and as thou art dear to me, spare
it not, but throw it in.'

Then Sir Bedevere went back and took the sword in his hand; but again
he could not bring himself to throw away that noble sword, so again he
hid the sword and went back to the king.

'What sawest thou this time?' said the king.

'Lord,' said Bedevere, 'I saw the waters ebb and flow and the sedges
trembling.'

'Ah, traitor untrue!' said the king, deep sorrow in his voice, 'who
would have weened that thou who hast been so true and dear to me, and
who hast been named a noble knight, would betray me for the jewels on a
sword? Now go ye again, I charge thee, and as thou shalt answer for thy
sins at the last day, throw ye the sword far into the waters.'

Then in heavy mood Sir Bedevere went the third time, and took the sword
from its hiding-place, and looking away from the weapon lest its beauty
should soften him, he bound the girdle about the hilt, and then he
threw the sword with all his might far out over the water.

As he looked, inwardly lamenting, he saw the jewels flash in the low

light as the sword passed through the air. Then suddenly, when it
neared the water, he marvelled to see a great arm and hand come up
through the waves. The hand caught the weapon by the haft, shook it and
brandished it thrice, and then vanished with the sword under the waves.

With some fear in his heart Sir Bedevere went back to the king and told
him all that he had seen.

'It is well,' said the king. 'Now have I performed my promise. Help me
hence to some village, for I am cold and would die beneath a roof, if I
may.'

Then Sir Bedevere took the king upon his back, thinking that he would
find some road in a little while which should lead them to a hamlet.
And as he went along, he passed by the waterside, near the low thorn
whence he had thrown the sword into the water.

There, in the sedges, he marvelled to see a barge draped all in black

cloth, and in it sat many fair ladies, all with black hoods on. When
they saw Sir Bedevere with the king upon his back, they shrieked and
wept.

And one that looked a queen, so fair and stately, yet so sad was she,
held out her arms towards the king, and cried unto him in a voice
wondrous sweet, 'Come to me, brother!'

'Put me into the barge,' said the king to Bedevere, 'for there I shall
have rest.'
Softly did Sir Bedevere lay him in the barge, and the fair ladies wept
over the king with much mourning, and one laid his head in her lap and
caressed it with soft hands.

Then, without sails or oars, the barge went from the shore, and fear
and sorrow shook the soul of Sir Bedevere to see them go from him.

'Alas, my lord Arthur,' he cried, 'what shall become of me if ye are

leaving me lonely?'

'Comfort thyself,' said the king in a faint voice, 'and do as well as

thou mayest, for in me ye may no longer trust. For I will go into the
vale of Avalon to heal me of my grievous wound, and if thou hear never
more of me, pray for my soul.'

Sir Bedevere stood watching till the barge went from his sight in the
mists of evening, and then he wept a little, and so fared forward
through the night, weeping as he thought how all the glory that was
Arthur's was now past, and how he himself was very old and very lonely.

When morning broke he was aware of a little chapel and a hermitage

between two hoar woods upon a knoll beside the marshes, and entering
therein he got cheer of the holy hermit and rested.

* * * * *

Now, when King Arthur had gone westwards to collect his host, Sir Owen,
marvelling that Sir Lancelot had sent no word in reply to the letter of
Sir Gawaine, had charged a trusty squire of his to go across to
Brittany, to tell Sir Lancelot of all that had passed and how King
Arthur longed for his aid and his love. Nigh mad with grief was Sir
Lancelot when he had learned all, and so deep was his sorrow and so
wild was his regret, that hardly could he wait till the ships were
ready to take him and his knights and army across to Britain.

When they arrived at Dover, Sir Lancelot sought out the tomb of Sir
Gawaine, and there with much weeping he prayed long and earnestly for
the repose of the soul of that dead warrior, his once dear friend. All
the other knights prayed likewise for the soul of Gawaine, and Sir
Lancelot gave one hundred pounds for masses to be said, and the others
gave according to their means.

Then word was brought him of the daylong dreadful battle in the west,
and how King Arthur was gone, mortally wounded, none knew whither, and
how all the knights of the Round Table were dead.

Silent was Sir Lancelot at this news, but men saw how his stern face
paled; and for a time he walked apart and would suffer none to speak to
him. Then he came to his knights, and all could see how his looks had
changed. Grief was deeply lined upon his face, and he had the air of an
aged and weary man.

'My fair lords,' he said, 'I thank you all for your coming with me, but
we came too late. But now I go alone to find the body of my dear lord,
and if I may, I will see my lady, Queen Gwenevere. And do ye all go
back into your country, for now we have no place in this.'

Thus Sir Lancelot fared forth, and would suffer none to go with him.
First he went to Amesbury, and in the convent there he saw Queen
Gwenevere. Few but very sad were the words they spake. Sir Lancelot
offered to give her a home in Brittany, away from the trouble and the
ruin of the land, but she would not.

'My lord is dead,' she said, weeping, 'and this dear kingdom may not
long stand, but while I live I will stay on its dear soil.'

Then Sir Lancelot fared far west through the wastelands, and came to
the battlefield; and there he wept sorely to see the long lines of
dead. Many were the dead knights of the Round Table whom he found
unburied, and these with his own hands he laid in the grave, and he
procured a priest to say prayers over them.

Further he went beside the shores of the Endless Waters, until one day
he found a black barge, and stepping therein he was taken without sail
or oars far over the wide sea, until the twilight. Then, raising his
sorrowing eyes, he was aware of a fair green island with a valley
between two sweet hills, and there was a chapel, and all about it were
trees all laden with blossoms.

A little bell began to ring just as the barge lightly touched the
shore, and stepping therefrom, Sir Lancelot went into the chapel, and
heard mass. Afterwards a bishop came unto him where he kneeled, and a
hermit, and the latter seized his hand; and when he looked up Sir
Lancelot knew it for Sir Bedevere. Neither could speak for the great
tears that rolled down their grim faces, but Sir Bedevere drew him
forth and led him to where a great white marble slab was lying, freshly
cut, in the midmost part of the chapel.

Thereon Sir Lancelot saw the words, cut deep and wide, in black
letters:

HIC JACET

ARTHURUS REX

QUONDAM REX QUE FUTURUS

Then did Sir Lancelot's heart almost burst with sorrow; and when he had
finished praying and weeping, he kneeled unto the bishop and prayed him
to shrive him and assoil him. Afterwards he besought him that he might
live with him, and the holy man granted his request, and there ever
after did Sir Lancelot, putting off all the fame and glory which he had
gotten in the world, pass all his days and nights, serving God with
prayers and fastings and much abstinence.

When, within a year, Queen Gwenevere died in her cell at Amesbury, Sir
Lancelot, having been advised in a dream of her death, braved the bands
of lawless men that now ravaged the fair land of Britain, and brought
her body to the isle of Glastonbury. He laid it solemnly beside the
body of her dear lord Arthur, and thereafter he endured greater
penance.

'For,' said he, 'by my stiffnecked pride did all this evil come. If I
had gone straightway to my dear lord, and cast myself upon his love and
justice, my lady the queen would not have been led to the stake, and I
should not unwittingly have slain young Gareth. I am the causer of all
the ruin and the sorrow that hath come upon this land, and never while
I live may I forgive me.'

Thus evermore he prayed and mourned, day and night, but sometimes he
slumbered a broken sleep. He ate but little, and neither the bishop nor
Sir Bedevere could make him take comfort. And if you would know the
time and place where Lancelot was happiest, it was when he was lying on
the tomb of King Arthur and Queen Gwenevere.

At last, on a sweet morn in June, they found him lying there, stark
dead, but with a gentle smile upon his wasted face. And when they had
made the mass of requiem, they laid him in the tomb at the feet of the
king and the queen, and on the slab that covered him they caused these
words to be graven:

HERE LIETH
SIR LANCELOT DU LAKE
WHO WAS CHIEF OF ALL CHRISTIAN KNIGHTS;
THE MOST COURTEOUS MAN AND THE TRUEST
FRIEND, THE MEEKEST DOER OF GREAT DEEDS,
AND THE GENTLEST TO ALL LADIES AND
WEAK CREATURES.
R. I. P.

***END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK KING ARTHUR'S KNIGHTS***

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The Project Gutenberg EBook of Red Cap Tales, by Samuel Rutherford Crockett

This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or
re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.net

Title: Red Cap Tales

Stolen from the Treasure Chest of the Wizard of the North

Author: Samuel Rutherford Crockett

Release Date: September 17, 2007 [EBook #22656]

Language: English

*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK RED CAP TALES ***

Produced by Suzanne Lybarger, Emille and the Booksmiths

at http://www.eBookForge.net
RED CAP TALES

[Illustration: Red Cap among the Wizard's Treasures.]

RED CAP TALES

STOLEN FROM THE TREASURE CHEST OF THE WIZARD OF THE NORTH

WHICH THEFT IS HUMBLY ACKNOWLEDGED BY

S. R. CROCKETT

=New York= THE MACMILLAN COMPANY

LONDON: ADAM AND CHARLES BLACK 1904

COPYRIGHT, 1904, BY THE MACMILLAN COMPANY.

Set up and electrotyped. Published September, 1904.

=Norwood Press=
J. S. Cushing & Co.--Berwick & Smith Co.
Norwood, Mass., U.S.A.

THE WHY!

FOUR CHILDREN WOULD NOT READ SCOTT

SO I told them these stories--and others--to lure them to the printed

book, much as carrots are dangled before the nose of the reluctant
donkey. They are four average intelligent children enough, but they hold
severely modern views upon storybooks. _Waverley_, in especial, they
could not away with. They found themselves stuck upon the very
threshold.

Now, since the first telling of these Red Cap Tales, the Scott shelf in
the library has been taken by storm and escalade. It is permanently
gap-toothed all along the line. Also there are nightly skirmishes, even
to the laying on of hands, as to who shall sleep with _Waverley_ under
his pillow.

It struck me that there must be many oldsters in the world who, for the
sake of their own youth, would like the various Sweethearts who now
inhabit their nurseries, to read Sir Walter with the same breathless
eagerness as they used to do--how many years agone? It is chiefly for
their sakes that I have added several interludes, telling how
Sweetheart, Hugh John, Sir Toady Lion, and Maid Margaret received my
petty larcenies from the full chest of the Wizard.

At any rate, Red Cap succeeded in one case--why should he not in

another? I claim no merit in the telling of the tales, save that, like
medicines well sugar-coated, the patients mistook them for candies
and--asked for more.

The books are open. Any one can tell Scott's stories over again in his
own way. This is mine.

S. R. CROCKETT.

CONTENTS

CERTAIN SMALL PHARAOHS THAT KNEW NOT JOSEPH 1

RED CAP TALES FROM "WAVERLEY"

THE FIRST TALE:

I. GOOD-BYE TO WAVERLEY-HONOUR 11
II. THE ENCHANTED CASTLE 16
III. THE BARON AND THE BEAR 21
_THE FIRST INTERLUDE OF ACTION_ 28

THE SECOND TALE:

I. THE CATTLE-LIFTING 31
II. THE ROBBER'S CAVE 35
_THE SECOND INTERLUDE_ 41

THE THIRD TALE:

I. THE CHIEF OF THE MAC-IVORS AND THE CHIEF'S SISTER 46
II. MISFORTUNES NEVER COME SINGLE 55
_THE THIRD INTERLUDE--BEING MAINLY A FEW WORDS
UPON HEROES_ 62

THE FOURTH TALE:

HERE AND THERE AMONG THE HEATHER 64
_INTERLUDE OF STICKING-PLASTER_ 78

THE FIFTH TALE:

THE WHITE COCKADE 81

THE SIXTH TALE:

BLACK LOOKS AND BRIGHT SWORDS 94
_INTERLUDE OF BREVITY_ 104

THE LAST TALE:

THE BARON'S SURPRISE 105

RED CAP TALES FROM "GUY MANNERING"

 _WHERE WE TOLD THE SECOND TALE_ 123

THE FIRST TALE:

I. WITCHCRAFT AND WIZARDRY 124
_INTERLUDE OF INTERROGATION_ 140

THE SECOND TALE:

I. HAPPY DOMINIE SAMPSON 143
II. DANDIE DINMONT 150
III. IN THE LION'S MOUTH 158
_INTERLUDE OF LOCALITY_ 162

THE THIRD TALE:

THE RETURN OF DIRK HATTERAICK 166

THE FOURTH TALE:

THE FIGHT IN THE CAVE 185
_INTERLUDE OF CONSULTATION_ 204

RED CAP TALES FROM "ROB ROY"

THE FIRST TALE:

FRANK THE HIGHWAYMAN 211
_INTERLUDE OF DISCUSSION_ 236

THE SECOND TALE:

I. IN THE TOILS OF RASHLEIGH 241
II. ROB ROY AT LAST 254
III. THE BAILIE FIGHTS WITH FIRE 267
IV. THE DROWNING OF THE SPY 276
_INTERLUDE OF EXPOSTULATION_ 284

THE THIRD TALE:

I. IN THE HANDS OF THE PHILISTINES 288
II. THE ESCAPE 294
III. THE DEATH OF RASHLEIGH 307

RED CAP TALES FROM "THE ANTIQUARY"

THE FIRST TALE:
I. THE MYSTERIOUS MR. LOVEL 326
II. THE NIGHT OF STORM 337
_INTERLUDE OF WARNING_ 352

THE SECOND TALE:

I. LOVEL FIGHTS A DUEL 354
II. THE SEEKERS OF TREASURE 370
III. MISTICOT'S GRAVE 377
_A QUITE SUPERFLUOUS INTERLUDE_ 389

THE THIRD TALE:

I. THE EARL'S SECRET 396
II. THE MOTHER'S VENGEANCE 400
III. THE HEIR OF GLENALLAN 408
LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS

BY SIMON HARMON VEDDER

1 Red Cap among the Wizard's treasures _Frontispiece_

WAVERLEY
_Facing page_
2 In an instant his red cap was off and he was
bowing and saluting . . . with . . . extravagant gestures 20
3 So fierce was the attack . . . made on Edward, that the
young man was compelled to draw his pistol 66
4 Rose Bradwardine . . . watched him with a sigh on her lip
and colour on her cheek 84
5 "Vich Ian Vohr," it said in a dreadful voice, "beware of
to-morrow" 102

GUY MANNERING

6 "Ride your ways, Laird of Ellangowan," she cried 136

7 He would stand there transfixed . . . till a serving-maid
pulled his skirts to tell him dinner was waiting 150
8 He saw his late companion . . . engaged in deadly combat
with a couple of rascals 154
9 Hazlewood snatched the gun from the servant and haughtily
ordered Brown to stand back and not to alarm the lady 170

ROB ROY

10 He took the lantern . . . and holding it up, proceeded to

examine the stern, set countenance of Frank's guide 256
11 The fight between Frank and Rashleigh 266
12 "Stand!" she cried, . . . "and tell me what you seek in
Macgregor's country" 278
13 The girl's face, perhaps not altogether unintentionally,
touched that of Frank Osbaldistone 300

THE ANTIQUARY

14 "Turn back! Turn back!" he cried 344

15 Dousterswivel flung himself on his knees 375
16 He lighted his beacon accordingly 410

RED CAP TALES

CERTAIN SMALL PHARAOHS THAT KNEW NOT JOSEPH

IT was all Sweetheart's fault, and this is how it came about.

She and I were at Dryburgh Abbey, sitting quietly on a rustic seat, and
looking toward the aisle in which slept the Great Dead. The long
expected had happened, and we had made pilgrimage to our Mecca. Yet, in
spite of the still beauty of the June day, I could see that a shadow lay
upon our Sweetheart's brow.

"Oh, I know he was great," she burst out at last, "and what you read me
out of the _Life_ was nice. I like hearing about Sir Walter--but--"

I knew what was coming.

"But what?" I said, looking severely at the ground, so that I might be

able to harden my heart against the pathos of Sweetheart's expression.

"But--I can't read the novels--indeed I can't. I have tried _Waverley_

at least twenty times. And as for _Rob Roy_--"

Even the multiplication table failed here, and at this, variously

a-sprawl on the turf beneath, the smaller fry giggled.

"Course," said Hugh John, who was engaged in eating grass like an ox,
"we know it is true about _Rob Roy_. She read us one whole volume, and
there wasn't no Rob Roy, nor any fighting in it. So we pelted her with
fir-cones to make her stop and read over _Treasure Island_ to us
instead!"

"Yes, though we had heard it twenty times already," commented Sir Toady
Lion, trying his hardest to pinch his brother's legs on the sly.

"Books wifout pictures is silly!" said a certain Maid Margaret, a

companion new to the honourable company, who was weaving daisy-chains,
her legs crossed beneath her, Turk fashion. In literature she had got as
far as words of one syllable, and had a poor opinion even of them.

"_I_ had read all Scott's novels long before I was your age," I said
reprovingly.

The children received this announcement with the cautious silence with
which every rising generation listens to the experiences of its elders
when retailed by way of odious comparison.

"Um-m!" said Sir Toady, the licensed in speech; "_we_ know all that. Oh,
yes; and you didn't like fruit, and you liked medicine in a big spoon,
and eating porridge and--"

"Oh, we know--we know!" cried all the others in chorus. Whereupon I

informed them what would have happened to us thirty years ago if we had
ventured to address our parents in such fashion. But Sweetheart, with
the gravity of her age upon her, endeavoured to raise the discussion to
its proper level.

"Scott writes such a lot before you get at the story," she objected,
knitting her brows; "why couldn't he just have begun right away?"

"With Squire Trelawney and Dr. Livesey drawing at their pipes in the
oak-pannelled dining room, and Black Dog outside the door, and Pew
coming tapping along the road with his stick!" cried Hugh John, turning
off a sketchy synopsis of his favourite situations in fiction.
"Now that's what I call a proper book!" said Sir Toady, hastily rolling
himself out of the way of being kicked. (For with these unusual
children, the smooth ordinary upper surfaces of life covered a constant
succession of private wars and rumours of wars, which went on under the
table at meals, in the schoolroom, and even, it is whispered, in
church.)

As for blithe Maid Margaret, she said nothing, for she was engaged in
testing the capacities of a green slope of turf for turning somersaults
upon.

"In Sir Walter Scott's time," I resumed gravely, "novels were not
written for little girls--"

"Then why did you give us Miss Edgeworth to read?" said Sweetheart,
quickly. But I went on without noticing the interruption, "Now, if you
like, I will tell you some of Sir Walter's stories over again, and then
I will mark in your own little edition the chapters you can read for
yourselves."

The last clause quieted the joyous shout which the promise of a
story--any sort of a story--had called forth. An uncertain look crept
over their faces, as if they scented afar off that abomination of
desolation--"lessons in holiday time."

"_Must_ we read the chapters?" said Hugh John, unhopefully.

"Tell us the stories, anyway, and leave it to our honour!" suggested Sir
Toady Lion, with a twinkle in his eye.

"Is it a story--oh, don't begin wifout me!" Maid Margaret called from
behind the trees, her sturdy five-year-old legs carrying her to the
scene of action so fast that her hat fell off on the grass and she had
to turn back for it.

"Well, I will tell you, if I can, the story of 'Waverley,'" I said.

"Was he called after the pens?" said Toady Lion the irreverent, but
under his breath. He was, however, promptly kicked into silence by his
peers--seriously this time, for he who interferes with the telling of a
story is a "Whelk,"--which, for the moment, is the family word for
whatever is base, mean, unprofitable, and unworthy of being associated
with.

But first I told them about the writing of _Waverley_, and the hand at
the Edinburgh back window which wrote and wrote. Only that, but the
story as told by Lockhart had affected my imagination as a boy.

"Did you ever hear of the Unwearied Hand?" I asked them.

"It sounds a nice title," said Sir Toady; "had he only one?"

"It was in the early summer weather of 1814," I began, "after a dinner
in a house in George Street, that a young man, sitting at the wine with
his companions, looked out of the window, and, turning pale, asked his
next neighbour to change seats with him.

"'There it is--at it again!' he said, with a thump of his fist on

thetable that made the decanters jump, and clattered the glasses;
'it has haunted me every night these three weeks. Just when I am
lifting my glass I look through the window, and there it is at
it--writing--writing--always writing!'

"So the young men, pressing about, looked eagerly, and lo! seen through
the back window of a house in a street built at right angles, they saw
the shape of a man's hand writing swiftly, steadily, on large quarto
pages. As soon as one was finished, it was added to a pile which grew
and grew, rising, as it were, visibly before their eyes.

"'It goes on like that all the time, even after the candles are lit,'
said the young man, 'and it makes me ashamed. I get no peace for it when
I am not at my books. Why cannot the man do his work without making
others uncomfortable?'

"Perhaps some of the company may have thought it was not a man at all,
but some prisoned fairy tied to an endless task--Wizard Michael's
familiar spirit, or Lord Soulis's imp Red Cap doing his master's bidding
with a goose-quill.

"But it was something much more wonderful than any of these. It was the
hand of Walter Scott finishing _Waverley_, at the rate of a volume every
ten days!"

"Why did he work so hard?" demanded Hugh John, whom the appearance of
fifty hands diligently writing would not have annoyed--no, not if they
had all worked like sewing-machines.

"Because," I answered, "the man who wrote _Waverley_ was beginning to

have more need of money. He had bought land. He was involved in other
people's misfortunes. Besides, for a long time, he had been a great
poet, and now of late there had arisen a greater."

"I know," cried Sweetheart, "Lord Byron--but _I_ don't think he was."

"Anyway Fitzjames and Roderick Dhu is ripping!" announced Hugh John,

and, rising to his feet, he whistled shrill in imitation of the outlaw.
It was the time to take the affairs of children at the fulness of the
tide.

"I think," I ventured, "that you would like the story of _Waverley_ if I
were to tell it now. I know you will like _Rob Roy_. Which shall it be
first?"

Then there were counter-cries of "Waverley" and "Rob Roy"--all the fury
of a contested election. But Sweetheart, waiting till the brawlers were
somewhat breathed, indicated the final sense of the meeting by saying
quietly, "_Tell us the one the hand was writing!_"

RED CAP TALES

TOLD FROM

WAVERLEY
THE FIRST TALE FROM "WAVERLEY"[1]

I. GOOD-BYE TO WAVERLEY-HONOUR

ON a certain Sunday evening, toward the middle of the eighteenth

century, a young man stood practising the guards of the broadsword in
the library of an old English manor-house. The young man was Captain
Edward Waverley, recently assigned to the command of a company in
Gardiner's regiment of dragoons, and his uncle was coming in to say a
few words to him before he set out to join the colours.

Being a soldier and a hero, Edward Waverley was naturally tall and
handsome, but, owing to the manner of his education, his uncle, an high
Jacobite of the old school, held that he was "somewhat too bookish" for
a proper man. He must therefore see a little of the world, asserted old
Sir Everard.

His Aunt Rachel had another reason for wishing him to leave
Waverley-Honour. She had actually observed her Edward look too often
across at the Squire's pew in church! Now Aunt Rachel held it no wrong
to look at Squire Stubbs's pew if only that pew had been empty. But it
was (oh, wickedness!) just when it contained the dear old-fashioned
sprigged gown and the fresh pretty face of Miss Cecilia Stubbs, that
Aunt Rachel's nephew looked most often in that direction. In addition to
which the old lady was sure she had observed "that little Celie Stubbs"
glance over at her handsome Edward in a way that--well, when _she_ was
young! And here the old lady bridled and tossed her head, and the words
which her lips formed themselves to utter (though she was too ladylike
to speak them) were obviously "The Minx!" Hence it was clear to the most
simple and unprejudiced that a greater distance had better be put
between the Waverley loft and the Squire's pew--and that as soon as
possible.

Edward's uncle, Sir Everard, had wished him to travel abroad in company
with his tutor, a staunch Jacobite clergyman by the name of Mr.
Pembroke. But to this Edward's father, who was a member of the
government, unexpectedly refused his sanction. Now Sir Everard despised
his younger brother as a turncoat (and indeed something little better
than a spy), but he could not gainsay a father's authority, even though
he himself had brought the boy up to be his heir.

"I am willing that you should be a soldier," he said to Edward; "your

ancestors have always been of that profession. Be brave like them, but
not rash. Remember you are the last of the Waverleys and the hope of
the house. Keep no company with gamblers, with rakes, or with Whigs. Do
your duty to God, to the Church of England, and--" He was going to say
"to the King," when he remembered that by his father's wish Edward was
going to fight the battles of King George. So the old Jacobite finished
off rather lamely by repeating, "to the Church of England and all
constituted authorities!"

Then the old man, not trusting himself to say more, broke off abruptly
and went down to the stables to choose the horses which were to carry
Edward to the north. Finally, he delivered into the hands of his nephew
an important letter addressed as follows:--

"To Cosmo Comyne Bradwardine, Esquire of Bradwardine, at his principal

mansion of Tully-Veolan in Perthshire, North Britain,--_These._--"

For that was the dignified way in which men of rank directed their
letters in those days.

The leave-taking of Mr. Pembroke, Edward's tutor, was even longer and
more solemn. And had Edward attended in the least to his moralisings, he
might have felt somewhat depressed. In conclusion, the good clergyman
presented him with several pounds of foolscap, closely written over in
a neat hand.

"These," he said, handling the sheets reverently, "are purposely written

small that they may be convenient to keep by you in your saddle-bags.
They are my works--my unpublished works. They will teach you the real
fundamental principles of the Church, principles concerning which, while
you have been my pupil, I have been under obligation never to speak to
you. But now as you read them, I doubt not but that the light will come
upon you! At all events, I have cleared my conscience."

Edward, in the quiet of his chamber, glanced at the heading of the

first: _A Dissent from Dissenters or the Comprehension Confuted_. He
felt the weight and thickness of the manuscript, and promptly confuted
their author by consigning the package to that particular corner of his
travelling trunk where he was least likely to come across it again.

On the other hand, his Aunt Rachel warned him with many head-shakings
against the forwardness of the ladies whom he would meet with in
Scotland (where she had never been). Then, more practically, she put
into his hand a purse of broad gold pieces, and set on his finger a
noble diamond ring.

As for Miss Celie Stubbs, she came to the Waverley church on the last
day before his departure, arrayed in all her best and newest clothes,
mighty fine with hoops, patches, and silks everywhere. But Master
Edward, who had his uniform on for the first time, his gold-laced hat
beside him on the cushion, his broadsword by his side, and his spurs on
his heels, hardly once looked at the Squire's pew. At which neglect
little Celie pouted somewhat at the time, but since within six months
she was married to Jones, the steward's son at Waverley-Honour, with
whom she lived happy ever after, we may take it that her heart could not
have been very deeply touched by Edward's inconstancy.

* * * * *

[As a suitable first taste of the original I now read to my audience

from a pocket _Waverley_, Chapter the Sixth, "The Adieus of Waverley."
It was listened to on the whole with more interest than I had hoped for.
It was an encouraging beginning. But Sir Toady, always irrepressible,
called out a little impatiently: "That's enough about him. Now tell us
what he _did!_" And this is how I endeavoured to obey.]

II. THE ENCHANTED CASTLE

Edward Waverley found his regiment quartered at Dundee in Scotland, but,

the time being winter and the people of the neighbourhood not very fond
of the "red soldiers," he did not enjoy the soldiering life so much as
he had expected. So, as soon as the summer was fairly come, he asked
permission to visit the Castle of Bradwardine, in order to pay his
respects to his uncle's friend.

It was noon of the second day after setting out when Edward Waverley
arrived at the village of Tully-Veolan to which he was bound. Never
before had he seen such a place. For, at his uncle's house of
Waverley-Honour, the houses of villagers, all white and neat, stood
about a village green, or lurked ancient and ivy-grown under the shade
of great old park trees. But the turf-roofed hovels of Tully-Veolan,
with their low doors supported on either side by all too intimate piles
of peat and rubbish, appeared to the young Englishman hardly fit for
human beings to live in. Indeed, from the hordes of wretched curs which
barked after the heels of his horse, Edward might have supposed them
meant to serve as kennels--save, that is, for the ragged urchins who
sprawled in the mud of the road and the old women who, distaff in hand,
dashed out to rescue them from being trampled upon by Edward's charger.

Passing gardens as full of nettles as of pot-herbs, and entering between

a couple of gate-posts, each crowned by the image of a rampant bear, the
young soldier at last saw before him, at the end of an avenue, the steep
roofs and crow-stepped gable ends of Bradwardine, half dwelling-house,
half castle. Here Waverley dismounted, and, giving his horse to the
soldier-servant who had accompanied him, he entered a court in which no
sound was to be heard save the plashing of a fountain. He saw the door
of a tall old mansion before him. Going up he raised the knocker, and
instantly the echoes resounded through the empty house. But no one came
to answer. The castle appeared uninhabited, the court a desert. Edward
glanced about him, half expecting to be hailed by some ogre or giant, as
adventurers used to be in the fairy tales he had read in childhood. But
instead he only saw all sorts of bears, big and little, climbing (as it
seemed) on the roof, over the windows, and out upon the ends of the
gables--while over the door at which he had been vainly knocking he read
in antique lettering the motto, "BEWAR THE BAR." But all these bruins
were of stone, and each one of them kept as still and silent as did
everything else about this strange mansion--except, that is, the
fountain, which, behind him in the court, kept up its noisy splashing.

Feeling, somehow, vaguely uncomfortable, Edward Waverley crossed the

court into a garden, green and pleasant, but to the full as solitary as
the castle court. Here again he found more bears, all sitting up in rows
on their haunches, on parapets and along terraces, as if engaged in
looking at the view. He wandered up and down, searching for some one to
whom to speak, and had almost made up his mind that he had found a real
enchanted Castle of Silence, when in the distance he saw a figure
approaching up one of the green walks. There was something uncouth and
strange about the way the newcomer kept waving his hands over his
head--then, for no apparent reason, flapping them across his breast like
a groom on a frosty day, hopping all the time first on one foot and then
on the other. Tiring of this way of getting over the ground, he would
advance by standing leaps, keeping both feet together. The only thing he
seemed quite incapable of doing was to use his feet, one after the
other, as ordinary people do when they are walking. Indeed, this strange
guardian of the enchanted castle of Bradwardine looked like a gnome or
fairy dwarf. For he was clad in an old-fashioned dress of grey, slashed
with scarlet. On his legs were scarlet stockings and on his head a
scarlet cap, which in its turn was surmounted by a turkey's feather.
He came along dancing and singing in jerks and snatches, till, suddenly
looking up from the ground, he saw Edward. In an instant his red cap was
off, and he was bowing and saluting, and again saluting and bowing,
with, if possible, still more extravagant gestures than before. Edward
asked this curious creature if the Baron Bradwardine were at home, and
what was his astonishment to be instantly answered in rhyme:

"The Knight's to the mountain

His bugle to wind;
The Lady's to greenwood
Her garland to bind.
The bower of Burd Ellen
Has moss on the floor,
That the step of Lord William,
Be silent and sure."

This was impressive enough, surely; but, after all, it did not tell
young Captain what he wanted to know. So he continued to question the
strange wight, and finally, after eliciting many unintelligible sounds,
was able to make out the single word "butler."

[Illustration: "HE came along dancing and singing in jerks and snatches,
till, suddenly looking up from the ground, he saw Edward. In an instant
his red cap was off, and he was bowing and saluting, and again saluting
and bowing, with, if possible, still more extravagant gestures than
before."]

Pouncing upon this, Edward commanded the Unknown to lead him instantly
to the butler.

Nothing loath, the fool danced and capered on in front, and, at a

turning of the path, they found an old man, who seemed by his dress to
be half butler, half gardener, digging diligently among the flower beds.
Upon seeing Captain Waverley, he let drop his spade, undid his green
apron, frowning all the time at Edward's guide for bringing his master's
guest upon him without warning, to find him digging up the earth like a
common labourer. But the Bradwardine butler had an explanation ready.

His Honour was with the folk, getting down the Black Hag (so he confided
to Edward). The two gardener lads had been ordered to attend his Honour.
So in order to amuse himself, he, the majordomo of Bradwardine, had been
amusing himself with dressing Miss Rose's flower beds. It was but seldom
that he found time for such like, though personally he was very fond of
garden work.

"He cannot get it wrought in more than two days a week, at no rate
whatever!" put in the scarecrow in the red cap and the turkey feather.

"Go instantly and find his Honour at the Black Hag," cried the majordomo
of Bradwardine, wrathful at this interference, "and tell him that there
is a gentleman come from England waiting him at the Hall."

"Can this poor fellow deliver a letter?" Edward asked doubtfully.

"With all fidelity, sir," said the butler, "that is, to any one whom he
respects. After all, he is more knave than fool. We call the innocent
Davie Dolittle, though his proper name is Davie Gellatley. But the truth
is, that since my young mistress, Miss Rose Bradwardine, took a fancy to
dress him up in fine clothes, the creature cannot be got to do a single
hand's turn of work. But here comes Miss Rose herself. Glad will she be
to welcome one of the name of Waverley to her father's house!"

III. THE BARON AND THE BEAR

Rose Bradwardine was still quite young. Scarce did the tale of her
years number seventeen, but already she was noted over all the
countryside as a pretty girl, with a skin like snow, and hair that
glistened like pale gold when the light fell upon it. Living so far from
society, she was naturally not a little shy. But as soon as her first
feeling of bashfulness was over, Rose spoke freely and brightly. Edward
and she, however, had but little time to be alone together. For it was
not long before the Baron of Bradwardine appeared, striding toward them
as if he had possessed himself of the giant's seven-league boots.
Bradwardine was a tall, thin, soldierly man, who in his time had seen
much of the world, and who under a hard and even stern exterior, hid a
heart naturally warm.

He was much given to the singing of French songs and to making long and
learned Latin quotations. And indeed he quoted Latin, even with the
tears standing in his eyes, as he first shook Edward by the hand and
then embraced him in the foreign fashion on both cheeks--all to express
the immense pleasure it was to receive in his house of Tully-Veolan "a
worthy scion of the old stock of Waverley-Honour."

While Miss Rose ran off to make some changes in her dress, the Baron
conducted Edward into a hall hung about with pikes and armour. Four or
five servants, in old-fashioned livery, received them with honour, the
majordomo at their head. The butler-gardener was not to be caught
napping a second time.

Bradwardine took Captain Waverley at once into an old dining room all
panelled with black oak, round the walls of which hung pictures of
former chiefs of the line of Tully-Veolan. Somewhere out-of-doors a bell
was ringing to announce the arrival of other guests, and Edward observed
with some interest that the table was laid for six people. In such a
desolate country it seemed difficult to imagine where they would arrive
from.

Upon this point Edward soon received enlightenment. First, there was the
Laird of Balmawhapple,--"a discreet young gentleman," said the Baron,
"much given to field sports." Next came the Laird of Killancureit, who
cultivated his own fields and cared for his own cattle--thereby (quoth
the Baron) showing the commonness of his origin. Added to these were a
"non-juring" Episcopal minister--that is, one who had refused to take
the oaths of allegiance to King George's government, and, last of all,
the "Baron-Bailie" or land-steward of Bradwardine, one Mr. Macwheeble.

This last, to show his consciousness of his inferior position, seated

himself as far as possible from the table, and as often as he wanted to
eat, he bent himself nearly double over his plate, in the shape of a
clasp-knife about to shut. When dinner was over, Rose and the clergyman
discreetly retired, when, with a sign to the butler, the Baron of
Bradwardine produced out of a locked case a golden cup called the
Blessed Bear of Bradwardine, in which first the host and then all the
company pledged the health of the young English stranger. After a while,
the Baron and Edward set out to see their guests a certain distance on
their way, going with them down the avenue to the village "change-house"
or inn, where Balmawhapple and Killancureit had stabled their horses.

Edward, being weary, would much rather have found himself in bed, but
this desertion of good company the Baron would noways allow. So under
the low cobwebbed roof of Lucky Macleary's kitchen the four gentlemen
sat down to "taste the sweets of the night." But it was not long before
the wine began to do its work in their heads. Each one of them, Edward
excepted, talked or sang without paying any attention to his fellows.
From wine they fell to politics, when Balmawhapple proposed a toast
which was meant to put an affront upon the uniform Edward wore, and the
King in whose army he served.

"To the little gentleman in black velvet," cried the young Laird, "he
who did such service in 1702, and may the white horse break his neck
over a mound of his making!"

The "little gentleman in black velvet" was the mole over whose hillock
King William's horse is said to have stumbled, while the "white horse"
represented the house of Hanover.

Though of a Jacobite family, Edward could not help taking offence at the
obvious insult, but the Baron was before him. The quarrel was not his,
he assured him. The guest's quarrel was the host's--so long as he
remained under his roof.

"Here," quoth the Baron, "I am _in loco parentis_ to you, Captain
Waverley. I am bound to see you scatheless. And as for you, Mr. Falconer
of Balmawhapple, I warn you to let me see no more aberrations from the
paths of good manners."

"And I tell you, Mr. Cosmo Comyne Bradwardine of Bradwardine and

Tully-Veolan," retorted the other, in huge disdain, "that I will make a
muir cock of the man that refuses my toast, whether he be a crop-eared
English Whig wi' a black ribband at his lug, or ane wha deserts his
friends to claw favour wi' the rats of Hanover!"

In an instant rapiers were out, and the Baron and Balmawhapple hard at
it. The younger man was stout and active, but he was no match for the
Baron at the sword-play. And the encounter would not have lasted long,
had not the landlady, Lucky Macleary, hearing the well-known clash of
swords, come running in on them, crying that surely the gentlemen would
not bring dishonour on an honest widow-woman's house, when there was all
the lee land in the country to do their fighting upon.

So saying, she stopped the combat very effectually by flinging her plaid
over the weapons of the adversaries.

* * * * *

Next morning Edward awoke late, and in no happy frame of mind. It was an
age of duels, and with his first waking thoughts there came the memory
of the insult which had been passed upon him by the Laird of
Balmawhapple. His position as an officer and a Waverley left him no
alternative but to send that sportsman a challenge. Upon descending, he
found Rose Bradwardine presiding at the breakfast table. She was alone,
but Edward felt in no mood for conversation, and sat gloomy, silent, and
ill-content with himself and with circumstances. Suddenly he saw the
Baron and Balmawhapple pass the window arm in arm, and the next moment
the butler summoned him to speak with his master in another apartment.

There he found Balmawhapple, no little sulky and altogether silent, with

the Baron by his side. The latter in his capacity of mediator made
Edward a full and complete apology for the events of the past
evening--an apology which the young man gladly accepted along with the
hand of the offender--somewhat stiffly given, it is true, owing to the
necessity of carrying his right arm in a sling--the result (as
Balmawhapple afterwards assured Miss Rose) of a fall from his horse.

It was not till the morning of the second day that Edward learned the
whole history of this reconciliation, which had at first been so welcome
to him. It was Daft Davie Gellatley, who, by the roguish singing of a
ballad, first roused his suspicions that something underlay
Balmawhapple's professions of regret for his conduct.

"The young man will brawl at the evening board

_Heard ye so merry the little birds sing?_
But the old man will draw at the dawning the sword,
_And the throstle-cock's head is under his wing._"

Edward could see by the sly looks of the Fool that he meant something
personal by this, so he plied the butler with questions, and discovered
that the Baron had actually fought Balmawhapple on the morning after the
insult, and wounded him in the sword-arm!

Here, then, was the secret of the young Laird's unexpected submission
and apology. As Davie Gellatley put it, Balmawhapple had been "sent hame
wi' his boots full o' bluid!"

THE FIRST INTERLUDE OF ACTION

The tale-telling had at this point to be broken

off. Clouds began to spin themselves from Eildon
top. Dinner also was in prospect, and, most of all,
having heard so much of the tale, the four
listeners desired to begin to "play Waverley."

Sweetheart made a stately, if skirted,

Bradwardine. Besides, she was in _C�sar_, and
had store of Latin quotations--mostly, it is true,
from the examples in the grammar, such as "_Illa
incedit regina!_" Certainly she walked like a
queen. Or, as it might be expressed, more fittingly
with the character of the Baron in the original:

"Stately stepped she east the wa',

And stately stepped she west."

Hugh John considered the hero's part in any story

only his due. His only fault with that of Waverley
was that so far he had done so little. He specially
resented the terrible combat "in the dawning"
between the Baron and the overbold Balmawhapple
(played by Maid Margaret). Sir Toady Lion as low
comedian ("camelion" he called it) performed
numerous antics as Daft Davie Gellatley. He had
dressed the part to perfection by putting his
striped jersey on outside his coat, and sticking in
his cricket cap such feathers as he could find.

"Lie down, Hugh John," he cried, in the middle of

his dancing and singing round and round the
combatants; "why, you are asleep in bed!"

This, according to the authorities, being obvious,

the baffled hero had to succumb, with the muttered
reflection that "Jim Hawkins wouldn't have had to
stay asleep, when there was a fight like that going
on!"

Still, however, Hugh John could not restrain the

natural rights of criticism. He continually raised
his head from his pillow of dried branches to watch
Sweetheart and Maid Margaret.

"You fight just like girls," he cried indignantly;

"keep your left hand behind you, Bradwardine--or
Balmawhapple will hack it off! I say--girls _are_
silly things. You two are afraid of hurting each
other. Now me and Toady Lion--"

And he gave details of a late fraternal combat much

in the manner of Froissart.

It is to be noted that thus far both Sweetheart and

Maid Margaret disdained the female parts, the
latter even going the length of saying that she
preferred Celie Stubbs, the Squire's daughter at
Waverley-Honour, to Rose Bradwardine. On being
asked for an explanation of this heresy, she said,
"Well, at any rate, Celie Stubbs got a new hat to
come to church in!"

* * * * *

And though I read the "Repentance and a

Reconciliation" chapter, which makes number Twelve
of _Waverley_, to the combatants, I was conscious
that I must hasten on to scenes more exciting if I
meant to retain the attention of my small but
exacting audience. Furthermore, it was beginning to
rain. So, hurriedly breaking off the tale, we drove
back to Melrose across the green holms of St.
Boswells.

It was after the hour of tea, and the crowd of

visitors had ebbed away from the precincts of the
Abbey before the tale was resumed. A flat "throuch"
stone sustained the narrator, while the four
disposed themselves on the sunny grass, in the
various attitudes of severe inattention which youth
assumes when listening to a story. Sweetheart pored
into the depths of a buttercup. Hugh John scratched
the freestone of a half-buried tomb with a nail
till told to stop. Sir Toady Lion, having a
"pinch-bug" coralled in his palms, sat regarding it
 cautiously between his thumbs. Only Maid Margaret,
her dimpled chin on her knuckles, sat looking
upward in rapt attention. For her there was no joy
like that of a story. Only, she was too young to
mind letting the tale-teller know it. That made the
difference.

Above our heads the beautiful ruin mounted, now all

red gold in the lights, and purple in the shadows,
while round and round, and through and through,
from highest tower to lowest arch, the swifts
shrieked and swooped.

THE SECOND TALE FROM "WAVERLEY"

I. THE CATTLE-LIFTING

NEXT morning (I continued, looking up for inspiration to the pinnacles

of Melrose, cut against the clear sky of evening, as sharply as when
"John Morow, master mason," looked upon his finished work and found it
very good)--next morning, as Captain Edward Waverley was setting out for
his morning walk, he found the castle of Bradwardine by no means the
enchanted palace of silence he had first discovered. Milkmaids,
bare-legged and wild-haired, ran about distractedly with pails and
three-legged stools in their hands, crying, "Lord, guide us!" and "Eh,
sirs!"

Bailie Macwheeble, mounted on his dumpy, round-barrelled pony, rode

hither and thither with half the ragged rascals of the neighbourhood
clattering after him. The Baron paced the terrace, every moment glancing
angrily up at the Highland hills from under his bushy grey eyebrows.

From the byre-lasses and the Bailie, Edward could obtain no satisfactory
explanation of the disturbance. He judged it wiser not to seek it from
the angry Baron.

Within-doors, however, he found Rose, who, though troubled and anxious,

replied to his questions readily enough.

"There has been a 'creach,' that is, a raid of cattle-stealers from out
of the Highland hills," she told him, hardly able to keep back her
tears--not, she explained, because of the lost cattle, but because she
feared that the anger of her father might end in the slaying of some of
the Caterans, and in a blood-feud which would last as long as they or
any of their family lived.

"And all because my father is too proud to pay blackmail to Vich Ian
Vohr!" she added.

"Is the gentleman with that curious name," said Edward, "a local robber
or a thief-taker?"

"Oh, no," Rose laughed outright at his southern ignorance, "he is a

great Highland chief and a very handsome man. Ah, if only my father
would be friends with Fergus Mac-Ivor, then Tully-Veolan would once
again be a safe and happy home. He and my father quarrelled at a county
meeting about who should take the first place. In his heat he told my
father that he was under his banner and paid him tribute. But it was
Bailie Macwheeble who had paid the money without my father's knowledge.
And since then he and Vich Ian Vohr have not been friends."

"But what is blackmail?" Edward asked in astonishment. For he thought

that such things had been done away with long ago. All this was just
like reading an old black-letter book in his uncle's library.

"It is money," Rose explained, "which, if you live near the Highland
border, you must pay to the nearest powerful chief--such as Vich Ian
Vohr. And then, if your cattle are driven away, all you have to do is
just to send him word and he will have them sent back, or others as good
in their places. Oh, you do not know how dreadful to be at feud with a
man like Fergus Mac-Ivor. I was only a girl of ten when my father and
his servants had a skirmish with a party of them, near our home-farm--so
near, indeed, that some of the windows of the house were broken by the
bullets, and three of the Highland raiders were killed. I remember
seeing them brought in and laid on the floor in the hall, each wrapped
in his plaid. And next morning their wives and daughters came, clapping
their hands and crying the _coronach_ and shrieking--and they carried
away the dead bodies, with the pipes playing before them. Oh, I could
not sleep for weeks afterward, without starting up, thinking that I
heard again these terrible cries."

All this seemed like a dream to Waverley--to hear this young gentle girl
of seventeen talk familiarly of dark and bloody deeds, such as even he,
a grown man and a soldier, had only imagined--yet which she had seen
with her own eyes!

By dinner-time the Baron's mood had grown somewhat less stormy. He

seemed for the moment to forget his wounded honour, and was even
offering, as soon as the quarrel was made up, to provide Edward with
introductions to many powerful northern chiefs, when the door opened,
and a Highlander in full costume was shown in by the butler.

"Welcome, Evan Dhu Maccombich!" said the Baron, without rising, and
speaking in the manner of a prince receiving an embassy; "what news from
Fergus Mac-Ivor Vich Ian Vohr?"

The ambassador delivered a courteous greeting from the Highland chief.

"Fergus Mac-Ivor (he said) was sorry for the cloud that hung between him
and his ancient friend. He hoped that the Baron would be sorry too--and
that he should say so. More than this he did not ask."

This the Baron readily did, drinking to the health of the chief of the
Mac-Ivors, while Evan Maccombich in turn drank prosperity to the house
of Bradwardine.

II. THE ROBBER'S CAVE

Then these high matters being finished, the Highlander retired with
Bailie Macwheeble, doubtless to arrange with him concerning the arrears
of blackmail. But of that the Baron was supposed to know nothing. This
done, the Highlander began to ask all about the party which had driven
off the cattle, their appearance, whence they had come, and in what
place they had last been seen. Edward was much interested by the man's
shrewd questions and the quickness with which he arrived at his
conclusions. While on his part Evan Dhu was so flattered by the evident
interest of the young Englishman, that he invited him to "take a walk
with him into the mountains in search of the cattle," promising him that
if the matter turned out as he expected, he would take Edward to such a
place as he had never seen before and might never have a chance of
seeing again.

Waverley accepted with eager joy, and though Rose Bradwardine turned
pale at the idea, the Baron, who loved boldness in the young, encouraged
the adventure. He gave Edward a young gamekeeper to carry his pack and
to be his attendant, so that he might make the journey with fitting
dignity.

Through a great pass, full of rugged rocks and seamed with roaring
torrents--indeed, the very pass of Bally-Brough in which the reivers had
last been spied--across weary and dangerous morasses, where Edward had
perforce to spring from tuft to tussock of coarse grass, Evan Dhu led
our hero into the depths of the wild Highland country,--where no Saxon
foot trod or dared to tread without the leave of Vich Ian Vohr, as the
chief's foster-brother took occasion to inform Edward more than once.

By this time night was coming on, and Edward's attendant was sent off
with one of Evan Dhu's men, that they might find a place to sleep in,
while Evan himself pushed forward to warn the supposed cattle-stealer,
one Donald Bean Lean, of the party's near approach. For, as Evan Dhu
said, the Cateran might very naturally be startled by the sudden
appearance of a _sidier roy_--or red soldier--in the very place of his
most secret retreat.

Edward was thus left alone with the single remaining Highlander, from
whom, however, he could obtain no further information as to his
journey's end--save that, as the Sassenach was somewhat tired, Donald
Bean might possibly send the _currach_ for him.

Edward wished much to know whether the _currach_ was a horse, a cart, or
a chaise. But in spite of all his efforts, he could get no more out of
the man with the Lochaber axe than the words repeated over and over
again, "_Aich aye, ta currach! Aich aye, ta currach!_"

However, after stumbling on a little farther, they came out on the

shores of a loch, and the guide, pointing through the darkness in the
direction of a little spark of light far away across the water, said,
"Yon's ta cove!" Almost at the same moment the dash of oars was heard,
and a shrill whistle came to their ears out of the darkness. This the
Highlander answered, and a boat appeared in which Edward was soon
seated, and on his way to the robber's cave.

The light, which at first had been no bigger than a rush-light, grew
rapidly larger, glowing red (as it seemed) upon the very bosom of the
lake. Cliffs began to rise above their heads, hiding the moon. And, as
the boat rapidly advanced, Edward could make out a great fire kindled on
the shore, into which dark mysterious figures were busily flinging pine
branches. The fire had been built on a narrow ledge at the opening of a
great black cavern, into which an inlet of the loch seemed to advance.
The men rowed straight for this black entrance. Then, letting the boat
run on with shipped oars, the fire was soon passed and left behind, and
the cavern entered through a great rocky arch. At the foot of some
natural steps the boat stopped. The beacon brands which had served to
guide them were thrown hissing into the water, and Edward found himself
lifted out of the boat by brawny arms and carried almost bodily into the
depths of the cavern. Presently, however, he was allowed to walk, though
still guided on either side, when suddenly at a turn of the rock
passage, the cave opened out, and Edward found the famous Cateran,
Donald Bean Lean, and his whole establishment plain before his eyes.

The cavern was lit with pine torches, and about a charcoal fire five or
six Highlanders were seated, while in the dusk behind several others
slumbered, wrapped in their plaids. In a large recess to one side were
seen the carcasses of both sheep and cattle, hung by the heels as in a
butcher's shop, some of them all too evidently the spoils of the Baron
of Bradwardine's flocks and herds.

The master of this strange dwelling came forward to welcome Edward,

while Evan Dhu stood by his side to make the necessary introductions.
Edward had expected to meet with a huge savage warrior in the captain of
such banditti, but to his surprise he found Donald Bean Lean to be a
little man, pale and insignificant in appearance, and not even Highland
in dress. For at one time Donald had served in the French army. So now,
instead of receiving Edward in his national costume, he had put on an
old blue-and-red foreign uniform, in which he made so strange a figure
that, though it was donned in his honour, his visitor had hard work to
keep from laughing. Nor was the freebooter's conversation more in accord
with his surroundings. He talked much of Edward's family and
connections, and especially of his uncle's Jacobite politics--on which
last account, he seemed inclined to welcome the young man with more
cordiality than, as a soldier of King George, Edward felt to be his due.
The scene which followed was, however, better fitted to the time and
place.

At a half-savage feast Edward had the opportunity of tasting steaks

fresh cut from some of the Baron's cattle, broiled on the coals before
his eyes, and washed down with draughts of Highland whiskey.

Yet in spite of the warmth of his welcome, there was something very
secret and unpleasant about the shifty cunning glance of this little
robber-chief, who seemed to know so much about the royal garrisons, and
even about the men of Edward's own troop whom he had brought with him
from Waverley-Honour.

When at last they were left alone together, Evan Dhu having lain down in
his plaid, the little captain of cattle-lifters asked Captain Waverley
in a very significant manner, "if he had nothing particular to say to
him."

Edward, a little startled at the tone in which the question was put,
answered that he had no other reason for coming to the cave but a desire
to see so strange a dwelling-place.

For a moment Donald Bean Lean looked him full in the face, as if waiting
for something more, and then, with a nod full of meaning, he muttered:
"You might as well have confided in me. I am as worthy of trust as
either the Baron of Bradwardine or Vich Ian Vohr! But you are equally
welcome to my house!"

His heather bed, the flickering of the fire, the smoking torches, and
the movement of the wild outlaws going and coming about the cave, soon,
however, diverted Waverley's thoughts from the mysterious words of his
host. His eyelids drew together, nor did he reopen them till the morning
sun, reflected from the lake, was filling all the cave with a glimmering
twilight.

THE SECOND INTERLUDE

As soon as this part of the tale was finished, the

audience showed much greater eagerness to enter
immediately upon the acting of Donald Bean Lean's
cattle-raid, and its consequences, than it had
previously displayed as to the doings of Edward
Waverley.

As Hugh John admitted, this was "something like!"

The Abbey precincts were instantly filled with the
mingled sounds characteristic of all well-conducted
forays, and it was well indeed that the place was
wholly deserted. For the lowings of the driven
cattle, the shouts of the triumphant Highlanders,
the deep rage of the Baron, stalking to and fro
wrapped in his cloak on the Castle terrace, might
well have astonished the crowd which in these
summer days comes from the four corners of the
world "to view fair Melrose aright."

It was not till the edge had worn off their first
enthusiasm, that it became possible to collect them
again in order to read "The Hold of a Highland
Robber," which makes Chapter Seventeenth of
_Waverley_ itself. And the reading so fired the
enthusiasm of Sweetheart that she asked for the
book to take to bed with her. The boys were more
practical, though equally enthusiastic.

"Wait till we get home," cried Hugh John, cracking

his fingers and thumbs. "I know a proper place for
Donald Bean Lean's cave."

"And I," said Sir Toady Lion, "will light a fire by

the pond and toss the embers into the water. It
will be jolly to hear 'em hiss, I tell you!"

"But what," asked Maid Margaret, "shall we do for

the cattle and sheep that were hanging by the
heels, when Edward went into Donald Bean Lean's
cave?"

"Why, we will hang _you_ up by the heels and cut

slices off you!" said Sir Toady, with frowning
truculence.

Whereat the little girl, a little solemnised, began

to edge away from the dangerous neighbourhood of
such a pair of young cannibals. Sweetheart
reproached her brothers for inventing calumnies
against their countrymen.

"Even the Highlanders were never so wicked," she

objected; "they did not eat one another."
"Well, anyway," retorted Sir Toady Lion, unabashed,
"Sawney Bean did. Perhaps he was a cousin of
Donald's, though in the history it says that he
came from East Lothian."

"Yes," cried Hugh John, "and in an old book written

in Latin it says (father read it to us) that one of
his little girls was too young to be executed with
the rest on the sands of Leith. So the King sent
her to be brought up by kind people, where she was
brought up without knowing anything of her father,
the cannibal, and her mother, the cannibaless--"

"Oh," cried Sweetheart, who knew what was coming,

putting up her hands over her ears, "please don't
tell that dreadful story all over again."

"Father read it out of a book--so there!" cried Sir

Toady, implacably, "go on, Hugh John!"

"And so when this girl was about as big as

Sweetheart, and, of course, could not remember her
grandfather's nice cave or the larder where the
arms and legs were hung up to dry in the smoke--"

"Oh, you horrid boy!" cried Sweetheart, not,

however, removing herself out of ear-shot--because,
after all, it was nice to shiver just a little.

"Oh, yes, and I have seen the cave," cried Sir

Toady, "it is on the shore near Ballantrae--a
horrid place. Go on, Hugh John, tell about Sawney
Bean's grandchild!"

"Well, she grew up and up, playing with dolls just

like other girls, till she was old enough to be
sent out to service. And after she had been a while
about the house to which she went, it was noticed
that some of the babies in the neighbourhood began
to go a-missing, and they found--"

"I think she was a nursemaid!" interrupted Sir

Toady, dispassionately. "That must have been it.
The little wretches cried--_so she ate them!_"

"Oh," cried Sweetheart, stopping her ears with her

fingers, "don't tell us what they found--I believe
you made it all up, anyway."

"No, I didn't," cried Hugh John, shouting in her

ear as if to a very deaf person, "it was father who
read it to us, out of a big book with fat black
letters. So it must be true!"

Sir Toady was trying to drag away his sister's arms

that she might have the benefit of details, when I
appeared in the distance. Whereupon Hugh John, who
felt his time growing limited, concluded thus, "And
when they were taking the girl away to hang her,
 the minister asked her why she had killed the
babies, and she answered him, 'If people only knew
how good babies were--especially little
girls--_there would not be one left between Forth
and Solway!_'"

Then quite unexpectedly Maid Margaret began to sob

bitterly.

"They _shan't_ hang me up and eat me," she cried,

running as hard as she could and flinging herself
into my arms; "Hugh John and Sir Toady say they
will, as soon as we get home."

Happily I had a light cane of a good vintage in my

hand, and it did not take long to convince the pair
of young scamps of the inconvenience of frightening
their little sister. Sweetheart looked on
approvingly as two forlorn young men were walked
off to a supper, healthfully composed of plain
bread and butter, and washed down by some nice cool
water from the pump.

"I told you!" she said, "you wouldn't believe me."

All the same she was tender-hearted enough to

convey a platter of broken meats secretly up to
their "condemned cell," as I knew from finding the
empty plate under their washstand in the morning.
And as Maid Margaret was being carried off to be
bathed and comforted, a Voice, passing their door,
threatened additional pains and penalties to little
boys who frightened their sisters.

"It was all in a book," said Hugh John, defending

himself from under the bedclothes, "father read it
to us!"

"We did it for her good," suggested Sir Toady.

"If I hear another word out of you--" broke in the

Voice; and then added, "go to sleep this instant!"

The incident of the cave had long been forgotten

and forgiven, before I could continue the story of
Waverley in the cave of Donald Bean Lean. We sat
once more "in oor ain hoose at hame," or rather
outside it, near a certain pleasant chalet in a
wood, from which place you can see a brown and
turbulent river running downward to the sea.

THE THIRD TALE FROM "WAVERLEY"

I. THE CHIEF OF THE MAC-IVORS AND THE CHIEF'S SISTER

WHEN Edward awoke next morning, he could not for a moment remember where
he was. The cave was deserted. Only the grey ashes of the fire, a few
gnawed bones, and an empty keg remained to prove that he was still on
the scene of last night's feast. He went out into the sunlight. In a
little natural harbour the boat was lying snugly moored. Farther out, on
a rocky spit, was the mark of last night's beacon-fire. Here Waverley
had to turn back. Cliffs shut him in on every side, and Edward was at a
loss what to do, till he discovered, climbing perilously out in the rock
above the cave mouth, some slight steps or ledges. These he mounted with
difficulty, and, passing over the shoulder of the cliff, found himself
presently on the shores of a loch about four miles long, surrounded on
every side by wild heathery mountains.

In the distance he could see a man fishing and a companion watching him.
By the Lochaber axe which the latter carried Edward recognised the
fisher as Evan Dhu. On a stretch of sand under a birch tree, a girl was
laying out a breakfast of milk, eggs, barley bread, fresh butter, and
honeycomb. She was singing blithely, yet she must have had to travel far
that morning to collect such dainties in so desolate a region.

This proved to be Alice, the daughter of Donald Bean Lean, and it is

nothing to her discredit that she had made herself as pretty as she
could, that she might attend upon the handsome young Englishman. All
communication, however, had to be by smiles and signs, for Alice spoke
no English. Nevertheless she set out her dainties with right good-will,
and then seated herself on a stone a little distance away to watch for
an opportunity of serving the young soldier.

Presently Evan Dhu came up with his catch, a fine salmon-trout, and soon
slices of the fish were broiling on the wood embers. After breakfast,
Alice gathered what was left into a wicker basket, and, flinging her
plaid about her, presented her cheek to Edward for "the stranger's
kiss." Evan Dhu made haste to secure a similar privilege, but Alice
sprang lightly up the bank out of his reach, and with an arch wave of
her hand to Edward she disappeared.

Then Evan Dhu led Edward back to the boat. The three men embarked, and
after emerging from the mouth of the cavern, a clumsy sail was hoisted,
and they bore away up the lake--Evan Dhu all the time loud in the
praises of Alice Bean Lean.

Edward said that it was a pity that such a maiden should be the daughter
of a common thief. But this Evan hotly denied. According to Evan, Donald
Bean Lean, though indeed no reputable character, was far from being a
thief. A thief was one who stole a cow from a poor cotter, but he who
lifted a drove from a Sassenach laird was "a gentleman drover."

"But he would be hanged, all the same, if he were caught!" objected

Edward. "I do not see the difference."

"To be sure, he would _die for the law_, as many a pretty man has done
before him," cried Evan. "And a better death than to die, lying on damp
straw in yonder cave like a mangy tyke!"

"And what," Edward suggested, "would become of pretty Alice then?"

"Alice is both canny and fendy," said the bold Evan Dhu, with a cock of
his bonnet, "and I ken nocht to hinder me to marry her mysel'!"
Edward laughed and applauded the Highlander's spirit, but asked also as
to the fate of the Baron of Bradwardine's cattle.

"By this time," said Evan, "I warrant they are safe in the pass of
Bally-Brough and on their road back to Tully-Veolan. And that is more
than a regiment of King George's red soldiers could have brought about!"

Evan Dhu had indeed some reason to be proud.

Reassured as to this, Edward accompanied his guide with more confidence

toward the castle of Vich Ian Vohr. The "five miles Scots" seemed to
stretch themselves out indefinitely, but at last the figure of a hunter,
equipped with gun, dogs, and a single attendant, was seen far across the
heath.

"_Shogh_," said the man with the Lochaber axe, "tat's the Chief!"

Evan Dhu, who had boasted of his master's great retinue, denied it
fiercely.

"The Chief," he said, "would not come out with never a soul with him but
Callum Beg, to meet with an English gentleman."

But in spite of this prophecy, the Chief of Clan Ivor it was. Fergus
Mac-Ivor, whom his people called Vich Ian Vohr, was a young man of much
grace and dignity, educated in France, and of a strong, secret, and
turbulent character, which by policy he hid for the most part under an
appearance of courtesy and kindness. He had long been mustering his clan
in secret, in order once more to take a leading part in another attempt
to dethrone King George, and to set on the throne of Britain either the
Chevalier St. George or his son Prince Charles.

When Waverley and the Chief approached the castle--a stern and rugged
pile, surrounded by walls, they found a large body of armed Highlanders
drawn up before the gate.

"These," said Vich Ian Vohr, carelessly, "are a part of the clan whom I
ordered out, to see that they were in a fit state to defend the country
in such troublous times. Would Captain Waverley care to see them go
through part of their exercise?"

Thereupon the men, after showing their dexterity at drill, and their
fine target-shooting, divided into two parties, and went through the
incidents of a battle--the charge, the combat, the flight, and the
headlong pursuit--all to the sound of the great warpipes.

Edward asked why, with so large a force, the Chief did not at once put
down such robber bands as that of Donald Bean Lean.

"Because," said the Chief, bitterly, "if I did, I should at once be

summoned to Stirling Castle to deliver up the few broadswords the
government has left us. I should gain little by that. But there is
dinner," he added, as if anxious to change the subject, "let me show you
the inside of my rude mansion."

The long and crowded dinner-table to which Edward sat down, told of the
Chief's immense hospitality. After the meal, healths were drunk, and the
bard of the clan recited a wild and thrilling poem in Gaelic--of which,
of course, Edward could not understand so much as one word, though it
excited the clansmen so that they sprang up in ecstasy, many of them
waving their arms about in sympathy with the warlike verses. The Chief,
exactly in the ancient manner, presented a silver cup full of wine to
the minstrel. He was to drink the one and keep the other for himself.

After a few more toasts, Vich Ian Vohr offered to take Waverley up to be
presented to his sister. They found Flora Mac-Ivor in her parlour, a
plain and bare chamber with a wide prospect from the windows. She had
her brother's dark curling hair, dark eyes, and lofty expression, but
her expression seemed sweeter, though not, perhaps, softer. She was,
however, even more fiercely Jacobite than her brother, and her devotion
to "the King over the Water" (as they called King James) was far more
unselfish than that of Vich Ian Vohr. Flora Mac-Ivor had been educated
in a French convent, yet now she gave herself heart and soul to the good
of her wild Highland clan and to the service of him whom she looked on
as the true King.

She was gracious to Edward, and at the request of Fergus, told him the
meaning of the war-song he had been listening to in the hall. She was,
her brother said, famed for her translations from Gaelic into English,
but for the present she could not be persuaded to recite any of these to
Edward.

He had better fortune, however, when, finding Flora Mac-Ivor in a wild

spot by a waterfall, she sang him, to the accompaniment of a harp, a
song of great chiefs and their deeds which fired the soul of the young
man. He could not help admiring--he almost began to love her from that
moment.

After this reception, Edward continued very willingly at

Glennaquoich--both because of his growing admiration for Flora, and
because his curiosity increased every day as to this wild race, and the
life so different from all that he had hitherto known. Nothing occurred
for three weeks to disturb his pleasant dreams, save the chance
discovery, made when he was writing a letter to the Baron, that he had
somehow lost his seal with the arms of Waverley, which he wore attached
to his watch. Flora was inclined to blame Donald Bean Lean for the
theft, but the Chief scouted the idea. It was impossible, he said, when
Edward was his guest, and, besides (he added slyly), Donald would never
have taken the seal and left the watch. Whereupon Edward borrowed Vich
Ian Vohr's seal, and, having despatched his letter, thought no more of
the matter.

Soon afterwards, whilst Waverley still remained at Glennaquoich, there

was a great hunting of the stag, to which Fergus went with three hundred
of his clan to meet some of the greatest Highland chiefs, his
neighbours. He took Edward with him, and the numbers present amounted
almost to those of a formidable army. While the clansmen drove in the
deer, the chiefs sat on the heather in little groups and talked in low
tones. During the _drive_, the main body of the deer, in their
desperation, charged right upon the place where the chief sportsmen
were waiting in ambush. The word was given for every one to fling
himself down on his face. Edward, not understanding the language,
remained erect, and his life was only saved by the quickness of Vich Ian
Vohr, who seized him and flung him down, holding him there by main force
till the whole herd had rushed over them. When Edward tried to rise, he
found that he had severely sprained his ankle.
However, among those present at the _drive_, there was found an old man,
half-surgeon, half-conjurer, who applied hot fomentations, muttering all
the time of the operation such gibberish as _Gaspar-Melchior-Balthazar-max-prax-
fax!_

Thus it happened that, to his great disappointment, Edward was unable to

accompany the clansmen and their chiefs any farther. So Vich Ian Vohr
had Edward placed in a litter, woven of birch and hazel, and walked
beside this rude couch to the house of an old man, a smaller chieftain,
who, with only a few old vassals, lived a retired life at a place called
Tomanrait.

Here he left Edward to recruit, promising to come back in a few days, in

the hope that by that time Edward would be able to ride a Highland pony
in order to return to Glennaquoich.

On the sixth morning Fergus returned, and Edward gladly mounted to

accompany him. As they approached the castle, he saw, with pleasure,
Flora coming to meet them.

II. MISFORTUNES NEVER COME SINGLE

The Chief's beautiful sister appeared very glad to see Edward, and, as
her brother spoke a few hasty words to her in Gaelic, she suddenly
clasped her hands, and, looking up to heaven, appeared to ask a blessing
upon some enterprise. She then gave Edward some letters that had arrived
for him during his absence. It was perhaps as well that Edward took
these to his room to open, considering the amount of varied ill news
that he found in them.

The first was from his father, who had just been dismissed from his
position as King's minister, owing (as he put it) to the ingratitude of
the great--but really, as was proved afterwards, on account of some
political plots which he had formed against his chief, the prime
minister of the day.

Then his generous uncle, Sir Everard, wrote that all differences were
over between his brother and himself. He had espoused his quarrel, and
he directed Edward at once to send in the resignation of his commission
to the War Office without any preliminaries, forbidding him longer to
serve a government which had treated his father so badly.

But the letter which touched Edward most deeply was one from his
commanding officer at Dundee, which declared curtly that if he did not
report himself at the headquarters of the regiment within three days
after the date of writing, he would be obliged to take steps in the
matter which would be exceedingly disagreeable to Captain Waverley.

Edward at once sat down and wrote to Colonel Gardiner that, as he had
thus chosen to efface the remembrance of past civilities, there was
nothing left to him but to resign his commission, which he did formally,
and ended his letter by requesting his commanding officer to forward
this resignation to the proper quarter.

No little perplexed as to the meaning of all this, Edward was on his way
to consult Fergus Mac-Ivor on the subject, when the latter advanced with
an open newspaper in his hand.
"Do your letters," he asked, "confirm this unpleasant news?"

And he held out the _Caledonian Mercury_, in which not only did he find
his father's disgrace chronicled, but on turning to the _Gazette_ he
found the words, "Edward Waverley, Captain in the --th regiment of
dragoons, superseded for absence without leave." The name of his
successor, one Captain Butler, followed immediately.

On looking at the date of Colonel Gardiner's missive as compared with

that of the _Gazette_, it was evident that his commanding officer had
carried out his threat to the letter. Yet it was not at all like him to
have done so. It was still more out of keeping with the constant
kindness that he had shown to Edward. It was the young man's first idea,
in accordance with the customs of the time, to send Colonel Gardiner a
challenge. But, upon Fergus Mac-Ivor's advice, Edward ultimately
contented himself with adding a postscript to his first letter, marking
the time at which he had received the first summons, and regretting that
the hastiness of his commander's action had prevented his anticipating
it by sending in his resignation.

"That, if anything," said Fergus, "will make this Calvinistic colonel

blush for his injustice."

But it was not long before some part at least of the mystery was made
plain. Fergus took advantage of Edward's natural anger at his unworthy
treatment, to reveal to him that a great rising was about to take place
in the Highlands in favour of King James, and to urge him to cast in his
lot with the clans. Flora, on the contrary, urged him to be careful and
cautious, lest he should involve others to whom he owed everything, in a
common danger with himself.

Edward, whose fancy (if not whose heart) had gradually been turning more
and more toward the beautiful and patriotic Flora, appeared less
interested in rebellion than in obtaining her brother's good-will and
bespeaking his influence with his sister.

"Out upon you," cried Fergus, with pretended ill-humour, "can you think
of nothing but ladies at such a time? Besides, why come to me in such a
matter? Flora is up the glen. Go and ask herself. And Cupid go with you!
But do not forget that my lovely sister, like her loving brother, is apt
to have a pretty strong will of her own!"

Edward's heart beat as he went up the rocky hillside to find Flora. She
received and listened to him with kindness, but steadily refused to
grant him the least encouragement. All her thoughts, her hopes, her life
itself, were set on the success of this one bold stroke for a crown.
Till the rightful King was on his throne, she could not think of
anything else. Love and marriage were not for such as Flora Mac-Ivor.
Edward, in spite of the manifest good-will of the chief, had to be
content with such cold comfort as he could extract from Flora's promise
that she would remember him in her prayers!

Next morning Edward was awakened to the familiar sound of Daft Davie
Gellatley's voice singing below his window. For a moment he thought
himself back at Tully-Veolan. Davie was declaring loudly that

"_My heart's in the Highland, my heart is not here._"

Then, immediately changing to a less sentimental strain, he added with a

contemptuous accent:

"_There's nocht in the Highlands but syboes and leeks,_

_And lang-leggit callants gaun wanting the breeks;_
_Wanting the breeks, and without hose or shoon,_
_But we'll a' win the breeks when King Jamie comes hame._"

Edward, eager to know what had brought the Bradwardine "innocent" so far
from home, dressed hastily and went down. Davie, without stopping his
dancing for a moment, came whirling past, and, as he went, thrust a
letter into Waverley's hand. It proved to be from Rose Bradwardine, and
among other things it contained the news that the Baron had gone away to
the north with a body of horsemen, while the red soldiers had been at
Tully-Veolan searching for her father and also asking after Edward
himself. Indeed they had carried off his servant prisoner, together with
everything he had left at Tully-Veolan. Rose also warned him against the
danger of returning thither, and at the same time sent her compliments
to Fergus and Flora. The last words in the letter were, "_Is she not as
handsome and accomplished as I described her to be?_"

Edward was exceedingly perplexed. Knowing his innocence of all treason,

he could not imagine why he should be accused of it. He consulted
Fergus, who told him he would to a certainty be hanged or imprisoned if
he went south. Nevertheless, Edward persisted in "running his hazard."
The Chief, though wishful to keep him, did not absolutely say him nay.
Flora, instead of coming down to bid him good-bye, sent only excuses. So
altogether it was in no happy frame of mind that Edward rode away to the
south upon the Chief's horse, Brown Dermid, and with Callum Beg for an
attendant in the guise of a Lowland groom.

Callum warned his master against saying anything when they got to the
first little Lowland town, either on the subject of the Highlands, or
about his master, Vich Ian Vohr.

"The people there are bitter Whigs, teil burst them!" he said fiercely.
As they rode on they saw many people about the street, chiefly old women
in tartan hoods and red cloaks, who seemed to cast up their hands in
horror at the sight of Waverley's horse. Edward asked the reason.

"Oh," said Callum Beg, "it's either the muckle Sunday hersel', or the
little government Sunday that they caa the Fast!"

It proved to be the latter, and the innkeeper, a severe sly-looking man,

received them with scanty welcome. Indeed, he only admitted them because
he remembered that it was in his power to fine them for the crime of
travelling on a Fast Day by an addition to the length of his reckoning
next morning.

But as soon as Edward announced his wish for a horse and guide to Perth,
the hypocritical landlord made ready to go with him in person. Callum
Beg, excited by the golden guinea which Waverley gave him, offered to
show his gratitude by waiting a little distance along the road, and
"kittlin' the landlord's quarters wi' her skene-occle"--or, in other
words, setting a dagger in his back. Apparently Vich Ian Vohr's page
thought no more of such a deed than an ordinary English boy would have
thought of stealing an apple out of an orchard.

THE THIRD INTERLUDE--BEING MAINLY A FEW WORDS UPON HEROES

Among the listeners there was somewhat less
inclination than before to act this part of the
story. For one thing, the boys were righteously
indignant at the idea of any true hero being in
love--unless, indeed, he could carry off his bride
from the deck of a pirate vessel, cutlass in hand,
and noble words of daring on his lips.

As for the girls, well--they knew that the bushes

were dripping wet, and that if they set their feet
upon their native heath, they would certainly be
made to change their stockings as soon as they went
home. This was a severe discourager of romance.
There was nothing to prevent any one of them from
asking questions, however. _That_ was a business in
which they excelled.

"But why did the Highland people want to rebel,

anyway?" demanded Hugh John. "If I could have
hunted like that, and raided, and carried off
cattle, and had a castle with pipes playing and
hundreds of clansmen to drill, I shouldn't have
been such a soft as to rebel and get them all taken
away from me!"

"It was because they were loyal to their rightful

King," said Sweetheart, who is a Cavalier and a
Jacobite--in the intervals of admiring Cromwell,
and crying because they shot down the poor
Covenanters.

"_I_ think," said Sir Toady, who had been sitting

very thoughtful, "that they just liked to fight,
and King George would not let them. So they wanted
a king who would not mind. Same as us, you know. If
we are caught fighting in school, we get whipped,
but father lets us fight outside as much as we want
to. Besides, what did old Vich Ian Vohr want with
all these silly Highlanders, eating up everything
in his castle, if there were never any battles that
they could fight for him?"

This was certainly a very strong and practical

view, and so much impressed the others that they
sat a long while quiet, turning it over in their
minds.

"Well, at any rate," said Sweetheart, dropping her

head with a sigh to go on with her seam, "I know
that Flora Mac-Ivor was truly patriotic. See how
she refused to listen to Waverley, all because she
wanted to give her life for the cause."

"Humph," said Hugh John, disrespectfully turning up

his nose, "that's all girls think about--loving,
an' marrying, an' playing on harps--"

"I don't play on harps," sighed Sweetheart, "but I

 do wish I had a banjo!"

"I wish I had a targe and a broadsword, and the

Chief's horse, Brown Dermid, to ride on," said Hugh
John, putting on his "biggety" look.

"And a nice figure you would cut," sneered Sir

Toady Lion, provokingly; "Highlanders don't fight
on horseback! You ought to know that!"

Whereupon the first engagement of the campaign was

immediately fought out on the carpet. And it was
not till after the intervention of the Superior
Power had restored quiet that the next tale from
_Waverley_ could be proceeded with.

THE FOURTH TALE FROM "WAVERLEY"

HERE AND THERE AMONG THE HEATHER

NOT long after Callum Beg had been left behind, and indeed almost as
soon as the innkeeper and Edward were fairly on their way, the former
suddenly announced that his horse had fallen lame and that they must
turn aside to a neighbouring smithy to have the matter attended to.

"And as it is the Fast Day, and the smith a religious man, it may cost
your Honour as muckle as sixpence a shoe!" suggested the wily innkeeper,
watching Edward's face as he spoke.

For this announcement Edward cared nothing. He would gladly have paid a
shilling a nail to be allowed to push forward on his journey with all
speed. Accordingly to the smithy of Cairnvreckan they went. The village
was in an uproar. The smith, a fierce-looking man, was busy hammering
"dogs' heads" for musket-locks, while among the surrounding crowd the
names of great Highland chiefs--Clanronald, Glengarry, Lochiel, and that
of Vich Ian Vohr himself, were being bandied from mouth to mouth.

Edward soon found himself surrounded by an excited mob, in the midst of

which the smith's wife, a wild witchlike woman, was dancing, every now
and then casting her child up in the air as high as her arms would
reach, singing all the while, and trying to anger the crowd, and
especially to infuriate her husband, by the Jacobite songs which she
chanted.

At last the smith could stand this provocation no longer. He snatched a

red-hot bar of iron from the forge, and rushed at his wife, crying out
that he would "thrust it down her throat." Then, finding himself held
back by the crowd from executing vengeance on the woman, all his anger
turned upon Edward, whom he took to be a Jacobite emissary. For the news
which had caused all this stir was that Prince Charles had landed and
that the whole Highlands was rallying to his banner.

So fierce and determined was the attack which the angry smith of
Cairnvreckan made on Edward that the young man was compelled to draw his
pistol in self-defence. And as the crowd threatened him and the smith
continued furiously to attack with the red-hot iron, almost
unconsciously his finger pressed the trigger. The shot went off, and
immediately the smith fell to the ground. Then Edward, borne down by the
mob, was for some time in great danger of his life. He was saved at last
by the interference of the minister of the parish, a kind and gentle old
man, who caused Edward's captors to treat him more tenderly. So that
instead of executing vengeance upon the spot as they had proposed, they
brought him before the nearest magistrate, who was, indeed, an old
military officer, and, in addition, the Laird of the village of
Cairnvreckan, one Major Melville by name.

[Illustration: "SO fierce and determined was the attack which the angry
smith of Cairnvreckan made on Edward that the young man was compelled to
draw his pistol in self-defence."]

The latter proved to be a stern soldier, so severe in manner that he

often became unintentionally unjust. Major Melville found that though
the blacksmith's wound proved to be a mere scratch, and though he had to
own that the provocation given was a sufficient excuse for Edward's
hasty action, yet he must detain the young man prisoner upon the warrant
issued against Edward Waverley, which had been sent out by the Supreme
Court of Scotland.

Edward, who at once owned to his name, was astonished beyond words to
find that not only was he charged with being in the company of actual
rebels, such as the Baron of Bradwardine and Vich Ian Vohr, but also
with trying to induce his troop of horse to revolt by means of private
letters addressed to one of them, Sergeant Houghton, in their barracks
at Dundee. Captain Waverley was asserted to have effected this through
the medium of a pedlar named Will Ruthven, or Wily Will--whose very name
Edward had never heard up to that moment.

As the magistrate's examination proceeded, Waverley was astonished to

find that, instead of clearing himself, everything he said, every
article he carried about his person, was set down by Major Melville as
an additional proof of his complicity with treason. Among these figured
Flora's verses, his own presence at the great hunting match among the
mountains, his father's and Sir Everard's letters, even the huge
manuscripts written by his tutor (of which he had never read six
pages)--all were brought forward as so many evidences of his guilt.

Finally, the magistrate informed Edward that he would be compelled to

detain him a prisoner in his house of Cairnvreckan. But that if he would
furnish such information as it was doubtless in his power to give
concerning the forces and plans of Vich Ian Vohr and the other Highland
chiefs, he might, after a brief detention, be allowed to go free. Edward
fiercely exclaimed that he would die rather than turn informer against
those who had been his friends and hosts. Whereupon, having refused all
hospitality, he was conducted to a small room, there to be guarded till
there was a chance of sending him under escort to the Castle of
Stirling.

Here he was visited by Mr. Morton, the minister who had saved him from
the clutches of the mob, and so sympathetically and kindly did he speak,
that Edward told him his whole story from the moment when he had first
left Waverley-Honour. And though the minister's favourable report did
not alter the opinion Major Melville had formed of Edward's treason, it
softened his feelings toward the young man so much that he invited him
to dinner, and afterwards did his best to procure him favourable
treatment from the Westland Whig captain, Mr. Gifted Gilfillan, who
commanded the party which was to convoy him to Stirling Castle.

The escort which was to take Edward southward was not so strong as it
might have been. Part of Captain Gifted Gilfillan's command had stayed
behind to hear a favourite preacher upon the occasion of the afternoon
Fast Day service at Cairnvreckan. Others straggled for purposes of their
own, while as they went along, their leader lectured Edward upon the
fewness of those that should be saved. Heaven, he informed Edward, would
be peopled exclusively by the members of his own denomination. Captain
Gifted was still engaged in condemning all and sundry belonging to the
Churches of England and Scotland, when a stray pedlar joined his party
and asked of "his Honour" the favour of his protection as far as
Stirling, urging as a reason the uncertainty of the times and the value
of the property he carried in his pack.

The pedlar, by agreeing with all that was said, and desiring further
information upon spiritual matters, soon took the attention of Captain
Gifted Gilfillan from his prisoner. He declared that he had even
visited, near Mauchline, the very farm of the Whig leader. He
congratulated him upon the fine breed of cattle he possessed. Then he
went on to speak of the many evil, popish, and unchristian things he had
seen in his travels as a pedlar over the benighted countries of Europe.
Whereupon Gifted Gilfillan became so pleased with his companion and so
enraptured with his subject, that he allowed his party to string itself
out along the route without an attempt at discipline, or even the power
of supporting each other in case of attack.

The leaders were ascending a little hill covered with whin bushes and
crowned with low brushwood, when, after looking about him quickly to
note some landmarks, the pedlar put his fingers to his mouth and
whistled. He explained that he was whistling on a favourite dog, named
Bawty, which he had lost. The Covenanter reproved him severely for
thinking of a useless dog in the midst of such precious and improving
conversation as they were holding together.

But in spite of his protests the pedlar persisted in his whistling, and
presently, out of a copse close to the path, six or eight stout
Highlanders sprang upon them brandishing their claymores.

"The Sword of the Lord and of Gideon!" shouted Gifted Gilfillan, nothing
daunted. And he was proceeding to lay about him stoutly, when the
pedlar, snatching a musket, felled him to the ground with the butt. The
scattered Whig party hurried up to support their leader. In the scuffle,
Edward's horse was shot, and he himself somewhat bruised in falling.
Whereupon some of the Highlanders took him by the arms, and
half-supported, half-carried him away from the highroad, leaving the
unconscious Gifted still stretched on the ground. The Westlanders, thus
deprived of a leader, did not even attempt a pursuit, but contented
themselves with sending a few dropping shots after the Highlanders,
which, of course, did nobody any harm.

They carried Edward fully two miles, and it was not till they reached
the deep covert of a distant glen that they stopped with their burden.
Edward spoke to them repeatedly, but the only answer he got was that
they "had no English." Even the mention of the name of Vich Ian Vohr,
which he had hitherto regarded as a talisman, produced no response.

Moreover, Edward could see from the tartans of his captors that they
were not of the Clan Ivor. Nor did the hut, into which they presently
conveyed our hero, reveal any more. Edward was placed in a large bed,
planked all round, and after his bruises were attended to by an old
woman, the sliding panel was shut upon him. A kind of fever set his
ideas wandering, and sometimes he fancied that he heard the voice of
Flora Mac-Ivor speaking in the hut without. He tried to push back the
panel, but the inmates had secured it on the outside with a large nail.

Waverley remained some time in these narrow quarters, ministered to by

the old woman and at intervals hearing the same gentle girlish voice
speaking outside, without, however, ever being able to see its owner. At
last, after several days, two of the Highlanders who had first captured
him returned, and by signs informed him that he must get ready to follow
them immediately.

At this news Edward, thoroughly tired of his confinement, rejoiced, and,

upon rising, found himself sufficiently well to travel. He was seated in
the smoky cottage quietly waiting the signal for departure, when he felt
a touch on his arm, and, turning, he found himself face to face with
Alice, the daughter of Donald Bean Lean. With a quick movement she
showed him the edges of a bundle of papers which she as swiftly
concealed. She then laid her finger on her lips, and glided away to
assist old Janet, his nurse, in packing his saddle-bags. With the tail
of his eye, however, Edward saw the girl fold the papers among his linen
without being observed by the others. This being done, she took no
further notice of him whatever, except that just at the last, as she was
leaving the cottage, she turned round and gave him a smile and nod of
farewell.

The tall Highlander who was to lead the party now made Edward understand
that there was considerable danger on the way. He must follow without
noise, and do exactly as he was bidden. A steel pistol and a broadsword
were given him for use in case of attack. The party had not been long
upon its night journeying, moving silently along through the woods and
copses in Indian file, before Edward found that there was good reason
for this precaution.

At no great distance he heard the cry of an English sentinel, "All's

well!" Again and again the cry was taken up by other sentries till the
sound was lost in the distance. The enemy was very near, but the trained
senses of the Highlanders in their own rugged country were more than a
match for the discipline of the regulars.

A little farther on they passed a large building, with lights still

twinkling in the windows. Presently the tall Highlander stood up and
sniffed. Then motioning Waverley to do as he did, he began to crawl on
all fours toward a low and ruinous sheep-fold. With some difficulty
Edward obeyed, and with so much care was the stalk conducted, that
presently, looking over a stone wall, he could see an outpost of five or
six soldiers lying round their camp-fire, while in front a sentinel
paced backward and forward, regarding the heavens and whistling _Nancy
Dawson_ as placidly as if he were a hundred miles from any wild rebel
Highlandmen.

At that moment the moon, which up to this time had been hidden behind
clouds, shone out clear and bright. So Edward and his Highland guide had
perforce to remain where they were, stuck up against the dike, not
daring to continue their journey in the full glare of light, while the
Highlander muttered curses on "MacFarlane's lanthorn," as he called the
moon.
At last the Highlander, motioning Edward to stay where he was, began
with infinite pains to worm his way backward on all fours, taking
advantage of every bit of cover, lying stock-still behind a boulder
while the sentry was looking in his direction, and again crawling
swiftly to a more distant bush as often as he turned his back or marched
the other way. Presently Edward lost sight of the Highlander, but before
long he came out again at an altogether different part of the thicket,
in full view of the sentinel, at whom he immediately fired a shot--the
bullet wounding the soldier on the arm, stopping once and for all the
whistling of _Nancy Dawson_.

Then all the soldiers, awakened by the shot and their comrade's cry,
advanced alertly toward the spot where the tall man had been seen. He
had, however, retired, but continued to give them occasionally such a
view of his figure in the open moonlight, as to lead them yet farther
from the path.

Meanwhile, taking advantage of their leader's ruse, Waverley and his

attendants made good speed over the heather till they got behind a
rising ground, from which, however, they could still hear the shouts of
the pursuers, and the more distant roll of the royal drums beating to
arms. They had not gone far before they came upon an encampment in a
hollow. Here several Highlanders, with a horse or two, lay concealed.
They had not arrived very long before the tall Highlander, who had led
the soldiers such a dance, made his appearance quite out of breath, but
laughing gayly at the ease with which he had tricked his pursuers.

Edward was now mounted on a stout pony, and the whole party set forward
at a good round pace, accompanied by the Highlanders as an escort. They
continued without molestation all the night, till, in the morning light,
they saw a tall old castle on the opposite bank of the river, upon the
battlements of which they could see the plaid and targe of a Highland
sentry, and over which floated the white banner of the exiled Stuarts.

They passed through a small town, and presently were admitted into the
courtyard of the ancient fortress, where Edward was courteously
received by a chief in full dress and wearing a white cockade. He showed
Waverley directly to a half-ruinous apartment where, however, there was
a small camp bed. Here he was about to leave him, after asking him what
refreshment he would take, when Edward, who had had enough of mysteries,
requested that he might be told where he was.

"You are in the castle of Doune, in the district of Menteith," said the
governor of the castle, "and you are in no danger whatever. I command
here for his Royal Highness Prince Charles."

At last it seemed to Waverley as if he had reached a place of rest and

safety. But it was not to be. On the very next day he was put in charge
of a detachment of irregular horsemen who were making their way eastward
to join the forces of the Prince. The leader of this band was no other
than the Laird of Balmawhapple, who, backing words by deeds, had
mustered his grooms and huntsmen in the cause of the Stuarts. Edward
attempted to speak civilly to him, but found himself brutally repulsed.
Captain Falconer of Balmawhapple had noways forgotten the shrewd pinch
in the sword-arm which he had received from the Baron of Bradwardine in
Waverley's quarrel.

At first Edward had better luck with his Lieutenant, a certain

horse-coper or dealer. This man had sold Balmawhapple the chargers upon
which to mount his motley array, and seeing no chance of getting his
money except by "going out" himself, he had accepted the post of
Lieutenant in the Chevalier's army. So far good. But just at the moment
when it seemed that our hero was about to get some information of a
useful sort, Balmawhapple rode up, and demanded of his Lieutenant if he
had not heard his orders that no one should speak to the prisoner.

After that they marched in silence, till, as the little company of

adventurers was passing Stirling Castle, Balmawhapple must needs sound
his trumpet and display his white banner. This bravado, considerably to
that gentleman's discomfiture, was answered at once by a burst of smoke
from the Castle, and the next moment a cannon-ball knocked up the earth
a few feet from the Captain's charger, and covered Balmawhapple himself
with dirt and stones. An immediate retreat of the command took place
without having been specially ordered.

As they approached Edinburgh, they could see that white wreaths of smoke
circled the Castle. The cannonade rolled continuously. Balmawhapple,
however, warned by what had happened at Stirling, gave the Castle a wide
berth, and finally, without having entered the city, he delivered up
his prisoner at the door of the ancient palace of Holyrood.

And so, for the time being, Edward's adventures in the wild Highlands
were ended.

INTERLUDE OF STICKING-PLASTER

This time the children were frankly delighted.

"It's just like _Kidnapped_, father," cried Hugh

John, more truly than he dreamed of, "there's the
Flight through the Heather, you remember, and the
tall man is Allan Breck, heading off the soldiers
after the Red Fox was shot. There was a sentinel
that whistled, too--Allan heard him when he was
fishing, and learned the tune--oh, and a lot of
things the same!"

"I like the part best where Alice Bean gives him
the papers," said Sweetheart; "perhaps she was in
love with him, too."

"Pshaw!" cried Toady Lion; "much good that did him.

He never even got them looked at. But it was a pity
that he did not get a chance at a King George
soldier with that lovely sword and steel pistol.
The Highlanders had all the luck."

"I would have banged it off anyway," declared Hugh

John; "fancy carrying a pistol like that all the
way, scouting and going Indian file, and never
getting a shot at anybody!"

"What I want to know," said Sweetheart, dreamily,

"is why they all thought Edward a traitor. I
believe the papers that Alice Bean Lean put in his
bag would reveal the secret, if Waverley only had
 time to read them."

"Him," said Sir Toady, naturally suspicious of all

girls' heroes, "why, he's always falling down and
getting put to bed. Then somebody has to nurse
him. Why doesn't he go out and fight, like Fergus
Mac-Ivor? Then perhaps Flora would have him; though
what he wanted her for--a girl--I don't know. She
could only play harps and--make poetry."

So with this bitter scorn for the liberal arts,

they all rushed off to enact the whole story, the
tale-teller consenting, as occasion required, to
take the parts of the wounded smith, the stern
judge, or the Cameronian Captain. Hugh John
hectored insufferably as Waverley. Sir Toady
scouted and stalked as the tall Highlander, whom he
refused to regard as anybody but Allan Breck.
Sweetheart moved gently about as Alice
Bean--preparing breakfast was quite in her
line--while Maid Margaret, wildly excited, ran
hither and thither as a sort of impartial chorus,
warning all and sundry of the movements of the
enemy.

I saw her last, seated on a knoll and calling out

"Bang" at the pitch of her voice. She was, she
explained, nothing less imposing than the castle of
Edinburgh itself, cannonading the ranks of the
Pretender. While far away, upon wooden chargers,
Balmawhapple's cavalry curvetted on the slopes of
Arthur's Seat and cracked vain pistols at the
frowning fortress. There was, in fact, all through
the afternoon, a great deal of imagination loose in
our neighbourhood. And even far into the gloaming
sounds of battle, boastful recriminations, the
clash of swords, the trample and rally of the heavy
charge, even the cries of the genuinely wounded,
came fitfully from this corner and that of the wide
shrubberies.

And when all was over, as they sat reunited, Black

Hanoverian and White Cockade, victor and
vanquished, in the kindly truce of the
supper-table, Hugh John delivered his verdict.

"That's the best tale you have told us yet. Every

man of us needed to have sticking-plaster put on
when we came in--even Sweetheart!"

Than which, of course, nothing _could_ have been

more satisfactory.

THE FIFTH TALE FROM "WAVERLEY"

THE WHITE COCKADE

IT was Fergus Mac-Ivor himself who welcomed Edward within the palace of
Holyrood, where the adventurous Prince now kept his court.

Hardly would he allow Edward even to ask news of Flora, before carrying
him off into the presence-chamber to be presented. Edward was deeply
moved by the Chevalier's grace and dignity, as well as moved by the
reception he received. The Prince praised the deeds of his ancestors,
and called upon him to emulate them. He also showed him a proclamation
in which his name was mentioned along with those of the other rebels as
guilty of high treason. Edward's heart was melted. This princely
kindness, so different from the treatment which he had received at the
hands of the English government, the direct appeal of the handsome and
gallant young Chevalier, perhaps also the thought of pleasing Flora in
the only way open to him, all overwhelmed the young man, so that, with a
sudden burst of resolve, he knelt down and devoted his life and his
sword to the cause of King James.

The Prince raised and embraced Waverley, and in a few words confided to
him that the English general, having declined battle and gone north to
Aberdeen, had brought his forces back to Dunbar by sea. Here it was the
Prince's instant intention to attack him.

Before taking leave he presented Edward with the splendid silver-hilted

sword which he wore, itself an heirloom of the Stuarts. Then he gave him
over into the hands of Fergus Mac-Ivor, who forthwith proceeded to make
Waverley into a true son of Ivor by arraying him in the tartan of the
clan, with plaid floating over his shoulder and buckler glancing upon
his arm.

Soon after came the Baron of Bradwardine, anxious about the honour of
his young friend Edward. He said that he desired to know the truth as
to the manner in which Captain Waverley had lost his commission in
Colonel Gardiner's dragoons,--so that, if he should hear his honour
called in question, he might be able to defend it,--which, no doubt, he
would have performed as stoutly and loyally as he had previously done
upon the sulky person of the Laird of Balmawhapple.

The morrow was to be a day of battle. But it was quite in keeping with
the gay character of the adventurer-prince, that the evening should be
spent in a hall in the ancient palace of Holyrood. Here Edward, in his
new full dress as a Highlander and a son of Ivor, shone as the
handsomest and the boldest of all. And this, too, in spite of the marked
coldness with which Flora treated him. But to make amends, Rose
Bradwardine, close by her friend's side, watched him with a sigh on her
lip, and colour on her cheek--yet with a sort of pride, too, that she
should have been the first to discover what a gallant and soldierly
youth he was. Jacobite or Hanoverian, she cared not. At Tully-Veolan or
at a court ball, she was equally proud of Edward Waverley.

Next morning our hero was awakened by the screaming of the warpipes
outside his bedroom, and Callum Beg, his attendant, informed him that
he would have to hurry if he wished to come up with Fergus and the Clan
Ivor, who had marched out with the Prince when the morning was yet grey.

Thus spurred, Edward proved himself no laggard. On they went, threading

their way through the ranks of the Highland army, now getting mixed up
with Balmawhapple's horsemen, who, careless of discipline, went spurring
through the throng amid the curses of the Highlanders. For the first
time Edward saw with astonishment that more than half the clansmen were
poorly armed, many with only a scythe on a pole or a sword without a
scabbard, while some for a weapon had nothing better than their dirks,
or even a stake pulled out of the hedge. Then it was that Edward, who
hitherto had only seen the finest and best armed men whom Fergus could
place in the field, began to harbour doubts as to whether this
unmilitary array could defeat a British army, and win the crown of three
kingdoms for the young Prince with whom he had rashly cast in his lot.

[Illustration: "ROSE BRADWARDINE, close by her friend's side, watched

him with a sigh on her lip, and colour on her cheek--yet with a sort of
pride, too, that she should have been the first to discover what a
gallant and soldierly youth he was."]

But his dismal and foreboding thoughts were quickly changed to pride
when whole Clan Ivor received him with a unanimous shout and the braying
of their many warpipes.

"Why," said one of a neighbouring clan, "you greet the young Sassenach
as if he were the Chief himself!"

"If he be not Bran, he is Bran's brother!" replied Evan Dhu, who was now
very grand under the name of Ensign Maccombich.

"Oh, then," replied the other, "that will doubtless be the young English
duinh�-wassel who is to be married to the Lady Flora?"

"That may be or that may not be," retorted Evan, grimly; "it is no
matter of yours or mine, Gregor."

The march continued--first by the shore toward Musselburgh and then

along the top of a little hill which looked out seaward. While marching
thus, news came that Bradwardine's horse had had a skirmish with the
enemy, and had sent in some prisoners.

Almost at the same moment from a sort of stone shed (called a sheep
smearing-house) Edward heard a voice which, as if in agony, tried to
repeat snatches of the Lord's Prayer. He stopped. It seemed as if he
knew that voice.

He entered, and found in the corner a wounded man lying very near to
death. It was no other than Houghton, the sergeant of his own troop, to
whom he had written to send him the books. At first he did not recognise
Edward in his Highland dress. But as soon as he was assured that it
really was his master who stood beside him, he moaned out, "Oh, why did
you leave us, Squire?" Then in broken accents he told how a certain
pedlar called Ruffin had shown them letters from Edward, advising them
to rise in mutiny.

"Ruffin!" said Edward, "I know nothing of any such man. You have been
vilely imposed upon, Houghton."

"Indeed," said the dying man, "I often thought so since. And we did not
believe till he showed us your very seal. So Tims was shot, and I was
reduced to the ranks."

Not long after uttering these words, poor Houghton breathed his last,
praying his young master to be kind to his old father and mother at
Waverley-Honour, and not to fight with these wild petticoat men against
old England.

The words cut Edward to the heart, but there was no time for sentiment
or regret. The army of the Prince was fast approaching the foe. The
English regiments came marching out to meet them along the open shore,
while the Highlanders took their station on the higher ground to the
south. But a morass separated the combatants, and though several
skirmishes took place on the flanks, the main fighting had to be put off
till another day. That night both sides slept on their arms, Fergus and
Waverley joining their plaids to make a couch, on which they lay, with
Callum Beg watching at their heads.

Before three, they were summoned to the presence of the Prince. They
found him giving his final directions to the chiefs. A guide had been
found who would guide the army across the morass. They would then turn
the enemy's flank, and after that the Highland yell and the Highland
claymore must do the rest.

The mist of the morning was still rolling thick through the hollow
between the armies when Clan Ivor got the word to charge. Prestonpans
was no midnight surprise. The English army, regularly ranked, stood
ready, waiting. But their cavalry, suddenly giving way, proved
themselves quite unable to withstand the furious onslaught of the
Highlanders. Edward charged with the others, and was soon in the
thickest of the fray. It happened that while fighting on the battle
line, he was able to save the life of a distinguished English officer,
who, with the hilt of his broken sword yet in his hand, stood by the
artillery from which the gunners had run away, disdaining flight and
waiting for death. The victory of the Highlanders was complete. Edward
even saw his old commander, Colonel Gardiner, struck down, yet was
powerless to save him. But long after, the reproach in the eyes of the
dying soldier haunted him. Yet it expressed more sorrow than
anger--sorrow to see him in such a place and in such a dress.

But this was soon forgotten when the prisoner he had taken, and whom the
policy of the Prince committed to his care and custody, declared himself
as none other than Colonel Talbot, his uncle's dearest and most intimate
friend. He informed Waverley that on his return from abroad he had found
both Sir Everard and his brother in custody on account of Edward's
reported treason. He had, therefore, immediately started for Scotland to
endeavour to bring back the truant. He had seen Colonel Gardiner, and
had found him, after having made a less hasty inquiry into the mutiny
of Edward's troop, much softened toward the young man. All would have
come right, concluded Colonel Talbot, had it not been for our hero's
joining openly with the rebels in their mad venture.

Edward was smitten to the heart when he heard of his uncle's sufferings,
believing that they were on his account. But he was somewhat comforted
when Colonel Talbot told him that through his influence Sir Everard had
been allowed out under heavy bail, and that Mr. Richard Waverley was
with him at Waverley-Honour.

Yet more torn with remorse was Edward when, having once more arrived in
Edinburgh, he found at last the leather valise which contained the
packet of letters Alice Bean Lean had placed among his linen. From these
he learned that Colonel Gardiner had thrice written to him, once indeed
sending the letter by one of the men of Edward's own troop, who had been
instructed by the pedlar to go back and tell the Colonel that his
officer had received them in person. Instead of being delivered to
Waverley, the letters had been given to a certain Mr. William Ruffin, or
Riven, or Ruthven, whom Waverley saw at once could be none other than
Donald Bean Lean himself. Then all at once remembering the business of
the robber cave, he understood the loss of his seal, and poor Houghton's
dying reproach that he should not have left the lads of his troop so
long by themselves.

Edward now saw clearly how in a moment of weakness he had made a great
and fatal mistake by joining with the Jacobites. But his sense of honour
was such that in spite of all Colonel Talbot could say, he would not go
back on his word. His own hastiness, the clever wiles of Fergus
Mac-Ivor, Flora's beauty, and most of all the rascality of Donald Bean
Lean had indeed brought his neck, as old Major Melville had prophesied,
within the compass of the hangman's rope.

The best Edward could now do was to send a young soldier of his troop,
who had been taken at Prestonpans, to his uncle and his father with
letters explaining all the circumstances. By Colonel Talbot's advice and
help this messenger was sent aboard one of the English vessels cruising
in the Firth, well furnished with passes which would carry him in safety
all the way to Waverley-Honour.

Still the days went by, and nothing was done. Still the Prince halted in
Edinburgh waiting for reinforcements which never came. He was always
hopeful that more clans would declare for him or that other forces would
be raised in the Lowlands or in England. And meanwhile, chiefly because
in the city there was nothing for them to do, plans and plots were being
formed. Quarrellings and jealousies became the order of the day among
the troops of the White Cockade. One morning Fergus Mac-Ivor came in to
Edward's lodgings, furious with anger because the Prince had refused him
two requests,--one, to make good his right to be an Earl, and the other,
to give his consent to his marriage with Rose Bradwardine. Fergus must
wait for the first, the Prince had told him, because that would offend a
chief of his own name and of greater power, who was still hesitating
whether or not to declare for King James. As for Rose Bradwardine,
neither must he think of her. Her affections were already engaged. The
Prince knew this privately, and, indeed, had promised already to favour
the match upon which her heart was set.

As for Edward himself, he began about this time to think less and less
of the cruelty of Flora Mac-Ivor. He could not have the moon, that was
clear--and he was not a child to go on crying for it. It was evident,
also, that Rose Bradwardine liked him, and her marked favour, and her
desire to be with him, had their effect upon a heart still sore from
Flora's repeated and haughty rejections.

One of the last things Edward was able to do in Edinburgh, was to obtain
from the Prince the release of Colonel Talbot, whom he saw safely on his
way to London from the port of Leith. After that it was with actual
relief that Edward found the period of waiting in Edinburgh at last at
an end, and the Prince's army to the number of six thousand men marching
southward into England. All was now to be hazarded on the success of a
bold push for London.

The Highlanders easily escaped a superior army encamped on the borders.

They attacked and took Carlisle on their way, and at first it seemed as
if they had a clear path to the capital before them. Fergus, who marched
with his clan in the van of the Prince's army, never questioned their
success for a moment. But Edward's clearer eye and greater knowledge of
the odds made no such mistake.

He saw that few joined them, and those men of no great weight, while all
the time the forces of King George were daily increasing. Difficulties
of every kind arose about them the farther they marched from their
native land. Added to which there were quarrels and dissensions among
the Prince's followers, those between his Irish officers and such
Highland chiefs as Fergus being especially bitter.

Even to Edward, Fergus became fierce and sullen, quite unlike his former
gay and confident self. It was about Flora that the quarrel, long
smouldering, finally broke into flame. As they passed this and that
country-seat, Fergus would always ask if the house were as large as
Waverley-Honour, and whether the estate or the deer park were of equal
size. Edward had usually to reply that they were not nearly so great.
Whereupon Fergus would remark that in that case Flora would be a happy
woman.

"But," said Waverley, who tired of the implied obligation, "you forget
Miss Flora has refused me, not once, but many times. I am therefore
reluctantly compelled to resign all claims upon her hand."

At this, Fergus thought fit to take offence, saying that having once
made application for Flora's hand, Waverley had no right to withdraw
from his offer without the consent of her guardian. Edward replied that
so far as he was concerned, the matter was at an end. He would never
press himself upon any lady who had repeatedly refused him.

Whereupon, Fergus turned away furiously, and the quarrel was made.
Edward betook himself to the camp of his old friend, the Baron, and, as
he remembered the instruction he had received in the dragoons, he became
easily a leader and a great favourite among the Lowland cavalry which
followed the old soldier Bradwardine.

But he had left seeds of bitter anger behind him in the camp of the
proud clan he had quitted.

Some of the Lowland officers warned him of his danger, and Evan Dhu, the
Chief's foster-brother--who, ever since the visit to the cave had taken
a liking to Edward--waited for him secretly in a shady place and bade
him beware. The truth was that the Clan Mac-Ivor had taken it into their
heads that Edward had somehow slighted their Lady Flora. They saw that
the Chief's brow was dark against Edward, and therefore he became all at
once fair game for a bullet or a stab in the dark.

And the first of these was not long in arriving.

* * * * *

And here (I concluded) is the end of the fifth

tale.

"Go on--oh--go on!" shouted all the four listeners

in chorus; "we don't want to play or to talk, just
now. We want to know what happened."

"Very well, then," said I, "then the next story

 shall be called 'Black Looks and Bright Swords.'"

Carrying out which resolve we proceeded at once to

the telling of

THE SIXTH TALE FROM "WAVERLEY"

BLACK LOOKS AND BRIGHT SWORDS

IT was in the dusk of an avenue that Evan Dhu had warned Waverley to
beware, and ere he had reached the end of the long double line of trees,
a pistol cracked in the covert, and a bullet whistled close past his
ear.

"There he is," cried Edward's attendant, a stout Merseman of the

Baron's troop; "it's that devil's brat, Callum Beg."

And Edward, looking through the trees, could make out a figure running
hastily in the direction of the camp of the Mac-Ivors.

Instantly Waverley turned his horse, and rode straight up to Fergus.

"Colonel Mac-Ivor," he said, without any attempt at salutation, "I have

to inform you that one of your followers has just attempted to murder me
by firing upon me from a lurking-place."

"Indeed!" said the Chief, haughtily; "well, as that, save in the matter
of the lurking-place, is a pleasure I presently propose for myself, I
should be glad to know which of my clansmen has dared to anticipate me."

"I am at your service when you will, sir," said Edward, with equal
pride, "but in the meantime the culprit was your page, Callum Beg."

"Stand forth, Callum Beg," cried Vich Ian Vohr; "did you fire at Mr.
Waverley?"

"No," said the unblushing Callum.

"You did," broke in Edward's attendant, "I saw you as plain as ever I
saw Coudingham kirk!"

"You lie!" returned Callum, not at all put out by the accusation. But
his Chief demanded Callum's pistol. The hammer was down. The pan and
muzzle were black with smoke, the barrel yet warm. It had that moment
been fired.

"Take that!" cried the Chief, striking the boy full on the head with the
metal butt; "take that, for daring to act without orders and then lying
to disguise it."

Callum made not the slightest attempt to escape the blow, and fell as if
he had been slain on the spot.

"And now, Mr. Waverley," said the Chief, "be good enough to turn your
horse twenty yards with me out upon the common. I have a word to say to
you."

Edward did so, and as soon as they were alone, Fergus fiercely charged
him with having thrown aside his sister Flora in order to pay his court
to Rose Bradwardine, whom, as he knew, Fergus had chosen for his own
bride.

"It was the Prince--the Prince himself who told me!" added Fergus,
noticing the astonishment on Edward's face.

"Did the Prince tell you that I was engaged to Miss Rose Bradwardine?"
cried Edward.

"He did--this very morning," shouted Fergus; "he gave it as a reason for
a second time refusing my request. So draw and defend yourself, or
resign once and forever all claims to the lady."

"In such a matter I will not be dictated to by you or any man living!"
retorted Waverley, growing angry in his turn.

In a moment swords were out and a fierce combat was beginning, when a
number of Bradwardine's cavalry, who being Lowlanders were always at
feud with the Highlandmen, rode hastily up, calling on their companions
to follow. They had heard that there was a chance of a fight between
their corps and the Highlanders. Nothing would have pleased them
better. The Baron himself threatened that unless the Mac-Ivors returned
to their ranks, he would charge them, while they on their side pointed
their guns at him and his Lowland cavalry.

A cry that the Prince was approaching alone prevented bloodshed. The
Highlanders returned to their places. The cavalry dressed its ranks. It
was indeed the Chevalier who arrived. His first act was to get one of
his French officers, the Count of Beaujeu, to set the regiment of
Mac-Ivors and the Lowland cavalry again upon the road. He knew that the
Count's broken English would put them all in better humour, while he
himself remained to make the peace between Fergus and Waverley.

Outwardly the quarrel was soon made up. Edward explained that he had no
claims whatever to be considered as engaged to Rose Bradwardine or any
one else, while Fergus sulkily agreed that it was possible he had made a
mistake. The Prince made them shake hands, which they did with the air
of two dogs whom only the presence of the master kept from flying at
each other's throats. Then after calming the Clan Mac-Ivor and riding
awhile with the Baron's Lowland cavalry, the Prince returned to the
Count of Beaujeu, saying with a sigh, as he reined his charger beside
him, "Ah, my friend, believe me this business of prince-errant is no bed
of roses!"

* * * * *

It was not long before the poor Prince had a further proof of this fact.

On the 5th of December, after a council at Derby, the Highland chiefs,

disappointed that the country did not rally about them, and that the
government forces were steadily increasing on all sides, compelled the
Prince to fall back toward Scotland. Fergus Mac-Ivor fiercely led the
opposition to any retreat. He would win the throne for his Prince, or if
he could not, then he and every son of Ivor would lay down their lives.
That was his clear and simple plan of campaign. But he was easily
overborne by numbers, and when he found himself defeated in council, he
shed actual tears of grief and mortification. From that moment Vich Ian
Vohr was an altered man.

Since the day of the quarrel Edward had seen nothing of him. It was,
therefore, with great surprise that he saw Fergus one evening enter his
lodgings and invite him to take a walk with him. The Chieftain smiled
sadly as he saw his old friend take down his sword and buckle it on.
There was a great change in the appearance of Vich Ian Vohr. His cheek
was hollow. His eye burned as if with fever.

As soon as the two young men had reached a beautiful and solitary glen,
Fergus began to tell Edward that he had found out how wrongheaded and
rash he had been in the matter of their quarrel. "Flora writes me,"
continued Fergus, "that she never had, and never could have, the least
intention of giving you any encouragement. I acted hastily--like a
madman!"

Waverley hastily entreated him to let all be forgotten, and the two
comrades-in-arms shook hands, this time heartily and sincerely.

Notwithstanding, the gloom on the Chief's brow was scarcely lightened.

He even besought Waverley to betake himself at once out of the kingdom
by an eastern port, to marry Rose Bradwardine, and to take Flora with
him as a companion to Rose, and also for her own protection.

Edward was astonished at this complete change in Fergus.

"What!" he cried, "abandon the expedition on which we have all

embarked?"

"Embarked," answered the Chief, bitterly; "why, man, the expedition is

going to pieces! It is time for all those who can, to get ashore in the
longboat!"

"And what," said Edward, "are the other Highland chiefs going to do?"

"Oh, the chiefs," said Fergus, contemptuously, "they think that all the
heading and hanging will, as before, fall to the lot of the Lowlands,
and that they will be left alone in their poor and barren Highlands, to
'listen to the wind on the hill till the waters abate.' But they will be
disappointed. The government will make sure work this time, and leave
not a clan in all the Highlands able to do them hurt. As for me, it will
not matter. I shall either be dead or taken by this time to-morrow. I
have seen the _Bodach Glas_--the Grey Spectre."

Edward looked the surprise he did not speak.

"Why!" continued Fergus, in a low voice, "were you so long about

Glennaquoich and yet never heard of the Bodach Glas? The story is well
known to every son of Ivor. I will tell it you in a word. My forefather,
Ian nan Chaistel, wasted part of England along with a Lowland chief
named Halbert Hall. After passing the Cheviots on their way back, they
quarrelled about the dividing of the spoil, and from words came speedily
to blows. In the fight, the Lowlanders were cut off to the last man, and
their leader fell to my ancestor's sword. But ever since that day the
dead man's spirit has crossed the Chief of Clan Ivor on the eve of any
great disaster. My father saw him twice, once before he was taken
prisoner at Sheriff-Muir, and once again on the morning of the day on
which he died."

Edward cried out against such superstition.

"How can you," he said, "you who have seen the world, believe such
child's nonsense as that?"

"Listen," said the Chief, "here are the facts, and you can judge for
yourself. Last night I could not sleep for thinking on the downfall of
all my hopes for the cause, for the Prince, for the clan--so, after
lying long awake, I stepped out into the frosty air. I had crossed a
small foot-bridge, and was walking backward and forward, when I saw,
clear before me in the moonlight, a tall man wrapped in a grey plaid,
such as the shepherds wear. The figure kept regularly about four yards
from me."

"That is an easy riddle," exclaimed Edward; "why, my dear Fergus, what

you saw was no more than a Cumberland peasant in his ordinary dress!"

"So I thought at first," answered Fergus, "and I was astonished at the

man's audacity in daring to dog me. I called to him, but got no answer.
I felt my heart beating quickly, and to find out what I was afraid of, I
turned and faced first north, and then south, east, and west. Each way I
turned, I saw the grey figure before my eyes at precisely the same
distance! Then I knew I had seen the Bodach Glas. My hair stood up, and
so strong an impression of awe came upon me that I resolved to return to
my quarters. As I went, the spirit glided steadily before me, till we
came to the narrow bridge, where it turned and stood waiting for me. I
could not wade the stream. I could not bring myself to turn back. So,
making the sign of the cross, I drew my sword and cried aloud, 'In the
name of God, Evil Spirit, give place!'

"'_Vich Ian Vohr_,' it said in a dreadful voice, '_beware of

to-morrow!_'

"It was then within half a yard of my sword's point, but as the words
were uttered it was gone. There was nothing either on the bridge or on
the way home. All is over. I am doomed. I have seen the Bodach Glas,
the curse of my house."

[Illustration: "THE spirit glided steadily before me, till we came to

the narrow bridge, where it turned and stood waiting for me. I could not
wade the stream. I could not bring myself to turn back. So, making the
sign of the cross, I drew my sword and cried aloud, 'In the name of God,
Evil Spirit, give place!'

"'_Vich Ian Vohr_,' it said in a dreadful voice, '_beware of

to-morrow!_'"]

Edward could think of nothing to say in reply. His friend's belief in

the reality of the vision was too strong. He could only ask to be
allowed to march once more with the sons of Ivor, who occupied the post
of danger in the rear. Edward easily obtained the Baron's leave to do
so, and when the Clan Mac-Ivor entered the village, he joined them, once
more arm in arm with their Chieftain. At the sight, all the Mac-Ivors'
ill feeling was blown away in a moment. Evan Dhu received him with a
grin of pleasure. And the imp Callum, with a great patch on his head,
appeared particularly delighted to see him.
But Waverley's stay with the Clan Ivor was not to be long. The enemy was
continually harassing their flanks, and the rear-guard had to keep
lining hedges and dikes in order to beat them off. Night was already
falling on the day which Fergus had foretold would be his last, when in
a chance skirmish of outposts the Chief with a few followers found
himself surrounded by a strong attacking force of dragoons. A swift eddy
of the battle threw Edward out to one side. The cloud of night lifted,
and he saw Evan Dhu and a few others, with the Chieftain in their midst,
desperately defending themselves against a large number of dragoons who
were hewing at them with their swords. It was quite impossible for
Waverley to break through to their assistance. Night shut down
immediately, and he found it was equally impossible for him to rejoin
the retreating Highlanders, whose warpipes he could still hear in the
distance.

INTERLUDE OF BREVITY

The _Bodach Glas_ held the children. The brilliant

sunshine of the High Garden in which they had
listened to the tale became instantly palest
moonlight, and between them and the strawberry bed
they saw the filmy plaid of the Grey Spectre of the
House of Ivor. It had been helpful and even
laudable to play-act the chief scenes when the
story was beginning, but now they had no time. It
would have been an insult to the interest of the
narrative.

Doubtless, if they had had the book, they would

have _skipped_, to know "how it all ended." But it
was time for the evening walk. So, instead of
stringing themselves out along the way as was their
custom, seeing if the raspberry bushes had grown
any taller since the morning, the four collected in
a close swarm about the tale-teller, like bees
about an emigrant queen.

"You must tell us the rest--you _must!_" they said,

linking arms about my waist to prevent any attempt
at an evasion of such just demands.

So, being secretly no little pleased with their

eagerness, I launched out upon the conclusion of
the whole matter--which showed, among other things,
how Waverley-Honour was more honoured than ever and
the Blessed Bear of Bradwardine threefold blessed.

THE LAST TALE FROM "WAVERLEY"

THE BARON'S SURPRISE

AFTER wandering about for some time Edward came unexpectedly upon a
hamlet. Lights gleamed down the street, and Edward could hear loud
voices and the tramp of horses. The sound of shouted orders and
soldiers' oaths soon told him that he was in great danger. For these
were English troops, and if they caught him in his Mac-Ivor tartan,
would assuredly give him short shrift and a swift bullet.

Lingering a moment uncertainly near the gate of a small garden

enclosure, he felt himself caught by gentle hands and drawn toward a
house.

"Come, Ned," said a low voice, "the dragoons are down the village, and
they will do thee a mischief. Come with me into feyther's!"

Judging this to be very much to the purpose, Edward followed, but when
the girl saw the tall figure in tartans instead of the sweetheart she
had expected, she dropped the candle she had lighted, and called out for
her father.

A stout Westmoreland peasant at once appeared, poker in hand, and

presently Edward found himself not ill received--by the daughter on
account of a likeness to her lover (so she said) and by the father
because of a certain weakness for the losing side. So, in the house of
Farmer Jopson, Edward slept soundly that night, in spite of the dangers
which surrounded him on every side. In the morning the true Edward,
whose name turned out to be Ned Williams, was called in to consult with
father and daughter. It seemed impossible for Edward to go north to
rejoin the Prince's forces. They had evacuated Penrith and marched away
toward Carlisle. The whole intervening country was covered by scouting
parties of government horsemen. Whereupon Ned Williams, who wished above
all things to rid the house of his handsome namesake, lest his
sweetheart Cicely should make other mistakes, offered to get Waverley a
change of clothes, and to conduct him to his father's farm near
Ulswater. Neither old Jopson nor his daughter would accept a farthing of
money for saving Waverley's life. A hearty handshake paid one; a kiss,
the other. And so it was not long before Ned Williams was introducing
our hero to his family, in the character of a young clergyman who was
detained in the north by the unsettled state of the country.

On their way into Cumberland they passed the field of battle where
Edward had lost sight of Fergus. Many bodies still lay upon the face of
the moorland, but that of Vich Ian Vohr was not among them, and Edward
passed on with some hope that in spite of the _Bodach Glas_, Fergus
might have escaped his doom. They found Callum Beg, however, his tough
skull cloven at last by a dragoon's sword, but there was no sign either
of Evan or of his Chieftain.

In the secure shelter of good Farmer Williams's house among the hills,
it was Edward's lot to remain somewhat longer than he intended. In the
first place, it was wholly impossible to move for ten days, owing to a
great fall of snow. Then he heard how that the Prince had retreated
farther into Scotland, how Carlisle had been besieged and taken by the
English, and that the whole north was covered by the hosts of the Duke
of Cumberland and General Wade.

But in the month of January it happened that the clergyman who came to
perform the ceremony at the wedding of Ned Williams and Cicely Jopson,
brought with him a newspaper which he showed to Edward. In it Waverley
read with astonishment a notice of his father's death in London, and of
the approaching trial of Sir Everard for high treason--unless (said the
report) Edward Waverley, son of the late Richard Waverley, and heir to
the baronet, should in the meantime surrender himself to justice.
It was with an aching anxious heart that Waverley set out by the
northern diligence for London. He found himself in the vehicle opposite
to an officer's wife, one Mrs. Nosebag, who tormented him all the way
with questions, on several occasions almost finding him out, and once at
least narrowly escaping giving him an introduction to a recruiting
sergeant of his own regiment.

However, in spite of all risks, he arrived safely under Colonel Talbot's

roof, where he found that, though the news of his father's death was
indeed true, yet his own conduct certainly had nothing to do with the
matter--nor was Sir Everard in the slightest present danger.

Whereupon, much relieved as to his family, Edward proclaimed his

intention of returning to Scotland as soon as possible--not indeed to
join with the rebels again, but for the purpose of seeking out Rose
Bradwardine and conducting her to a place of safety.

It was not, perhaps, the wisest course he might have pursued. But during
his lonely stay at Farmer Williams's farm, Edward's heart had turned
often and much to Rose. He could not bear to think of her alone and
without protection. By means of a passport (which had been obtained for
one Frank Stanley, Colonel Talbot's nephew), Waverley was able easily to
reach Edinburgh. Here from the landlady, with whom he and Fergus had
lodged, Edward first heard the dread news of Culloden, of the slaughter
of the clans, the flight of the Prince, and, worst of all, how Fergus
and Evan Dhu, captured the night of the skirmish, were presently on
trial for their lives at Carlisle. Flora also was in Carlisle, awaiting
the issue of the trial, while with less certainty Rose Bradwardine was
reported to have gone back to her father's mansion of Tully-Veolan.
Concerning the brave old Baron himself, Edward could get no news, save
that he had fought most stoutly at Culloden, but that the government
were particularly bitter against him because he had been '_out_'
twice--that is, he had taken part both in the first rising of the year
1715, and also in that which had just been put down in blood at
Culloden.

Without a moment's hesitation, Edward set off for Tully-Veolan, and

after one or two adventures he arrived there, only to find the white
tents of a military encampment whitening the moor above the village. The
house itself had been sacked. Part of the stables had been burned, while
the only living being left about the mansion of Tully-Veolan was no
other than poor Davie Gellatley, who, chanting his foolish songs as
usual, greeted Edward with the cheering intelligence that "_A' were dead
and gane--Baron--Bailie--Saunders Saunderson--and Lady Rose that sang
sae sweet!_"

However, it was not long before he set off at full speed, motioning
Waverley to follow him. The innocent took a difficult and dangerous path
along the sides of a deep glen, holding on to bushes, rounding perilous
corners of rock, till at last the barking of dogs directed them to the
entrance of a wretched hovel. Here Davie's mother received Edward with a
sullen fierceness which the young man could not understand--till, from
behind the door, holding a pistol in his hand, unwashed, gaunt, and
with a three weeks' beard fringing his hollow cheeks, he saw come
forth--the Baron of Bradwardine himself.

After the first gladsome greetings were over, the old man had many a
tale to tell his young English friend. But his chief grievance was not
his danger of the gallows, nor the discomfort of his hiding-place, but
the evil-doing of his cousin, to whom, as it now appeared, the Barony of
Bradwardine now belonged. Malcolm of Inch-Grabbit had, it appeared, come
to uplift the rents of the Barony. But the country people, being
naturally indignant that he should have so readily taken advantage of
the misfortune of his kinsman, received him but ill. Indeed, a shot was
fired at the new proprietor by some unknown marksman in the gloaming,
which so frightened the heir that he fled at once to Stirling and had
the estate promptly advertised for sale.

"In addition to which," continued the old man, "though I bred him up
from a boy, he hath spoken much against me to the great folk of the
time, so that they have sent a company of soldiers down here to destroy
all that belongs to me, and to hunt his own blood-kin like a partridge
upon the mountains."

"Aye," cried Janet Gellatley, "and if it had not been for my poor Davie
there, they would have catched the partridge, too!"

Then with a true mother's pride Janet told the story of how the poor
innocent had saved his master. The Baron was compelled by the strictness
of the watch to hide, all day and most of the nights, in a cave high up
in a wooded glen.

"A comfortable place enough," the old woman explained; "for the goodman
of Corse-Cleugh has filled it with straw. But his Honour tires of it,
and he comes down here whiles for a warm at the fire, or at times a
sleep between the blankets. But once, when he was going back in the
dawn, two of the English soldiers got a glimpse of him as he was
slipping into the wood and banged off a gun at him. I was out on them
like a hawk, crying if they wanted to murder a poor woman's innocent
bairn! Whereupon they swore down my throat that they had seen 'the auld
rebel himself,' as they called the Baron. But my Davie, that some folk
take for a simpleton, being in the wood, caught up the old grey cloak
that his Honour had dropped to run the quicker, and came out from among
the trees as we were speaking, majoring and play-acting so like his
Honour that the soldier-men were clean beguiled, and even gave me
sixpence to say nothing about their having let off their gun at 'poor
crack-brained Sawney,' as they named my Davie!"

It was not till this long tale was ended that Waverley heard what he had
come so far to find out--that Rose was safe in the house of a Whig
Laird, an old friend of her father's, and that the Bailie, who had early
left the army of the Prince, was trying his best to save something out
of the wreck for her.

The next morning Edward went off to call on Bailie Macwheeble. At first
the man of law was not very pleased to see him, but when he learned that
Waverley meant to ask Rose to be his wife, he flung his best wig out of
the window and danced the Highland fling for very joy. This rejoicing
was a little marred by the fact that Waverley was still under
proscription. But when a messenger of the Bailie's had returned from the
nearest post-town with a letter from Colonel Talbot, all fear on this
account was at an end. Colonel Talbot had, though with the greatest
difficulty, obtained royal Protections for both the Baron of Bradwardine
and for Edward himself. There was no doubt that full pardons would
follow in due course.

Right thankfully the Baron descended from his cave, as soon as Edward
carried him the good news, and with Davie Gellatley and his mother, all
went down to the house of Bailie Macwheeble, where supper was
immediately served.

It was from old Janet Gellatley, Davie's mother, that Waverley learned
whom he had to thank for rescuing him from the hands of Captain Gifted
Gilfillan, and to whom the gentle voice belonged which had cheered him
during his illness. It was none other than Rose Bradwardine herself. To
her, Edward owed all. She had even given up her jewels to Donald Bean
Lean, that he might go scatheless. She it was who had provided a nurse
for him in the person of old Janet Gellatley herself, and lastly she had
seen him safely on his way to Holyrood under the escort of the sulky
Laird of Balmawhapple.

So great kindness certainly required very special thanks. And Edward was
not backward in asking the Baron for permission to accompany him to the
house of Duchran, where Rose was at present residing. So well did Edward
express his gratitude to Rose, that she consented to give all her life
into his hands, that he might go on showing how thankful he was.

Of course the marriage could not take place for some time, because the
full pardons of the Baron and Edward took some time to obtain. For
Fergus Mac-Ivor, alas, no pardon was possible. He and Evan Dhu were
condemned to be executed for high treason at Carlisle, and all that
Edward could do was only to promise the condemned Chieftain that he
would be kind to the poor clansmen of Vich Ian Vohr, for the sake of his
friend.

As for Evan Dhu, he might have escaped. The Judge went the length of
offering to show mercy, if Evan would only ask it. But when Evan Dhu was
called upon to plead before the Court, his only request was that he
might be permitted to go down to Glennaquoich and bring up six men to be
hanged in the place of Vich Ian Vohr.

"And," he said, "ye may begin with me the first man!"

At this there was a laugh in the Court. But Evan, looking about him
sternly, added: "If the Saxon gentlemen are laughing because a poor man
such as me thinks my life, or the life of any six of my degree, is worth
that of Vich Ian Vohr, they may be very right. But if they laugh because
they think I would not keep my word, and come back to redeem him, I can
tell them they ken neither the heart of a Hielandman nor the honour of a
gentleman!"

After these words, there was no more laughing in that Court.

Nothing now could save Fergus Mac-Ivor. The government were resolved on
his death as an example, and both he and Evan were accordingly executed,
along with many others of the unhappy garrison of Carlisle.

* * * * *

Edward and Rose were married from the house of Duchran, and some days
after they started, according to the custom of the time, to spend some
time upon an estate which Colonel Talbot had bought, as was reported, a
very great bargain. The Baron had been persuaded to accompany them,
taking a place of honour in their splendid coach and six, the gift of
Sir Everard. The coach of Mr. Rubrick of Duchran came next, full of
ladies, and many gentlemen on horseback rode with them as an escort to
see them well on their way.

At the turning of the road which led to Tully-Veolan, the Bailie met
them. He requested the party to turn aside and accept of his hospitality
at his house of Little Veolan. The Baron, somewhat put out, replied that
he and his son-in-law would ride that way, but that they would not bring
upon him the whole matrimonial procession. It was clear, however, that
the Baron rather dreaded visiting the ancient home of his ancestors,
which had been so lately sold by the unworthy Malcolm of Inch-Grabbit
into the hands of a stranger. But as the Bailie insisted, and as the
party evidently wished to accept, he could not hold out.

When the Baron arrived at the avenue, he fell into a melancholy

meditation, thinking doubtless of the days when he had taken such pride
in the ancient Barony which had passed for ever away from the line of
the Bradwardines. From these bitter thoughts he was awakened by the
sight of the two huge stone bears which had been replaced over the
gate-posts.

Then down the avenue came the two great deer-hounds, Ban and Buscar,
which had so long kept their master company in his solitude, with Daft
Davie Gellatley dancing behind them.

The Baron was then informed that the present owner of the Barony was no
other than Colonel Talbot himself. But that if he did not care to visit
the new owner of Bradwardine, the party would proceed to Little Veolan,
the house of Bailie Macwheeble.

Then, indeed, the Baron had need of all his greatness of mind. But he
drew a long breath, took snuff abundantly, and remarked that as they had
brought him so far, he would not pass the Colonel's gate, and that he
would be happy to see the new master of his tenants. When he alighted in
front of the Castle, the Baron was astonished to find how swiftly the
marks of spoliation had been removed. Even the roots of the felled trees
had disappeared. All was fair and new about the house of Tully-Veolan,
even to the bright colours of the garb of Davie Gellatley, who ran first
to one and then to the other of the company, passing his hands over his
new clothes and crying, "Braw, braw Davie!"

The dogs, Bran and Buscar, leaping upon him, brought tears into the
Baron's eyes, even more than the kind welcome of Colonel Talbot's wife,
the Lady Emily. Still more astonishing appeared the changes in the so
lately ruined courtyard. The burned stables had been rebuilt upon a
newer and better plan. The pigeon-house was restocked, and populous with
fluttering wings. Even the smallest details of the garden, and the
multitude of stone bears on the gables, had all been carefully restored
as of old.

The Baron could hardly believe his eyes, and he marvelled aloud that
Colonel Talbot had not thought fit to replace the Bradwardine arms by
his own. But here the Colonel, suddenly losing patience, declared that
he would not, even to please these foolish boys, Waverley and Frank
Stanley (and his own more foolish wife), continue to impose upon another
old soldier. So without more ado he told the Baron that he had only
advanced the money to buy back the Barony, and that he would leave
Bailie Macwheeble to explain to whom the estate really belonged.

Trembling with eagerness the Bailie advanced, a formidable roll of

papers in his hand.
He began triumphantly to explain that Colonel Talbot had indeed bought
Bradwardine, but that he had immediately exchanged it for Brere-wood
Lodge, which had been left to Edward under his father's will.
Bradwardine had therefore returned to its ancient Lord in full and
undisputed possession, and the Baron was once more master of all his
hereditary powers, subject only to an easy yearly payment to his
son-in-law.

Tears were actually in the old gentleman's eyes as he went from room to
room, so that he could scarce speak a word of welcome either to the
guests within, or of thanks to the rejoicing farmers and cottars who,
hearing of his return, had gathered without. The climax of his joy was,
however, reached when the Blessed Bear of Bradwardine itself, the
golden cup of his line, mysteriously recovered out of the spoil of the
English army by Frank Stanley, was brought to the Baron's elbow by old
Saunders Saunderson.

Truth to tell, the recovery of this heirloom afforded the old man almost
as much pleasure as the regaining of his Barony, and there is little
doubt that a tear mingled with the wine, as, holding the Blessed Bear in
his hand, the Baron solemnly proposed the healths of the united families
of Waverley-Honour and Bradwardine.

THE END OF THE LAST TALE FROM "WAVERLEY."

RED CAP TALES

TOLD FROM

GUY MANNERING

GUY MANNERING

WHERE WE TOLD THE SECOND TALE

SUMMER there had been none. Autumn was a mockery. The golden harvest
fields lay prostrate under drenching floods of rain. Every burn foamed
creamy white in the linns and sulked peaty brown in the pools. The
heather, rich in this our Galloway as an emperor's robe, had scarce
bloomed at all. The very bees went hungry, for the lashing rain had
washed all the honey out of the purple bells.

Nevertheless, in spite of all, we were again in Galloway--that is, the

teller of tales and his little congregation of four. The country of _Guy
Mannering_ spread about us, even though we could scarce see a hundred
yards of it. The children flattened their noses against the blurred
window-panes to look. Their eyes watered with the keen tang of the peat
reek, till, tired with watching the squattering of ducks in farm
puddles, they turned as usual upon the family sagaman, and demanded,
with that militant assurance of youth which succeeds so often, that he
should forthwith and immediately "tell them something."

The tales from _Waverley_ had proved so enthralling that there was a
general demand for "another," and Sir Toady Lion, being of an
arithmetical turn of mind, proclaimed that there was plenty of material,
in so much as he had counted no fewer than twenty-four "all the same"
upon the shelf before he left home.

Thus, encouraged by the dashing rain on the windows and with the low
continual growl of Solway surf in our ears, we bent ourselves to fill a
gap in a hopeless day by the retelling of

A FIRST TALE FROM "GUY MANNERING"

I. WITCHCRAFT AND WIZARDRY

THROUGH storm and darkness a young Oxford scholar came to the New Place
of Ellangowan. He had been again and again refused shelter along the
road for himself and his tired horse, but at last he found himself
welcomed by Godfrey Bertram, the Laird of Ellangowan, attended by
Dominie Sampson, his faithful companion, the village schoolmaster, on
the threshold of the great house.

That very night an heir was born to the line of the Bertrams of
Ellangowan, one of the most ancient in Galloway, and as usual the New
Place was full of company come from far and near to make merry over the
event. Godfrey himself, a soft, good-natured, pliable man, welcomed
Mannering (for that was the name of the young Oxford student), and set
him forthwith to calculating the horoscope of the babe from the stars.
This, Mannering, to whom astrology seemed no better than child's play,
was at first unwilling to do, until the awkward opposition of Dominie
Sampson, as well as some curiosity to see if he could remember the terms
of the sham-science learned in youth, caused him to consent to make the
calculation.

He was still further pushed on by the appearance of a wild gipsy woman,

a sort of queen among the ragged wandering tribe which camped in a
little hamlet on the Laird's estates. She entered the house singing
shrilly a kind of ancient spell:

"Trefoil, vervain, John's wort, dill,

Hinder witches of their will!
Weel is them, that weel may
Fast upon Saint Andrew's day.
Saint Bride and her brat,
Saint Colme and his cat,
Saint Michael and his spear
Keep the house frae reif and weir."

So sang Meg Merrilies, the gipsy, a great cudgel in her hand, and her
dress and bearing more like those of a man than of a woman. Elf-locks
shot up through the holes in her bonnet, and her black eyes rolled with
a kind of madness. Soon, however, Godfrey, who evidently only half
disbelieved in her powers as a witch, dismissed her to the kitchen with
fair words, while Guy Mannering, whom his strange adventure had rendered
sleepless, walked forth into the night. The vast ruins of the ancient
castle of the Bertrams rose high and silent on the cliffs above him, but
beneath, in the little sandy cove, lights were still moving briskly,
though it was the dead hour of the night. A smuggler brig was disloading
a cargo of brandy, rum, and silks, most likely, brought from the Isle of
Man.

At sight of his figure moving on the cliffs above, a voice on the shore
sang out, "Ware hawk! Douse the glim!" And in a moment all was darkness
beneath him.

When Mannering returned to his chamber in the dim light of the morning,
he proceeded to carry out his calculations according to the strictest
rules of astrology, marking carefully the hour of the birth of the babe.
He found that young Harry Bertram, for so it had been decided to name
the child, was threatened with danger in his _fifth_, his _tenth_, and
his _twenty-first_ years.

More dissatisfied than he cared to own with these results, Mannering

walked out again to view the ruins of the old castle of Ellangowan in
the morning light. They were, he now saw, of vast extent and much
battered on the side toward the sea--so much so, indeed, that he could
observe through a gap in the mason-work, the smuggling brig getting
ready to be off with the tide. Guy Mannering penetrated into the
courtyard, and was standing there quietly, thinking of the past
greatness of the house of Bertram, when suddenly, from a chamber to the
left, he heard the voice of the gipsy, Meg Merrilies. A few steps took
him to a recess from which, unseen himself, he could observe what she
was doing. She continued to twirl her distaff, seemingly unconscious of
his presence, and also, after her own fashion, to "spae" the fortune of
young Harry Bertram, just as Mannering had so lately been doing himself.
Curiosity as to whether their results would agree kept him quiet while
she wove her spell. At last she gave her verdict: "A long life, three
score and ten years, but thrice broken by trouble or danger. The threads
thrice broke, three times united. He'll be a lucky lad if he wins
through wi' it!"

Mannering had hardly time to be astonished at the manner in which the

gipsy's prophecy confirmed his own half-playful calculations, before a
voice, loud and hoarse as the waves that roared beneath the castle,
called to the witch-wife, "Meg, Meg Merrilies--gipsy--hag--tousand
deyvils!"

"Coming, Captain--I am coming!" answered Meg, as calmly as if some one

had been calling her pet names. Through the broken portion of the wall
to seaward a man made his appearance. He was hard of feature,
savage-looking, and there was a cruel glint in his eyes which told of a
heart without pity.

The man's body, powerful and thick-set as an oak, his immense strength,
his savage temper made him shunned and disliked. There were few indeed
who would have ventured to cross the path of Dirk Hatteraick, whose best
name was "black smuggler," and whose worst a word it was safest to speak
in a whisper, lest a bird of the air should carry the matter.

On the present occasion Dirk had come to the gipsy queen to demand of
her a charm for a fair wind and a prosperous voyage. For the less
religion such a man has, the more superstitious he is apt to be.
"Where are you, Mother Deyvilson?" he cried again. "Donner and blitzen,
here we have been staying for you full half an hour! Come, bless the
good ship and the voyage--and be cursed to ye for a hag of Satan!"

At that moment, catching sight of Mannering, the smuggler stopped with a

strange start. He thrust his hand into his pocket as if to draw out a
hidden weapon, exclaiming: "What cheer, brother? You seem on the
outlook, eh?"

But with a glance at the intruder Meg Merrilies checked him. In a moment
Hatteraick had altered his tone, and was speaking to Mannering civilly,
yet still with an undercurrent of sullen suspicion which he tried to
disguise under a mask of familiarity.

"You are, I suppose," said Mannering, calmly, "the master of that vessel
in the bay?"

"Ay, ay, sir," answered the sailor, "I am Captain Dirk Hatteraick of the
_Yungfrauw Hagenslaapen_, and I am not ashamed of my name or of my
vessel, either. Right cognac I carry--rum, lace, real Mechlin, and
Souchong tea--if you will come aboard, I will send you ashore with a
pouchful of that last--Dirk Hatteraick knows how to be civil!"

Mannering got rid of his offers without openly offending the man, and
was well content to see the precious pair vanish down the stone stairs
which had formerly served the garrison of the castle in time of siege.

On his return to the house of Ellangowan, Mannering related his

adventure, and asked of his host who this villanous-looking Dutchman
might be, and why he was allowed to wander at will on his lands.

This was pulling the trigger, and Mr. Bertram at once exploded into a
long catalogue of griefs. According to him, the man was undoubtedly one
Captain Dirk Hatteraick, a smuggler or free-trader. As for allowing him
on his lands--well, Dirk was not very canny to meddle with. Besides,
impossible as it was to believe, he, Godfrey Bertram of Ellangowan, was
not upon his Majesty's commission of the peace for the county. Jealousy
had kept him off--among other things the ill-will of the sitting member.
Besides which--after all a gentleman must have his cognac, and his lady
her tea and silks. Only smuggled articles came into the country. It was
a pity, of course, but he was not more to blame than others.

Thus the Laird maundered on, and Mannering, glad to escape being asked
about the doubtful fortune which the stars had predicted for the young
heir, did not interrupt him. On the next day, however, before he mounted
his horse, he put the written horoscope into a sealed envelope, and,
having strictly charged Bertram that it should not be opened till his
son reached the age of five years, he took his departure with many
expressions of regret.

The next five years were outwardly prosperous ones for Godfrey Bertram
of Ellangowan. As the result of an election where he had been of much
service to the winning candidate, he was again made a Justice of the
Peace, and immediately he set about proving to his brothers of the bench
that he could be both a determined and an active magistrate. But this
apparent good, brought as usual much of evil with it. Many old kindly
customs and courtesies had endeared Godfrey Bertram to his poorer
neighbours. He was, they said, no man's enemy, and even the gipsies of
the little settlement would have cut off their right hands before they
touched a pennyworth belonging to the Laird, their patron and protector.
But the other landlords twitted him with pretending to be an active
magistrate, and yet harbouring a gang of gipsies at his own door-cheek.
Whereupon the Laird went slowly and somewhat sadly home, revolving
schemes for getting rid of the colony of Derncleugh, at the head of
which was the old witch-wife Meg Merrilies.

Occasions of quarrel were easy to find. The sloe-eyed gipsy children

swinging on his gates were whipped down. The rough-coated donkeys
forbidden to eat their bite of grass in peace by the roadside. The men
were imprisoned for poaching, and matters went so far that one stout
young fellow was handed over to the press-gang at Dumfries and sent to
foreign parts to serve on board a man-of-war.

The gipsies, on their side, robbed the Ellangowan hen-roosts, stole the
linen from my lady's bleaching-green, cut down and barked the young
trees--though all the while scarce believing that their ancient friend
the Laird of Ellangowan had really turned against them.

During these five years the son, so strangely brought into the world on
the night of Mannering's visit, had been growing into the boldest and
brightest of boys. A wanderer by nature from his youth, he went
fearlessly into each nook and corner of his father's estates in search
of berries and flowers. He hunted every bog for rushes to weave
grenadiers' caps, and haled the hazelnuts from the lithe coppice boughs.

To Dominie Sampson, long since released from his village school, the
difficult task was committed of accompanying, restraining, and guiding
this daring spirit and active body. Shy, uncouth, awkward, with the
memory of his failure in the pulpit always upon him, the Dominie was
indeed quite able to instruct his pupil in the beginnings of learning,
but it proved quite out of his power to control the pair of twinkling
legs belonging to Master Harry Bertram. Once was the Dominie chased by a
cross-grained cow. Once he fell into the brook at the stepping-stones,
and once he was bogged in his middle in trying to gather water-lilies
for the young Laird. The village matrons who relieved Dominie Sampson
on this last occasion, declared that the Laird might just as well "trust
the bairn to the care o' a tatie-bogle!"[2] But the good tutor, nothing
daunted, continued grave and calm through all, only exclaiming, after
each fresh misfortune, the single word "Prodeegious!"

Often, too, Harry Bertram sought out Meg Merrilies at Derncleugh, where
he played his pranks among the gipsies as fearlessly as within the walls
of Ellangowan itself. Meanwhile the war between that active magistrate
Godfrey Bertram and the gipsies grew ever sharper. The Laird was
resolved to root them out, in order to stand well with his brother
magistrates. So the gipsies sullenly watched while the ground officer
chalked their doors in token that they must "flit" at the next term.

At last the fatal day arrived. A strong force of officers summoned the
gipsies to quit their houses, and when they did not obey, the sheriff's
men broke down the doors and pulled the roofs off the poor huts of
Derncleugh.

Godfrey Bertram, who was really a kindly man, had gone away for the day
to avoid the sight, leaving the business to the chief exciseman of the
neighbourhood,--one Frank Kennedy, a bold, roistering blade, who knew no
fear, and had no qualms whatever about ridding the neighbourhood of a
gang of "sorners and thieves," as he called the Derncleugh gipsies.
But as Godfrey was riding back to Ellangowan with a single servant,
right in the middle of the King's highway, he met the whole congregation
of the exiles, evicted from their ruined houses, and sullenly taking
their way in search of a new shelter against the storms of the oncoming
winter. His servant rode forward to command every man to stand to his
beast's head while the Laird was passing.

"He shall have his half of the road," growled one of the tall thin
gipsies, his features half-buried in a slouch hat, "but he shall have no
more. The highway is as free to our cuddies as to his horse."

Never before had the Laird of Ellangowan received such a discourteous

reception. Anxious at the last to leave a good impression, he stammered
out as he passed one of the older men, "And your son, Gabriel Baillie,
is he well?" (He meant the young man who had been sent by means of the
press-gang to foreign parts.) With a deep scowl the old man replied, "If
I had heard otherwise, _you_ would have heard it too!"

At last Godfrey Bertram thought that he had escaped. He had passed the
last laden donkey of the expelled tribe. He was urging his beast toward
Ellangowan with a saddened spirit, when suddenly at a place where the
road was sunk between two high banks, Meg Merrilies appeared above him,
a freshly cut sapling in her hand, her dark eyes flashing anger, and her
elf-locks straying in wilder confusion than ever.

"Ride your ways, Laird of Ellangowan," she cried, "ride your ways,
Godfrey Bertram! This day ye have quenched seven smoking hearths--see if
the fire in your own parlour burns the brighter for that? Ye have riven
the thatch off seven cottars' houses--look if your roof-tree stands the
faster. There are thirty yonder that would have shed their lifeblood for
you--thirty, from the child of a week to the auld wife of a hundred,
that you have made homeless, that you have sent out to sleep with the
fox and the blackcock. Our bairns are hanging on our weary backs--look
to it that your braw cradle at hame is the fairer spread! Now ride your
ways, Godfrey Bertram. These are the last words ye shall ever hear from
Meg Merrilies, and this the last staff that I shall ever cut in the
bonny woods of Ellangowan!"

[Illustration: "MEG MERRILIES appeared above him, a freshly cut sapling

in her hand, her dark eyes flashing anger, and her elf-locks straying
in wilder confusion than ever.

"'Ride your ways, Laird of Ellangowan,' she cried, 'ride your ways,
Godfrey Bertram! This day ye have quenched seven smoking hearths--see if
the fire in your own parlour burns the brighter for that!'"]

And with the gesture of a queen delivering sentence she broke the
sapling she had held in her hand, and flung the fragments into the road.
The Laird was groping in his pocket for half a crown, and thinking
meanwhile what answer to make. But disdaining both his reply and his
peace-offering, Meg strode defiantly downhill after the caravan.

* * * * *

Not only was there war by land at Ellangowan. There was also war by sea.
The Laird, determined for once not to do things by halves, had begun to
support Frank Kennedy, the chief revenue officer, in his campaign
against the smugglers. Armed with Ellangowan's warrant, and guided by
his people who knew the country, Kennedy swooped down upon Dirk
Hatteraick as he was in the act of landing a large cargo upon
Ellangowan's ground. After a severe combat he had been able to clap the
government broad-arrow upon every package and carry them all off to the
nearest customs' post. Dirk Hatteraick got safely away, but he went,
vowing in English, Dutch, and German, the direst vengeance against Frank
Kennedy, Godfrey Bertram, and all his enemies.

It was a day or two after the eviction of the gipsies when the Lady of
Ellangowan, suddenly remembering that it was her son Harry's fifth
birthday, demanded of her husband that he should open and read the
horoscope written by the wandering student of the stars five years
before. While they were arguing about the matter, it was suddenly
discovered that little Harry was nowhere to be found. His guardian,
Dominie Sampson, having returned without him, was summoned to give an
account of his stewardship by the angry mother.

"Mr. Sampson," she cried, "it is the most extraordinary thing in the
world wide, that you have free up-putting in this house,--bed, board,
washing, and twelve pounds sterling a year just to look after that
boy,--and here you have let him out of your sight for three hours at a
time!"

Bowing with awkward gratitude at each clause in this statement of his

advantages, the poor Dominie was at last able to stammer out that Frank
Kennedy had taken charge of Master Harry, in the face of his protest,
and had carried him off to Warroch Head to see the taking of Dirk
Hatteraick's ship by the King's sloop-of-war, which he had ridden all
the way to Wigton Bay to bring about.

"And if that be so," cried the Lady of Ellangowan, "I am very little
obliged to Frank Kennedy. The bairn may fall from his horse, or anything
may happen."

The Laird quieted his wife by telling her that he and Frank Kennedy had
together seen the sloop-of-war giving chase to Dirk Hatteraick's ship,
and that even then the Dutchman, disabled and on fire, was fast drifting
upon the rocks. Frank Kennedy had ridden off to assist in the capture by
signalling to the man-of-war from Warroch Head, and had evidently picked
up little Harry upon the way. He would doubtless, continued the Laird,
be back in a little time. For he had ordered the punch-bowl to be made
ready, that they might drink good luck to the King's service and
confusion to all smugglers and free-traders wherever found.

But hour after hour went by, and neither Frank Kennedy nor the boy Harry
returned. The night approached. Parties of searchers anxiously beat the
woods and patrolled the cliffs. For long they found nothing, but at last
a boat's crew, landing perilously at the foot of the precipices, came
upon the body of the excise officer, a sword-cut in his head, lying
half in and half out of the water. He had been flung from the cliffs
above. Frank Kennedy was dead--as to that there was no question. But
what had become of the child, Harry Bertram? That--no one could answer.
Not a trace of him was to be found. The smuggler's ship still burned
fiercely, but Dirk Hatteraick and his men had completely vanished. Some
one suggested the gipsies, whereupon the Laird mounted the first horse
he came across and rode furiously to the huts of Derncleugh. Bursting in
a door, he found on the ruined hearth of the house that had once
sheltered Meg Merrilies, a fire still smouldering. But there, too,
Godfrey Bertram discovered nothing and no one.
While he remained on the spot, dazed and uncertain, looking at the
blackened hearthstone, his old servant entered hastily to bid him return
at once to Ellangowan. His wife had been taken dangerously ill. Godfrey
spurred as fast as horse would carry him, but Death had gone faster, and
had arrived before him. When he reached the gate, the Lady of Ellangowan
was dead, leaving him with a little baby girl less than an hour old. The
shock of Kennedy's murder and her own little Harry's loss had killed
her.

INTERLUDE OF INTERROGATION

The melancholy conclusion of the first _Guy

Mannering_ tale kept the children quieter than
usual. I think they regretted a little the gallant
opening of _Waverley_, but as ever they were full
of questions.

"And all that happened here, in our Galloway?"

began Sweetheart, looking about her at the hills of
dark heather and the sparkling Solway sands, from
which the storm-clouds were just beginning to lift.

"Yes," I answered her, "though it is doubtful if

Scott ever _was_ in Galloway. But he had seen
Criffel across from Dumfries-shire, and the castle
of Ellangowan is certainly described from the ruins
of Caerlaverock, opposite New Abbey. Besides, had
he not good old Joseph Train, the Castle Douglas
exciseman, to tell him everything--than whom no man
knew Galloway better?"

"Did gipsies really steal children?" said Maid

Margaret, with some apprehension. She was somewhat
anxious, for an affirmative answer might interfere
with certain wide operations in blackberrying which
she was planning.

"Sometimes they did," I answered, "but not nearly

so often as they were blamed for. They had usually
enough mouths of their own to feed. So, unless they
were sure of a ransom, or perhaps occasionally for
the sake of revenge, gipsies very seldom were
guilty of kidnapping."

"But they always do steal them in books," said Hugh

John; "well, I would just like to see them cart me
off! And if they took Sir Toady Lion, they would
soon send him back. He eats so much!"

This was Hugh John's idea of a joke, and somewhat

hastily I interrupted fraternal strife by returning
to the general subject.

"Adam Smith, a very learned man, who afterwards

wrote _The Wealth of Nations_, was stolen by
gipsies when a child," I said.
 "_I_ wish they had just kept him," said Hugh John,
unexpectedly; "then we wouldn't have had to
paraphrase the beastly thing at school. It is as
full of jaw-breakers as a perch is full of bones."

"Was little Harry really stolen by gipsies, or was

he killed over the cliff?" queried Maid Margaret.

"Of course he was stolen, silly," broke in Sir

Toady Lion, sagely; "look how much more of the book
there has got to be all about him. Think there
would be all that, if he got killed right at the
beginning, eh?"

"Do any people smuggle nowadays?" demanded Hugh

John.

"Of course they do--in Spain," interjected Sir

Toady Lion, "father got put in prison there once."

"That was all owing to a mistake," I explained

hastily (for really this had nothing to do with
Scott); "it was only because your parent happened
to be wearing the same kind of hat as a certain
well-known smuggler, a very desperate character."

"HUM-M!" said Sir Toady Lion, suddenly developing a

cold in the nose.

"Well, anyway, they do smuggle--though not much in

this country now," said Sweetheart, "and I'm glad
father knew a man who smuggled in Spain. It makes
this book so much more real."

"Getting put in prison instead of him made it

almost _too_ real," said Sir Toady. He is a most
disconcerting and ironical boy. One often wonders
where he gets it from.

So to shut off further questioning, I proceeded

immediately with the telling of the second tale
from _Guy Mannering_.

THE SECOND TALE FROM "GUY MANNERING"

I. HAPPY DOMINIE SAMPSON

IT was seventeen long years after the murder of Frank Kennedy and the
disappearance of little Harry Bertram when Guy Mannering, now a soldier
famous for his wars in the East, penetrated a second time into Galloway.
His object was to visit the family of Ellangowan, and secretly, also, to
find out for himself in what way his random prophesies had worked out.

But he arrived at an unfortunate time. He found that, chiefly by the

plotting and deceit of a rascally lawyer, one Gilbert Glossin, the
Bertrams were on the point of being sold out of Ellangowan. All their
money had been lost, and the sale of the estate was being forced on by
the rascally lawyer Glossin for his own ends.

The old man Godfrey Bertram also was very near his end. And indeed on
the very day of the sale, and while Mannering was paying his respects to
his former host, the sight of Glossin so enraged the feeble old man that
he was taken with a violent passion, falling back in his chair and dying
in a few minutes.

Mannering, whose heart was greatly touched, was most anxious to do all
that he could to assist Lucy Bertram, the old man's daughter, but he was
compelled by an urgent summons to return into England. It had been his
intention to save the estate of Ellangowan from the clutches of the
scoundrel Glossin by buying it himself, but the drunkenness of a postboy
whom he had sent with a letter to Mr. Mac-Morlan, the lawyer in charge
of the sale, defeated his intentions, so that Ellangowan became the
property of the traitor. So young Lucy Bertram and Dominie Sampson (who
refused to be separated from her) became for the moment inmates of Mr.
Mac-Morlan's house. The Dominie found a pupil or two in the
neighbourhood that he might not be chargeable to his dear Lucy or her
friend Mr. Mac-Morlan. And so, in the twenty-first year after the birth
of an heir, and after Mannering's prophecy concerning him, there seemed
an end to the ancient house of the Bertrams of Ellangowan.

During these years, Colonel Mannering also had a tale to tell. Wedded
early to the wife of his youth and his heart, he had gone to India in
the service of the Honourable, the East India Company. There by his
valour and talent he had rapidly acquired both wealth and position. But
during the twenty-first year an event occurred which gave him a distaste
for the land of his adoption, and he had come back to his native country
with the idea of settling down, far away from old memories and new
entanglements.

In a duel which he had fought in India with a young man named Brown--a
brave youth of no position, who had offended Mannering by his attentions
to his daughter, and by establishing himself in his house as a friend of
the family--he had left Brown for dead on the field, hardly escaping
himself with his life from a sudden attack of the armed banditti who, in
the India of that day, were always hovering round desert places. The
shock of that morning had so told on the health of Mannering's wife that
she died shortly afterwards, leaving him with one daughter, Julia--a
proud, sprightly, sentimental girl, whom he had brought home, and placed
under the care of a friend named Mervyn, whose house stood upon one of
the Cumberland lakes.

So it came about that when Mannering was in Scotland, he received a

letter from his friend which took him to Mervyn Hall as fast as
horse-flesh could carry him.

His friend wrote, as he was careful to say, without his wife's

knowledge. Mr. Mervyn told Colonel Mannering that he was certain that
his daughter Julia was receiving secret visits from some one whom she
did not dare to see openly. Not only were there long solitary walks and
hill-climbings, but on several occasions he had heard up the lake at
midnight, as if under her windows, a flageolet playing a little Indian
air to which Julia Mannering was partial. This was evidently a signal,
for a boat had been seen hastily crossing the lake, and the sash of
Julia's window had been heard to shut down at the first alarm. Mr.
Mervyn said that, little as he liked playing the part of tale-bearer, he
felt that Julia was under his care, and he would not deserve his old
name of Downright Dunstable if he did not inform her father of what he
had discovered. Julia, he said, was both a charming and high spirited
girl, but she was too much her own father's daughter to be without
romantic ideas. On the whole, concluded Mr. Mervyn, it behooved the
Colonel to come at once to Mervyn Hall and look after his own property.

This was the letter which, put into his hands at a seaport town in
Scotland, lost Mannering the estate of Ellangowan, and threw the ancient
seat of many generations of Bertrams into the clutches of the
scoundrelly Glossin. For Colonel Mannering instantly posted off to the
south, having first of all sent despatches to Mr. Mac-Morlan by the
untrustworthy postilion--the same who arrived a day too late for the
sale.

When Colonel Mannering first went to Mervyn Hall, he could make nothing
of the case. Of course he believed Brown to have died by his hand in
India, and he could find no traces of any other man likely to be making
love to his daughter. Nevertheless he had brought back a plan with him
from Scotland, which, he thought, would put an end to all future
difficulties. The helplessness of Lucy Bertram had moved his heart.
Besides, he was more amused than he cared to own by the originality of
the Dominie. He had easily obtained, by means of Mr. Mac-Morlan, a
furnished house in the neighbourhood of Ellangowan, and he resolved for
a time at least to repose himself there after his campaigns. His
daughter Julia would thus have a companion in Lucy Bertram, and it was
easy to provide the Dominie with an occupation. For the library of an
uncle of Mannering's, who had been a learned bishop of the Church of
England, had been willed to him. The Dominie was the very man to put the
books in order. So indeed it was arranged, after some saucy remarks from
Miss Mannering as to the supposed Scottish accent and probable red hair
of her companion.

Then Colonel Mannering, accustomed to do nothing by halves, sent down

his directions about Dominie Sampson, whose heart indeed would have been
broken if he had been separated from the young mistress over whom he had
watched from childhood.

"Let the poor man be properly dressed," wrote the Colonel to Mr.
Mac-Morlan, "and let him accompany his young lady to Woodbourne!"

The dressing of Dominie Sampson was, however, easier said than done. For
it would hurt the pride of the Dominie to have clothes presented to him
as to a schoolboy. But Lucy Bertram soon settled the matter. The
Dominie, she said, would never notice the difference, if they put one
garment at a time into his sleeping room and took away the other. This
was what her father had always done when the wardrobe of his dependent
needed renewing. Nor had the Dominie ever showed the least consciousness
of the change.

So said, so done. A good tailor, having come and looked Mr. Sampson
over, readily agreed to provide him with two excellent suits, one black
and one raven grey, such as would fit the Dominie as well as a man of
such an out-of-the-way build could be fitted by merely human needles and
shears.

The Dominie, when completely equipped, made no remark upon the

change--further than that, in his opinion, the air of a seaport town
like Kippletringan seemed to be favourable to wearing-apparel.

It was the depth of winter when the Mannerings arrived at Woodbourne.

All were a little anxious. Even Dominie Sampson longed to be at his
books, and going repeatedly to the windows demanded, "Why tarry the
wheels of their chariot?" But when at last they came, Lucy and Julia
Bertram were soon friends, while the Dominie stood with uplifted hands,
exclaiming, "Prodeegious! Prodeegious!" as, one after another, the
thirty or forty cart-loads of books were deposited on the library floor
ready to his hand. His arms flapped like windmills, and the uncouth
scholar counted himself the happiest man on earth as he began to
arrange the great volumes on the shelves. Not that he got on very
quickly. For he wrote out the catalogue in his best running-hand. He put
the books on the shelves as carefully as if they had been old and
precious china. Yet in spite of the Dominie's zeal, his labours advanced
but slowly. Often he would chance to open a volume when halfway up the
ladder. Then, his eye falling upon some entrancing passage, he would
stand there transfixed, oblivious of the flight of time, till a
serving-maid pulled his skirts to tell him dinner was waiting. He would
then bolt his food in three-inch squares, and rush back to the library,
often with his dinner napkin still tied round his neck like a pinafore.
Thus, for the first time in his life, Dominie Sampson was perfectly
content.

[Illustration: "HIS eye falling upon some entrancing passage, he would

stand there transfixed, oblivious of the flight of time, till a
serving-maid pulled his skirts to tell him dinner was waiting."]

II. DANDIE DINMONT

But the story now turns to the young man Brown, or, to give him his full
title, Captain Vanbeest Brown, whom Colonel Mannering had left for dead
on an Indian field. He did not die, but he had been compelled to
undergo a long captivity among the bandits before he found his way back
to his regiment. The new Colonel whom he found in Mannering's place had
been kind to him, and he soon found himself in command of a troop of
dragoons. He was at present on leave in England, and, as he was
conscious that Mannering had no reason for his ill-will and apparent
cruelty, Brown felt that he on his part had no reason for standing on
ceremony with such a man. He loved Julia Mannering, and, to say the
least of it, she did not discourage him. So it was he who had played the
Hindoo air upon the lake--he with whom Julia had talked at her window,
even as Mervyn had related in his letter to his friend Colonel
Mannering.

When the Colonel and his daughter went away to Scotland, Captain Brown,
having no relatives in the country, resolved to follow them. He set out
on foot, having for sole companion a little terrier named Wasp. On the
way he had to pass a long and weary waste of heath and morass. One house
alone broke the monotonous expanse. It was little better than a shed,
but was sheltered by an ash tree, and a clay-built shed alongside served
for a rude stable. A stout pony stood tethered in front of the door,
busy with a feed of oats. Stillness brooded all around. It was a poor
place, but Captain Brown had wandered too far and seen too much to care
about appearances. He stooped his head and entered at the low door. In
a few minutes he found himself attacking a round of beef and washing it
down with home-brewed ale in company with the owner of the pony tethered
outside, a certain Mr. Dandie Dinmont, a store-farmer on his way home
from a Cumberland fair. At first only pleasant nods passed between them
as they drank to each other in silence.

Presently Brown noticed, seated in the great chimney, a very tall old
woman clad in a red cloak and a slouched bonnet, having all the
appearance of a gipsy or tinker. She smoked silently at her clay pipe,
while the doubtful-looking landlady went about her affairs.

Brown's terrier Wasp was the means of his striking up an acquaintance

with the sturdy farmer opposite, who, hearing that he had never seen a
blackcock, invited him forthwith to Charlies-hope, the name of his farm,
where he promised him he should both see blackcock, shoot blackcock, and
eat blackcock. Dandie Dinmont was going on to tell Brown of his
wanderings, when the old crone in the red cloak by the side of the fire
suddenly broke silence by asking if he had been recently in Galloway,
and if he knew Ellangowan.

"Ellangowan!" cried the farmer, "I ken it weel! Auld Laird Bertram died
but a fortnight ago, and the estate and everything had to be sold for
want of an heir male."

The old gipsy (who, of course, was no other than Meg Merrilies) sprang
at once to her feet.

"And who dared buy the estate, when the bonny knave-bairn that heirs it
may any day come back to claim his ain?"

"It was, I believe," said Dandie Dinmont, "one of these writer bodies
that buy up everything,--Gilbert Glossin by name!"

"Ay, Gibbie Glossin," said the old witch-wife, "mony a time I hae
carried him in my creels. But maybe ye'll hae heard o' Derncleugh, about
a mile frae Ellangowan?"

"And a wild-looking den it is," said the farmer; "nothing but old ruined
walls."

"It was a blithe bit once," said the gipsy, as if talking to herself;
"did ye notice if there was a willow tree half blown down, that hangs
over the bit burnie? Mony is the time hae I sat there and knitted my
stockin'."

"The deil's in the wife," cried Dandie; "let me away! Here's saxpence
for ye to buy half-a-mutchkin, instead o' claverin' o' auld-world
tales."

The gipsy took the money from the farmer, and tendered in return this
advice: "When Tib Mumps brings ye out the stirrup-cup, and asks ye
whether ye will gang ower Willie's brae or by the Conscowthartmoss, be
sure to choose the road ye _dinna_ tell her."

The farmer laughed and promised. But to Brown he said that after all he
would rather that Tib Mumps kenned where he was going than yon gipsy
queen, so he would e'en hold on his way.

Captain Brown soon followed on foot, but at the door he found himself
stopped by Meg Merrilies, who, with much earnestness, asked his name and
from whence he came.
"My name is Brown," he answered, a little impatiently; "I come from the
East Indies."

[Illustration: "HE had not gone very far, and was still in the heart of
the morass, when he saw his late companion of the ale-house engaged in
deadly combat with a couple of rascals, one of them armed with a
cutlass, and the other with a bludgeon."]

The old gipsy appeared disappointed by his answer, and Brown put a
shilling into her hand as he took his leave. However, he had not gone
very far, and was still in the heart of the morass, when he saw his late
companion of the ale-house engaged in deadly combat with a couple of
rascals, one of them armed with a cutlass, and the other with a
bludgeon. Brown's terrier Wasp ran forward, barking furiously, but
before Brown could come to his assistance the ruffians had got Dandie
Dinmont down, and the man with the bludgeon bestowed some merciless
blows upon his head. Then with a shout they turned their attention to
Brown, crying that "the first one was content." But Brown was a staunch
antagonist, and they soon found that they had met more than their match.
Whereupon the leader bade him follow his nose over the heath, for that
they had nothing to say to him.

But, since to do this was to abandon Dandie Dinmont to their mercy,

Brown refused point-blank. Affairs were at this pass when Dandie,
staggering to his feet, his loaded whip in his hand, managed to come to
the assistance of his rescuer, whereupon the two men took to their heels
and ran as hard as they could over the moor.

Then the farmer, who knew their ways, bade Brown mount behind him on his
horse Dumple, for he warned him that in five minutes "the whole
clanjamphrey" would be down upon them. And even as he spoke five or six
men made their appearance, running toward them over the moss. But Dumple
was staunch, and by dint of following the safest roads, and being left
to pick his own way in the difficult places, Dandie's pony soon left the
villains behind him. Then, following the old Roman road, they reached
Dinmont's farm of Charlies-hope, across the border, not long after
nightfall.

A furious barking from innumerable terriers and dogs of all breeds was
their welcome. And soon Brown found himself within four hospitable
walls, where not only were his own wants satisfied, but the wounds of
the master of the house were bound up by his buxom wife.

At kindly Charlies-hope, Brown remained several days, while Dandie

Dinmont showed him the best sport to be had upon the border. Together
they hunted the fox after the manner of the country--that is, treating
Reynard as a thief and a robber, with whom no conditions are to be
observed. Together they went to the night fishing, where Brown heard the
leisters or steel tridents ringing on the stones at the bottom of the
water, as the fishers struck at the salmon in the light of the blazing
torches kindled to attract the fish. Otter-hunting and badger-baiting
filled in the time, so that Brown had never been so well amused in his
life. But he begged from his host that the badger, which had made so
gallant a defence, should be allowed henceforth to go scot-free. Dandie
promised with willingness, happy to oblige his guest, though quite
unable to understand why any one should "care about a brock." When Brown
told this hearty family that he must leave them, he was compelled to
promise, over and over again, that he would soon return. The chorus of
Dandie's tow-headed youngsters burst into one unanimous howl.

"Come back again, Captain," cried one sturdy little chap, "and Jennie
shall be your wife."

Jennie, a girl of eleven, promptly ran and hid herself behind her
mother.

"Captain, come back," said a little fat roll-about girl of six, holding
up her mouth to be kissed; "come back and I'll be your wife my
ainsel'!"

It was hard to leave so hospitable a home to go where, to say the least

of it, one was not wanted. Especially was it so when the sturdy farmer,
grasping Brown's hand, said with a certain shamefacedness, "There's a
pickle siller that I do not ken what to do wi', after Ailie has gotten
her new goon and the bairns their winter duds. But I was thinking, that
whiles you army gentlemen can buy yoursel's up a step. If ye wad tak the
siller, a bit scrape o' a pen wad be as guid to me. Ye could take your
ain time about paying it back. And--and it would be a great convenience
to me."

Brown was much moved, but he could only thank his kind host heartily and
promise that in case of need he would not forget to draw upon his purse.
So they parted, Brown leaving his little terrier Wasp to share bed and
board with the eldest of the Dinmont boys, who right willingly undertook
the task as a kind of security for his master's return.

Dinmont conveyed his guest some distance, and afterward, from the first
Dumfries-shire town which they entered, Brown took a carriage to carry
him part of the way in the direction of Woodbourne, where Julia
Mannering was at present residing.

III. IN THE LION'S MOUTH

Night and mist stopped him after many miles of journeying. The postboy
had lost his way, and could offer no suggestions. Brown descended to see
if by chance, in this wild place, they were near any farm-house at which
he could ask the way. Standing tiptoe upon a bank, it seemed as if he
could see in the distance a light feebly glimmering.

Brown proceeded toward it, but soon found himself stumbling among ruins
of cottages, the side walls of which were lying in shapeless heaps, half
covered with snow, while the gables still stood up gaunt and black
against the sky. He ascended a bank, steep and difficult, and found
himself in front of a small square tower, from the chinks of which a
light showed dimly. Listening cautiously, he heard a noise as of stifled
groaning.

Brown approached softly, and looked through a long arrow-slit upon a

dismal scene. Smoke filled a wretched apartment. On a couch a man lay,
apparently dying, while beside him, wrapped in a long cloak, a woman sat
with bent head, crooning to herself and occasionally moistening the
sufferer's lips with some liquid.

"It will not do," Brown heard her say at last "he cannot pass away with
the crime on his soul. It tethers him here. I must open the door."
As she did so she saw Brown standing without. He, on his part,
recognised in the woman the gipsy wife whom he had seen on the Waste of
Cumberland, when he and Dandie Dinmont had had their fight with the
robbers.

"Did I not tell you neither to mix nor mingle?" said the woman; "but
come in. Here is your only safety!"

Even as she spoke, the head of the wounded man fell back. He was dead,
and, before Brown could think of seeking safety in flight, they heard in
the distance the sound of voices approaching.

"They are coming!" whispered the gipsy; "if they find you here, you are
a dead man. Quick--you cannot escape. Lie down, and, whatever you see or
hear, do not stir, as you value your life."

Brown had no alternative but to obey. So the old gipsy wife covered him
over with old sacks as he lay in the corner upon a couch of straw.

Then Meg went about the dismal offices of preparing the dead man for
burial, but Brown could see that she was constantly pausing to listen to
the sounds which every moment grew louder without. At last a gang of
fierce-looking desperadoes poured tumultuously in, their leader abusing
the old woman for leaving the door open.

But Meg Merrilies had her answer ready.

"Did you ever hear of a door being barred when a man was in the
death-agony?" she cried. "Think ye the spirit could win away through all
these bolts and bars?"

"Is he dead, then?" asked one of the ruffians, glancing in the direction
of the bed.

"Ay, dead enough," growled another; "but here is the wherewithal to give
him a rousing lykewake!" And going to the corner he drew out a large jar
of brandy, while Meg busied herself in preparing pipes and tobacco.

Brown in his corner found his mind a little eased when he saw how
eagerly she went about her task.

"She does not mean to betray me, then!" he said to himself. Though for
all that, he could see no gleam of womanly tenderness on her face, nor
imagine any reason she should not give him up to her associates.

That they were a gang of murderers was soon evident from their talk. The
man, now wrapped in the dark sea-cloak, whose dead face looked down on
their revels, was referred to as one who had often gloried in the murder
of Frank Kennedy. But some of the others held that the deed was not
wisely done, because after that the people of the country would not do
business with the smugglers.

"It did up the trade for one while!" said one; "the people turned
rusty!"

Then there were evident threats uttered against some one whose name
Brown did not hear.

"I think," said the leader of the ruffians, "that we will have to be
down upon the fellow one of these nights, and let him have it well!"

After a while the carousing bandits called for what they called "Black
Peter." It was time (they said) "to flick it open."

To Brown's surprise and indignation, Black Peter proved to be nothing

else than his own portmanteau, which gave him reasons for some very dark
thoughts as to the fate of his postboy. He watched the rascals force his
bag open and coolly divide all that was in it among them. Yet he dared
not utter a word, well aware that had he done so, the next moment a
knife would have been at his throat.

At last, to his great relief, Brown saw them make their preparations for
departure. He was left alone with the dead man and the old woman.

Meg Merrilies waited till the first sun of the winter's morn had come,
lest one of the revellers of the night should take it into his head to
turn back. Then she led Brown by a difficult and precipitous path, till
she could point out to him, on the other side of some dense plantations,
the road to Kippletringan.

"And here," said she, mysteriously putting a large leathern purse into
his hand, "is what will in some degree repay the many alms your house
has given me and mine!"

She was gone before he could reply, and when Brown opened the purse, he
was astonished to find in it gold to the amount of nearly one hundred
pounds, besides many valuable jewels. The gipsy had endowed him with a
fortune.

INTERLUDE OF LOCALITY

"And all this happened here?" repeated Sweetheart,

incredulously, pointing up at the dark purple
mountains of Screel and Ben Gairn.

"Well," I answered, "Scott's Solway is the Dumfries

Solway, not the Galloway Solway. Portanferry exists
not far from Glencaple on the eastern bank of Nith,
and the castle of Ellangowan is as like as possible
to Caerlaverock."

"But he _says_ Galloway!" objected Sweetheart, who

has a pretty persistence of her own. "And I wanted
Ellangowan to be in Galloway. What with Carlyle
having been born there, the Dumfries folk have
quite enough to be proud of!"

"Yes, Scott _says_ Ellangowan is in Galloway," said

I, "but nevertheless to any one who knows the
country, it remains obstinately in Dumfries-shire.
His swamps and morasses are those of Lochar. The
frith is the Dumfries-shire Solway, the castle a
Dumfries-shire castle, and what Scott put in of
Galloway tradition was sent him by his friend the
Castle Douglas exciseman."

"Oh!" said Sweetheart, a little ruefully, "but are

you sure?"

"Certain," I answered, "if you consider time and

distance from the border--say from Charlies-hope,
you will see that Brown could not possibly have
reached the heart of Galloway. Besides, Scott was
far too wise a man to write about what he did not
know. So he wove in Train's Galloway legends, but
he put the people into his own well-kenned dresses,
and set them to act their parts under familiar
skies. Hence it is, that though the taste of Scott
was never stronger than in _Guy Mannering_, the
flavour of Galloway is somehow not in the mouth!"

"What does it matter where it all happened?" cried

Hugh John; "it is a rattling good tale, anyway, and
if the Man-who-Wrote-It imagined that it all
happened in Galloway, surely _we_ can!"

This being both sensible and unanswerable, the

party scattered to improvise old castles of
Ellangowan, and to squabble for what was to them
the only wholly desirable part, that of Dirk
Hatteraick. The combat between the smuggler and the
exciseman was executed with particular zeal and
spirit, Sir Toady Lion prancing and curvetting, as
Frank Kennedy, on an invisible steed, with Maid
Margaret before him on the saddle. So active was
the fight indeed, that the bold bad smuggler, Dirk,
assailed as to the upper part of his body by Sir
Toady, and with the Heir tugging at his legs, found
himself presently worsted and precipitated over the
cliff in place of Frank Kennedy. This ending
considerably disarranged the story, so that it was
with no little trouble that the pair of strutting
victors were induced to "play by the book," and to
accept (severally) death and captivity in the hold
of the smuggling lugger.

On the other hand, after I had read the

Twenty-seventh and Twenty-eighth Chapters of _Guy
Mannering_ to them in the original, it was
remarkable with what accuracy of detail Sweetheart
wrapped a plaid about her and played the witch, Meg
Merrilies, singing wild dirges over an imaginary
dead body, while Hugh John hid among the straw till
Sir Toady and Maid Margaret rushed in with
incredible hubbub and sat down to carouse like a
real gang of the most desperate characters.

Seated on a barrel of gunpowder, Sir Toady declared

that he smelt traitors in the camp, whereupon he
held a (paper) knife aloft in the air, and cried,
"If any deceive us or betray the gang, we will
destroy them--_thus!_"

"Yes," chimed in the rosebud mouth of Maid

Margaret, "and us will chop them into teeny-weeny
little bits wif a sausage minchine, and feed them
 to our b-r-r-lood-hounds!"

"Little monsters!" cried Sweetheart, for the moment

forgetting her proper character of witch-wife.
Nevertheless, all in the Kairn of Derncleugh were
happy, save Hugh John, who declared that Scott's
heroes were always getting put under soft cushions
or up the chimney. "You can't really distinguish
yourself," he insisted, "in such situations!" And
he referred once more to the luck of a certain Mr.
James Hawkins, ship's boy, late of "Treasure
Island."

"It's the nobodies that have all the fun--real

heroes don't count!" he continued ruefully, as he
dusted himself from the bits of straw.

"Wait," said I; "you have not heard the third tale

from Guy Mannering. Then there will be lots for you
to do!"

"High time!" he answered with awful irony.

THE THIRD TALE FROM "GUY MANNERING"

THE RETURN OF DIRK HATTERAICK

ONE event deeply stirred all Solway-side in the year of Colonel

Mannering's arrival at Woodbourne--the smugglers had returned in force,
and proved themselves ripe for any desperate act. Their stronghold was
as of old, the Isle of Man, from which they could descend in a few hours
upon the Solway coasts. Stricter laws and more severe penalties had only
rendered them fiercer than of old, and in case of need, they did not
hesitate in the least to shed blood.

As of yore also, their leader was the savage Dirk Hatteraick, under whom
served a Lieutenant named Brown. One of their first exploits was a
daring attack upon the house of Woodbourne, where dwelt Colonel
Mannering with his daughter and Lucy Bertram.

It happened thus. Mannering, in company with young Charles Hazlewood,

was setting out for a loch some miles away to look at the skaters.
Hazlewood had quite often come to visit the house of Woodbourne since
Lucy Bertram went to live there. Suddenly a few men, each leading a
laden horse, burst through the bushes, and, pressing straight across the
lawn, made for the front door. Mannering hastened to demand what they
wanted. They were revenue officers, they said, and as they knew that
Colonel Mannering had served in the East, they called upon him in the
King's name to protect them and their captures.

To this Mannering instantly agreed. No time was to be lost. The

smugglers were hot in pursuit, strongly reinforced. Immediately the
goods were piled in the hall. The windows were blocked up with cushions,
pillows, and (what caused the Dominie many a groan) great folios out of
the library, bound in wood, covered with leather, and studded with
brazen bosses like a Highland targe.

While these preparations were being made within the house of Woodbourne
the steady earth-shaking beat of a body of horsemen was heard
approaching, and in a few minutes a body of thirty mounted men rushed
out upon the lawn, brandishing weapons and uttering savage yells. Most
of them had their heads tied up in coloured handkerchiefs, while many
wore masks by way of disguising themselves.

Finding the mansion in an unexpected state of defence, they halted a

moment, as if to take counsel together. But finally one of them, his
face all blackened with soot, dismounted and came forward, waving a
white cloth in his hand.

Colonel Mannering immediately threw up a window, and asked the smuggler

what he wanted.

"We want our goods, of which we have been robbed by these sharks," cried
the man with the blackened face, "and we mean to have them. If you give
them up, we will go away quietly without harming any one, but if you
refuse, then we will burn the house and have the life-blood of every
soul under your roof."

This he swore with many horrible and cruel oaths.

"If you do not instantly ride off my lawn," answered Colonel Mannering,
"I will fire upon you without any further warning!"

The Ambassador returned to his troop, and no sooner had he told them the
Colonel's answer than they rushed forward to the attack with horrid
yells. Three volleys were fired, shattering the window-glass in all
directions, but, thanks to the Colonel's preparations, the slugs and
bullets rattled harmlessly against his defences. Many of the smugglers
now dismounted and advanced with axe and crow-bar to force the front
door. It was time for those within to take action.

"Let only Charles Hazlewood and myself shoot!" said the Colonel,
"Hazlewood, do you mark the Ambassador. I will take the commander of the
rascals--the man on the grey horse, whom they call their Lieutenant!"

Both men fell as the shots rang out. Astonished by this reception, the
smugglers retreated, carrying with them their wounded. It was one of
these whom Captain Brown saw die in the little ruined keep at Derncleugh
the night when he was overtaken in the darkness--indeed, that very
namesake of his own, Brown, the mate of Hatteraick's vessel.

There were many who thought that after this Captain Mannering ought to
remove his family out of danger. But that gentleman confined himself to
taking greater precautions at locking-up time, and insisting that when
the ladies went out walking, a gun should be carried by an attendant for
their protection.

One day Julia Mannering and Lucy Bertram had gone out with young Charles
Hazlewood to visit a small lake much frequented by skaters and curlers,
while a servant followed behind with a gun.

It chanced that Lucy, who never kept Hazlewood's arm when she could
avoid it, had dropped behind as they were passing along a narrow path
through a pine plantation. Julia Mannering was therefore alone at
Charles Hazlewood's side when Brown suddenly appeared from among the
trees, right in their path. He was roughly dressed, and young
Hazlewood, taking him for one of the smugglers, and mistaking the
meaning of Julia's cry of surprise at seeing her lover, snatched the gun
from the servant, and haughtily ordered Brown to stand back so as not to
alarm the lady. Brown, piqued at finding Julia on the arm of a stranger,
replied as haughtily that he did not require to take lessons from
Hazlewood how to behave to any lady. Instantly Charles Hazlewood pointed
the gun at his breast. Upon which Brown sprang upon him, and in the
struggle the gun went off by accident, and Hazlewood fell to the ground
wounded. Brown, anxious not to bring Julia Mannering into the affair, at
once sprang over the hedge and disappeared.

[Illustration: "HE was roughly dressed, and young Hazlewood, taking him
for one of the smugglers, and mistaking the meaning of Julia's cry of
surprise at seeing her lover, snatched the gun from the servant, and
haughtily ordered Brown to stand back so as not to alarm the lady."]

Hazlewood's wound was, happily, not serious, and being an honest open
young fellow, he was the first to own himself in the wrong. Nothing of
importance would have come of the affair, but for the officiousness of
Glossin, the new Laird of Ellangowan, who saw in it a way of
ingratiating himself with the two powerful families of Mannering and
Hazlewood.

Glossin began by questioning the landlady of the hotel where Brown had
been staying. Then he tried to draw out the postboy. From them he
gathered little, save the fact that a young man named Brown had been
staying at the Gordon Arms at Kippletringan. On the day of the accident
to Charles Hazlewood, Brown had taken the postboy with him to show him
the skating and curling on the pond in the neighbourhood of which the
supposed attack had taken place. Jock Jabos, the postboy, however,
denied that "the stoutest man in Scotland could take a gun frae him and
shoot him wi' it, though he was but a feckless little body, fit only for
the outside o' a saddle or the fore-end of a post-chaise. Na, nae living
man wad venture on the like o' that!"

So Glossin, in order the better to carry out his plans, pretended to

believe that Brown was the Lieutenant of the gang which had assaulted
the house of Woodbourne.

Much more to the point was the information which was waiting for Glossin
on his return to his house of Ellangowan. Mac-Guffog, the county
thief-taker, and two of his people were there. With them they had
brought a prisoner, whom they had first beguiled into drink, and then
easily handcuffed while asleep. Glossin was delighted. He was under a
great hope that this might prove to be Brown himself. Instead, he
recognised an old acquaintance--no other than Dirk Hatteraick, the
smuggler. In the interview which followed, Dirk told Glossin some facts
which made him tremble. His possession of Ellangowan was threatened. The
true heir, the young lad Harry Bertram, lost on the night of the murder
of Frank Kennedy, had not perished as had been supposed. He had been
brought up by the principal partner of the Dutch firm to which he had
been bound apprentice, sent to the East Indies under the name of
Vanbeest Brown, and he was at that very moment upon the coast of
Solway--it might be very near to Ellangowan itself.

Glossin saw his hopes wither before his eyes. If the heir should find
out his rights, then the fruits of his villany, the estate of Ellangowan
itself, must return to its true owner. The lawyer secretly gave Dirk
Hatteraick a small file with which to rid himself of his irons, and then
bade his captors confine him in the strong-room of the ancient castle.

"The stanchions are falling to pieces with rust," he whispered to Dirk,

"the distance to the ground is not twelve feet, and the snow lies thick.
After that, you must steal my boat which lies below in the cove, and
wait till I come to you in the cave of the Wood of Warroch!"

So saying, he called the thief-takers in, and made his arrangements.

Glossin could not sleep that night. Eagerly he watched the window of the
old castle. He heard the iron bars fall outward upon the rocks with a
clinking sound, and feared that all was lost. The light in the window
was obscured, and presently he saw a black object drop upon the snow.
Then the little boat put out from the harbour, the wind caught the sail,
and she bore away in the direction of Warroch Point.

On the morrow, however, he overwhelmed Mac-Guffog with the full force of

his anger for his carelessness in allowing his prisoner to escape. Then
he sent his men off in different directions, as fast as they could, to
retake Hatteraick--in all directions, that is, except the true one.

Having thus disposed of the thief-takers, he set out for Warroch Head
alone. But the marks of his feet in the snow startled him. Any officer,
coming upon that trail, would run it up like a bloodhound. So he changed
his path, descending the cliff, and making his way cautiously along the
sea-beach where the snow did not lie. He passed the great boulder which
had fallen with Frank Kennedy. It was now all overgrown with mussels and
seaweed. The mouth of the cave opened black and dismal before him.
Glossin drew breath before entering such a haunt of iniquity, and
recharged his pistols. He was, however, somewhat heartened by the
thought that Dirk Hatteraick had nothing to gain by his death. Finally
he took courage to push forward, and immediately the voice of Hatteraick
came hoarse from the back of the cave.

"Donner and hagel! Be'st du?" he growled.

"Are you in the dark?" said Glossin, soothingly.

"Dark? Der deyvel, ay!" retorted Hatteraick, "where should I get a glim?
I am near frozen also! Snow-water and hagel--I could only keep myself
warm by tramping up and down this vault and thinking on the merry rouses
we used to have here!"

Glossin made a light, and having set down the little lantern which he
carried, he gathered together some barrel-staves and driftwood. The
flame showed Hatteraick's fierce and bronzed visage as he warmed his
sinewy hands at the blaze. He sat with his face thrust forward and
actually in the smoke itself, so great had been his agony of cold. When
he was a little warmed up, Glossin gave him some cold meat and a flask
of strong spirits. Hatteraick eagerly seized upon these, exclaiming,
after a long draught, "Ah, that is good--that warms the liver!"

After the liquor and the food had put the smuggler into a somewhat
better temper, the two associates settled themselves to discuss the
project which had brought Glossin to the Cave of the Warroch Point.

Up to the present, Glossin had believed that the Vanbeest Brown who had
wounded young Hazlewood was the mate of the smuggling lugger. But now,
hearing that this Brown had been shot on the night of the Woodbourne
attack, all at once a light broke upon him. The assailant could be no
other than the rightful heir of Ellangowan, Harry Bertram.

"If he is on this coast," he meditated, half to himself, "I can have him
arrested as the leader of the attack upon Woodbourne, and also for an
assault upon Charles Hazlewood!"

"But," said Dirk Hatteraick, grimly, "he will be loose again upon you,
as soon as he can show himself to carry other colours!"

"True, friend Hatteraick," said Glossin; "still, till that is proved, I

can imprison him in the custom-house of Portanferry, where your goods
are also stowed. You and your crew can attack the custom-house, regain
your cargo, and--"

"Send the heir of Ellangowan to Jericho--or the bottom of the sea!"

cried Hatteraick, with fierce bitterness.

"Nay, I advise no violence," said Glossin, softly, looking at the

ground.

"Nein--nein," growled the smuggler; "you only leave that to me.

Sturm-wetter, I know you of old! Well, well, if I thought the trade
would not suffer, I would soon rid you of this younker--as soon, that
is, as you send me word that he is under lock and key!"

* * * * *

It so happened that at the very moment when Colonel Mannering and

Dominie Sampson had gone to Edinburgh to see after an inheritance,
Brown, or rather young Bertram (to give his real name), had succeeded in
crossing the Solway in a sailing-boat, and was safe in Cumberland.

Mannering's mission was one of kindliness to his guest, Lucy Bertram.

Her aunt, old Miss Bertram of Singleside, had formerly made Lucy her
heiress, and the Colonel hoped that she might have continued of this
excellent mind. By Mr. Mac-Morlan's advice he engaged a whimsical but
able Scottish lawyer to go with him to the opening of the will--at which
ceremony, among other connections of the deceased, Dandie Dinmont was
also present. But all were disappointed. For Miss Bertram had put her
whole property in trust on behalf of the lost heir of Ellangowan, young
Harry Bertram, whom (said the will) she had good reason for believing to
be still alive.

The object of all these plots and plans, good and evil intentions, was,
however, safe in Cumberland. And had he been content to stay where he
was, safe he would have remained. But as soon as young Bertram arrived
upon the English coast he had written to Julia Mannering to explain his
conduct in the affair with Hazlewood, to the Colonel of his regiment to
ask him for the means of establishing his identity as a Captain in one
of his Majesty's dragoon regiments, to his agent to send him a sum of
money, and in the meantime to Dandie Dinmont for a small temporary loan
till he could hear from his man-of-affairs.

So he had nothing to do but wait. However, a sharp reply from Julia

Mannering stung him to the quick. In this she first of all informed him
that the Colonel would be from home for some days, then reproached him
for the hastiness of his conduct, and concluded by saying that he was
not to think of returning to Scotland.

This last was, of course, what Bertram at once proceeded to do, as

perhaps the young lady both hoped and anticipated.

So once more the heir of Ellangowan was set ashore beneath the old
castle which had been built by his forefathers. He had worked his
passage manfully, and it was with regret that the sailors put him ashore
in the bay directly beneath the Auld Place of Ellangowan. Some
remembrance came across him, drifting fitfully over his mind, that
somehow he was familiar with these ruins. When he had entered and looked
about him, this became almost a certainty. It chanced that lawyer
Glossin had entered the castle at about the same time, coming, as he
said aloud, to see "what could be made of it as a quarry of good hewn
stone," and adding that it would be better to pull it down at any rate,
than to preserve it as a mere haunt of smugglers and evil-doers.

"And would you destroy this fine old ruin?" said Bertram, who had
overheard the last part of Glossin's remarks. The lawyer was struck
dumb, so exactly were the tone and attitude those of Harry Bertram's
father in his best days. Indeed, coming suddenly face to face with the
young man there within the ancient castle of Ellangowan, it seemed to
Glossin as if Godfrey Bertram had indeed risen from the dead to denounce
and punish his treachery.

But the lawyer soon recovered himself. The scheme he had worked out
together with Dirk Hatteraick matured in his mind, and this seemed as
good a time as any for carrying it out. So he waited only for the coming
of two of his thief-takers to lay hands on Bertram, and to send word to
the father of Charles Hazlewood that he held the would-be murderer of
his son at his disposition.

Now Sir Robert Hazlewood was a formal old dunderhead, who was of opinion
that his family, and all connected with it, were the only really
important things in the universe. Still when the prisoner was brought
before him, he was a good deal startled by Bertram's quiet assurance,
and, in spite of Glossin's sneers, could not help being influenced by
the information that Colonel Guy Mannering could speak to the fact of
his being both an officer and a gentleman. But Glossin pointed out that
Mannering was in Edinburgh, and that they could not let a possible
malefactor go merely because he said that he was known to an absent
man. It was, therefore, arranged that, pending the arrival of the
Colonel, Harry Bertram (or Captain Vanbeest Brown) should be confined in
the custom-house at Portanferry, where there was a guard of soldiers for
the purpose of guarding the goods taken from the smugglers.

Happy that his schemes were prospering so well, Glossin went off to
arrange with Dirk Hatteraick for the attack, and also as to the removal
of the soldiers, in such a way that no suspicion might fall upon that
honourable gentleman, Mr. Gilbert Glossin, Justice of the Peace and
present owner of Ellangowan.

* * * * *

Meanwhile, however, the emissaries of Meg Merrilies were not idle. They
brought her the earliest information that the heir of Ellangowan was in
the custom-house at Portanferry, and in imminent danger of his life. Far
on the hills of Liddesdale one Gibbs Faa, a gipsy huntsman, warned
Dandie Dinmont that if he wished his friend well, he had better take
horse and ride straight for Portanferry--where, if he found Brown in
confinement, he was to stay by him night and day. For if he did not, he
would only regret it once--and that would be for his whole life.

Glossin's plan was to work on the fears of the stupid pompous Sir Robert
Hazlewood, so that he would summon all the soldiers for the defence of
Hazlewood House, in the belief that it was to be assaulted by the
gipsies and smugglers. But Meg Merrilies herself sent young Charles
Hazlewood to order the soldiers back, in which mission he would have
succeeded but for the dull persistence of his father. However, Mr.
Mac-Morlan, as Sheriff-Substitute of the county, was able to do that in
spite of Sir Robert's protest which the good sense of his son had been
powerless to effect. The soldiers left Hazlewood House, and took the
direct road back to Portanferry in spite of Sir Robert's threats and
remonstrances.

Lastly Colonel Mannering, but recently returned from Edinburgh, was

warned by a missive which Dominie Sampson had brought from Meg herself.
So that on one particular night all the forces of order, as well as
those of disorder, were directing themselves toward the custom-house of
Portanferry, where in a close and ignoble apartment Harry Bertram and
his worthy friend, Dandie Dinmont, were sleeping. It was Bertram who
wakened first. There was a strong smell of burning in the room. From the
window he could see a crowded boat-load of men landing at the little
harbour, and in the yard below a huge mastiff was raging on his chain.

"Go down and let loose the dog!" the wife of Mac-Guffog called to her
husband; "I tell you they are breaking in the door of the liquor store!"

But the good man appeared to be more anxious about his prisoners. He
went from cell to cell, making sure that all was safe, while his wife,
affirming that he had not the heart of a chicken, descended herself into
the courtyard.

In the meantime, Bertram and Dandie watched from their barred window the
savage figures of the smugglers triumphantly loading their boats with
their recovered goods, while the whole custom-house flamed to the
heavens, sending sparks and blazing fragments upon the roof of the
adjoining prison.

Soon at the outer gate was heard the thunder of sledge-hammers and
crows. It was being forced by the smugglers. Mac-Guffog and his wife had
already fled, but the underlings delivered the keys, and the prisoners
were soon rejoicing in their liberty. In the confusion, four or five of
the principal actors entered the cell of Bertram.

"Der deyvil," exclaimed the leader, "here's our mark!"

Two of them accordingly seized Bertram and hurried him along. One of
them, however, whispered in his ear to make no resistance for the
present--also bidding Dinmont over his shoulder to follow his friend
quietly and help when the time came. Bertram found himself dragged along
passages, through the courtyard, and finally out into the narrow street,
where, in the crowd and confusion, the smugglers became somewhat
separated from each other. The sound of cavalry approaching rapidly made
itself heard.

"Hagel and wetter!" cried the leader, no other than Hatteraick himself,
"what is that? Keep together--look to the prisoner!"
But, for all that, the two who held Bertram were left last of the party.
The crowd began to break, rushing this way and that. Shots were fired,
and above the press the broadswords of the dragoons were seen to
glitter, flashing over the heads of the rioters.

"Now," whispered the man who had before advised Bertram to be quiet,
"shake off that fellow and follow me."

Bertram easily did so, and his left-hand captor, attempting to draw a
pistol, was instantly knocked senseless by the huge fist of Dandie
Dinmont.

"Now, follow quick!" said the first, diving at the word into a dirty and
narrow lane. There was no pursuit. Mr. Mac-Morlan and the soldiers had
appeared in the nick of time. The smugglers had enough to do to provide
for their own safety.

At the end of the lane they found a post-chaise with four horses.

"Are you here, in God's name?" cried their guide.

"Ay, troth am I," said Jock Jabos; "and I wish I were ony gate else!"

The guide opened the carriage door.

"Get in," he said to Bertram, "and remember your promise to the gipsy
wife!"

Through the windows of the coach Dinmont and he could see the village of
Portanferry, and indeed the whole landscape, brilliantly lighted by a
tall column of light. The flames had caught the stores of spirits kept
in the custom-house. But soon the carriage turned sharply through dark
woods at the top speed of the horses, and, after a long journey, finally
drew up in front of a mansion, in the windows of which lights still
burned, in spite of the lateness of the hour.

* * * * *

The listening children remained breathless as I

paused. I had meant this to be the end of my tale,
but I saw at once that no excuse would be held
valid for such a shameful dereliction of duty.

"Go on--go on," they cried; "where was the house

and what happened?"

"I know!" said Sweetheart; "it was the house of

Julia Mannering, and her lover--"

"Oh, bother her lover," cried Hugh John,

impatiently; "_we_ don't want to hear about how
they lived happy ever after. Tell us about the
gipsy, Meg Merrilies--"

"And about Dirk Hatteraick!" said Sir Toady Lion,

getting his word in. "I just love Dirk!"

"And how many people he killed wif his big knife,

 and if he was burnt up alive in the fire!" For Maid
Margaret also delights in the most gory details,
though she would not willingly tread upon a worm.

"Yes, go on, tell us all--everything that

happened!" said Sweetheart.

"But do skip the lovering parts," cried the boys in

chorus.

So within these statutes of limitation I had

perforce to recommence, without further preface,
telling the fourth and last tale from _Guy
Mannering_.

THE FOURTH TALE FROM "GUY MANNERING"

THE FIGHT IN THE CAVE

IMMEDIATELY upon receiving the message of Meg Merrilies, brought by

Dominie Sampson, Colonel Mannering had sent a carriage to the place
designated. Bertram and his companion Dandie, having by the help of the
gipsies, Meg's companions, made good their escape from the burning
custom-house, took their places in it and were whirled through the
darkness, they knew not whither. But it was at the door of the house of
Woodbourne that they found themselves. Mr. Pleydell, the lawyer, had
also arrived from Edinburgh, so that all were presently met together in
the drawing-room, and it is difficult to say which of the party appeared
the most surprised.

In Captain Brown (or Harry Bertram, to call him by his own proper name),
Colonel Mannering saw the man whom he had believed slain by his hand in
India. Julia met her lover in her father's house, and apparently there
by his invitation. Dominie Sampson stood half aghast to recognise the
lost heir of Ellangowan. Bertram himself feared the effect which his
sudden appearance might have on Julia, while honest Dandie wished his
thick-soled boots and rough-spun Liddesdale plaid anywhere else than in
a room filled with ladies and gentlemen.

Only the lawyer, Mr. Pleydell, was wholly master of the situation, and
bustled about, putting everybody at their ease. He saw himself in the
thick of a great mysterious lawsuit which he alone could unravel, and he
proceeded on the spot to cross-examine Bertram as to what he remembered
of his life before he went to Holland.

Bertram remembered, he said, quite clearly, a good-looking gentleman

whom he had called father, a delicate lady who must have been his
mother, but more distinctly than either he recalled a tall man in worn
black who had taught him his lessons and whom he loved for his kindness.

At these words Dominie Sampson could contain himself no longer. He rose

hastily from his chair, and with clasped hands and trembling limbs cried
out, "Harry Bertram--look at me! Was not I the man?"

Bertram started up as if a sudden light had dawned upon him.

"Yes," he cried, "that is my name--Bertram--Harry Bertram! And those are
the voice and figure of my kind old master!"

The Dominie threw himself into his arms, his whole frame shaking with
emotion, and at last, his feelings overcoming him, he lifted up his
voice and wept. Even Colonel Mannering had need of his handkerchief.
Pleydell made wry faces and rubbed hard at his glasses, while Dandie
Dinmont, after two strange blubbering explosions, fairly gave way and
cried out, "Deil's in the man! He's garred me do what I haena done since
my auld mither died!"

After this, the examination went on more staidly. Bertram said that he
remembered very well the walk he had taken with the Dominie and somebody
lifting him up on horseback--then, more indistinctly, a scuffle in which
he and his guide had been pulled from the saddle. Vaguely and gradually
the memory came back of how he had been lifted into the arms of a very
tall woman who protected him from harm. Again he was a poor half-starved
cabin-boy in the Holland trade. Quickly, however, gaining the good-will
of the leading partner of the firm to which the vessel belonged, he had
been thoroughly well educated in Holland, before being sent to seek his
fortune in India. He passed over his career there, but told in detail
the accidental way in which young Hazlewood had been wounded, and ended
by a request that he should now be told who the questioner might be who
took such an interest in his affairs.

"Why, for myself, sir," answered the counsellor, "I am Paulus Pleydell,
an advocate at the Scottish bar. And as for you, it is not easy for the
moment to say who you are. But I trust in a short time to hail you by
the title of Henry Bertram, Esquire, representative of one of the oldest
families in Scotland, and heir of entail to the estates of Ellangowan."

On the morrow the plotting at Woodbourne still went on merrily, around

the person of the newly found heir. The counsellor-at-law arranged his
plan of campaign. The Dominie, having left Harry Bertram at half-text
and words of two syllables when he was carried off in Warroch Wood,
prepared to take up his education at that exact point.

"Of a surety, little Harry," he said, "we will presently resume our
studies. We will begin from the foundation. Yes, I will reform your
education upward from the true knowledge of English grammar, even to
that of the Hebrew or Chaldaic tongue!"

In the meantime, Colonel Mannering, having first had an interview with

the counsellor in his room, gently drew from Julia that it was no other
than Bertram who had spoken with her under her window at Mervyn Hall;
also that, though she had remained silent, she had perfectly recognised
him before the scuffle took place with young Hazlewood at the pond. For
these concealments from her father, Mannering as gently forgave her, and
received in return a promise that, in future, she would hide nothing
from him which it concerned him to know.

The first step of the conspirators was to obtain a legal release for
Bertram from Sir Robert Hazlewood, who granted it most unwillingly,
having (it was evident) been secretly primed by Glossin as to what he
should say and do. But it was secured at last, upon Colonel Mannering's
pledging his word of honour for his appearance. And while the business
was being settled, Harry Bertram, with the two ladies, wandered out to a
knoll above the ancient castle of Ellangowan to look once again upon the
home of his ancestors.

They were standing here, looking on the crumbling walls, when suddenly,
as if emerging from the earth, Meg Merrilies ascended from the hollow
way beneath, and stood before them.

"I sought ye at the house," she said, "but ye are right and I was wrong.
It is here we should meet--here, on the very spot where my eyes last saw
your father. And now, remember your promise and follow me!"

In spite of the unwillingness of Lucy and Julia to allow him to depart

with such a companion, Bertram and Dandie (for Meg invited Dinmont also
to follow her) hastened to obey the gipsy's summons. There was something
weird in the steady swiftness of her gait as she strode right forward
across the moor, taking no heed either of obstacle or of well-trodden
path. She seemed like some strange withered enchantress drawing men
after her by her witchcrafts. But Julia and Lucy were somewhat comforted
by the thought that if the gipsy had meditated any evil against Bertram,
she would not have asked so doughty a fighter as Dandie Dinmont to
accompany him.

They therefore made the best of their way home, and while they were
telling the adventure to the Colonel, young Hazlewood, who happened to
be at Woodbourne, courageously offered to follow after, to see that no
harm came to Dandie and his former antagonist.

Meg Merrilies led them through the wood of Warroch, along the same path
by which Harry had been carried on the night of the exciseman's murder.

Turning for a moment, she asked Bertram if he remembered the way.

"Not very clearly!" he answered.

"Ay," she said, "here was the very spot where Frank Kennedy was pulled
from his horse. I was hiding behind the bour-tree bush at the moment.
Sair, sair he strove and sair he cried for mercy. But he was in the
hands of them that never kenned the word."

Continuing her way, she led them downward to the sea by a secret and
rugged path, cut in the face of the cliff, and hidden among brushwood.
There on the shore lay the stone under which the body of Frank Kennedy
had been found crushed. A little farther on was the cave itself in which
the murderers had concealed themselves. The gipsy pointed mysteriously.

"He is there," she said, in a low voice, "the man who alone can
establish your right--Jansen Hatteraick, the tyrant of your youth, and
the murderer of Frank Kennedy. Follow me--I have put the fire between
you. He will not see you as you enter, but when I utter the words, 'The
Hour and the Man'--then do you rush in and seize him. But be prepared.
It will be a hard battle, for Hatteraick is a very devil!"

"Dandie, you must stand by me now!" said Bertram to his comrade.

"That ye need never doubt," returned the Borderer; "but a' the same it's
an awesome thing to leave the blessed sun and free air, and gang and be
killed like a fox in his hole. But I'll never baulk ye--it'll be a
hard-bitten terrier that will worry Dandie!"

So forward they went, creeping cautiously on all fours after the gipsy
woman. When they were about halfway in, a hand was laid on Dandie
Dinmont's heel, and it was all the stout farmer could do to keep from
crying out--which, in the defenceless position in which they were
placed, might well have cost them all their lives.

However, Dandie freed his ankle with a kick, and instantly a voice
behind him whispered, "It is a friend--Charles Hazlewood!"

As soon as they had gained the higher part of the cave, Meg Merrilies
began rustling about among the dried branches, murmuring and singing, to
cover the noise made by the entrance of the three men who followed her.
From the deep dark where they stood, they could see Dirk Hatteraick at
the farther end of the cave, behind a fire which he was continually
building up by throwing into it bits of dried sticks. Hatteraick was of
powerful build, and his features were beyond description savage and
rugged. A cutlass hung by his side, and into his belt he had thrust,
ready to his hand at a moment's notice, two pairs of pistols. Truly the
capture of Dirk Hatteraick was no light adventure, and Bertram, having
been warned by Dandie in a cautious whisper of Hazlewood's arrival,
thought within himself that they would be none the worse of the third
who had come so opportunely to their assistance.

"Here, beldam--deyvil's kind," cried Hatteraick in his harshest voice,

"have you brought me the brandy and news of my people?"

"Here is the flask for you," answered Meg, passing it to him; "but as
for your crew, they are all cut down and scattered by the redcoats!"

"Storm and wetter, ye hag," he cried, "ye bring ill news. This coast is
fatal to me! And what of Glossin?"

"Ye missed your stroke there," she said; "ye have nothing to expect from
him!"

"Hagel," cried the ruffian, "if only I had him by the throat! He has led
me to perdition--men lost, boat lost, credit lost. I dare never show my
face in Flushing again!"

"_You will never need!_" croaked the gipsy.

Meg's sombre prophecy startled Hatteraick. He looked up suddenly.

"What is that you say, witch? And what are you doing there?" he cried.
Meg dropped a firebrand steeped in spirit upon some loose flax.
Instantly a tall column of brilliant wavering light filled the cave.

"Ye will never need to go to Flushing," she said, "because 'The Hour's
come and the Man!'"

At the signal, Bertram and Dandie Dinmont, springing over the brushwood,
rushed upon Hatteraick. Hazlewood, not knowing the plan of assault, was
a moment later. The ruffian instantly understood that he had been
betrayed, and the first brunt of his anger fell upon Meg Merrilies, at
whose breast he fired a pistol point-blank. She fell with a shriek which
was partly the sudden pain of the wound, and partly a shout of
triumphant laughter.

"I kenned it would end that way--and it is e'en this way that it should
end!"
Bertram had caught his foot on some slippery weed as he advanced, and
the chance stumble saved his life. For otherwise Hatteraick's second
bullet, aimed coolly and steadily, would certainly have crashed through
his skull. Before he could draw a third, Dandie Dinmont was upon him.
Yet such was the giant smuggler's strength and desperation, that he
actually dragged Dandie through the burning flax, before Bertram and
Hazlewood could come to the farmer's assistance. Then in a moment more
Hatteraick was disarmed and bound, though to master him took all the
strength of three strong well-grown men.

After he had been once bound securely, Hatteraick made no further

attempt to escape. He lay perfectly still while Bertram, leaving Dandie
to guard his prisoner, went to look to Meg Merrilies. The soldier,
familiar with gunshot wounds, knew at once that her case was hopeless.

But he did what he could to bind up the old gipsy's wound, while
Dandie, his hand laid heavily on Hatteraick's breast, watched pistol in
hand the entrance of the cave. Hazlewood, whose horse had been tied
outside, mounted to ride for assistance, and in a few moments silence
fell on the scene of so fierce a combat, broken only by the low moans of
the wounded gipsy.

It was no more than three-quarters of an hour that Bertram and Dandie

Dinmont had to keep their watch. But to them it seemed as if ages had
passed before Hazlewood returned and they were clear of the fatal
cavern. Hatteraick allowed himself to be removed without either
assisting or hindering those who had charge of him. But when his captors
would have had him rest against the huge boulder which had been thrown
down along with the murdered exciseman, Hatteraick shrank back with a
shout:

"Hagel--not there," he cried, "you would not have me sit _there!_"

On the arrival of a doctor, he could only confirm Bertram's opinion that

Meg Merrilies was indeed wounded to the death. But she had enough
strength left to call the assembled people to witness that Bertram was
indeed young Harry Bertram the lost heir of Ellangowan.

"All who have ever seen his father or grandfather, bear witness if he is
not their living image!" she cried.

Then with her failing breath she told the tale of the murder, and how
she had pleaded for the child's life. She dared Dirk Hatteraick to deny
the truth of what she was saying. But the villain only kept his grim
silence. Then suddenly the enthusiasm broke forth at the chance
testimony of the driver of a return coach to Kippletringan, who
exclaimed at sight of Bertram, "As sure as there's breath in man,
there's auld Ellangowan risen from the dead!" The shouts of the people,
many of whom had lived all their lives on his father's land, came
gratefully to the ear of the dying woman.

"Dinna ye hear?" she cried, "dinna ye hear? He's owned--he's owned! I am

a sinfu' woman! It was my curse that brought the ill, but it has been my
blessing that has ta'en it off! Stand oot o' the light that I may see
him yince mair. But no--it may not be! The darkness is in my ain e'en.
It's a' ended now:

"Pass breath,
 Come death!"

And sinking back on her bed of straw, Meg Merrilies died without a
groan.

* * * * *

Mr. Pleydell having, as Sheriff of the county, formerly conducted the

inquiry into Frank Kennedy's death, was asked by the other magistrates
to preside at this. The meeting was held in the court-house of
Kippletringan, and many of the chief people in the neighbourhood
hastened to the little town to be present at the examination of
Hatteraick. Pleydell, among the evidence formerly collected, had by him
the sizes and markings of the footmarks found round the place of Frank
Kennedy's death-struggle. These had, of course, been safely preserved,
ever since the failure of justice on that occasion. One set evidently
belonged to a long and heavy foot, and fitted the boots of Brown, the
mate of Hatteraick's vessel, the same who had been killed at the attack
on Woodbourne. The stouter and thicker moulds fitted those of the
prisoner himself.

At this Hatteraick cried out suddenly, "Der deyvil, how could there be
footmarks at all on the ground when it was as hard as the heart of a
Memel log?"

Instantly Pleydell noted the smuggler's slip.

"In the evening," he said, "I grant you the ground was hard--not,
however, in the morning. But, Captain Hatteraick, will you kindly tell
me where you were on the day which you remember so exactly?"

Hatteraick, seeing his mistake, again relapsed into silence, and at that
moment Glossin bustled in to take his place on the bench with his
brother magistrates. He was, however, very coldly received indeed,
though he did his best to curry favour with each in succession. Even
Hatteraick only scowled at him, when he suggested that "the poor man,
being only up for examination, need not be so heavily ironed."

"The poor man has escaped once before," said Mr. Mac-Morlan, drily. But
something worse was in store for Glossin than the cold shoulder from his
fellow-justices. In his search through the documents found upon
Hatteraick, Pleydell had come upon three slips of paper, being bills
which had been drawn and signed by Hatteraick on the very day of the
Kennedy murder, ordering large sums of money to be paid to Glossin. The
bills had been duly honoured. Mr. Pleydell turned at once upon Glossin.

"That confirms the story which has been told by a second eye-witness of
the murder, one Gabriel, or Gibbs Faa, a nephew of Meg Merrilies, that
you were an accessory after the fact, in so far as, though you did not
take part in the slaughter of Kennedy, you concealed the guilty persons
on account of their giving you this sum of money."

In a few minutes Glossin found himself deserted by all, and he was even
ordered to be confined in the prison of Kippletringan, in a room
immediately underneath the cell occupied by Hatteraick. The smuggler,
being under the accusation of murder and having once already escaped,
was put for safety in the dungeon, called the "condemned cell," and
there chained to a great bar of iron, upon which a thick ring ran from
one side of the room to the other.
Left to his unpleasant reflections, Glossin began to count up the
chances in his favour. Meg Merrilies was dead. Gabriel Faa, besides
being a gipsy, was a vagrant and a deserter. The other witnesses--he did
not greatly fear them! If only Dirk Hatteraick could be induced to be
steady, and to put another meaning upon the sums of money which had
been paid to him on the day of Kennedy's murder!

He must see Hatteraick--that very night he must see him! He slipped two
guineas into Mac-Guffog's hand (who since the burning of Portanferry
prison had been made under-turnkey at Kippletringan), and by the
thief-taker's connivance he was to be admitted that very night at
locking-up time into the cell of Dirk Hatteraick.

"But you will have to remain there all night," said the man. "I have to
take the keys of all the cells directly to the captain of the prison!"

So on his stocking-soles Glossin stole up after his guide, and was

presently locked in with the savage and desperate smuggler. At first
Hatteraick would neither speak to Glossin nor listen to a word
concerning his plans.

"Plans," he cried at last, in a burst of fury, "you and your plans! You
have planned me out of ship, cargo, and life. I dreamed this moment that
Meg Merrilies dragged you here by the hair, and put her long clasp-knife
into my hand. Ah, you don't know what she said! Sturm-wetter, it will be
your wisdom not to tempt me!"

"Why, Hatteraick," said Glossin, "have you turned driveller? Rise and
speak with me!"

"Hagel, nein--let me alone!"

"Get up, at least! Up with you for an obstinate Dutch brute!" said
Glossin, all at once losing his temper and kicking him with his heavy
boot.

"Donner and blitzen," cried Hatteraick, leaping up and grappling with

him, "you shall have it then!"

Glossin resisted as best he could, but his utmost strength was as

nothing in the mighty grasp of the angry savage. He fell under
Hatteraick, the back of his neck coming with a fearful crash upon the
iron bar.

In the morning, true to his promise, Mac-Guffog called Glossin to come

out of Hatteraick's cell.

"Call louder!" answered a voice from within, grimly.

"Mr. Glossin, come away," repeated Mac-Guffog; "for Heaven's sake come
away!"

"He'll hardly do that without help!" said Hatteraick.

"What are you standing chattering there for, Mac-Guffog?" cried the
captain of the prison, coming up with a lantern. They found Glossin's
body doubled across the iron bar. He was stone dead. Hatteraick's grip
had choked the life out of him as he lay.
The murderer, having thus done justice on his accomplice, asked neither
favour nor mercy for himself, save only that he might have paper whereon
to write to his firm in Holland.

"I was always faithful to owners," he said, when they reproached him
with his crimes. "I always accounted for cargo to the last stiver! As
for that carrion," he added (pointing to Glossin), "I have only sent him
to the devil a little ahead of me!"

They gave him what he asked for--pens, ink, and paper. And on their
return, in a couple of hours, they found his body dangling from the
wall. The smuggler had hanged himself by a cord taken from his own
truckle-bed.

And though Mac-Guffog lost his place, on the suspicion of having

introduced Glossin into Hatteraick's cell, there were many who believed
that it was the Evil One himself who had brought the rogue and the
ruffian together in order that they might save the hangman the trouble
of doing his office upon them.

* * * * *

The end can be told in a word. Harry Bertram was duly and legally
returned as heir of Ellangowan. His father's debts were soon paid, and
the Colonel, in giving him his daughter, gave him also the means of
rebuilding the ancient castle of the Ellangowan race. Sir Robert
Hazlewood had no objections to Lucy Bertram as a daughter-in-law, so
soon as he knew that she brought with her as a dowry the whole estate of
Singleside, which her brother insisted on her taking in accordance with
her aunt's first intention. And lastly, in the new castle, there was one
chamber bigger than all the others, called the Library, and just off it
a little one, in which dwelt the happiest of men upon the earth. This
chamber was called on the plans "Mr. Sampson's Apartment."

* * * * *

THE END OF THE FOURTH AND LAST TALE FROM "GUY MANNERING."

* * * * *

INTERLUDE OF CONSULTATION

A unanimous sigh greeted the close of _Guy

Mannering_. It was the narrator's reward--the same
which the orator hears, when, in a pause of speech,
the strained attention relaxes, and the people,
slowly bent forward like a field of corn across
which the wind blows, settle back into their
places.

"A jolly ending--and the cave part was ripping!"

summed up Hugh John, nodding his head in grave
approval of Sir Walter, "but why can't he always
write like that?"

"Couldn't keep it up," suggested Sir Toady Lion;

"books can't all be caves, you know."
"Well, anyhow, I'm not going to play any more
heroes," said Hugh John, emphatically. "I bags
Hatteraick--when we get out to the Den!"

The young man intimated by these cabalistic words

that the part of Hatteraick was to be his in any
future play-acting.

"Which being interpreted," said Sweetheart, with

spirit, "means that I am to be Gilbert Faa the
gipsy, and Glossin, and all these nasty sort of
people. Now I don't mind Meg Merrilies a bit. And
being shot like that--that's always something. But
I warn you, Hugh John, that if you were Hatteraick
ten times over, you couldn't get me down over that
iron bar!"

"No, that you couldn't," said Sir Toady Lion,

seeing a far-off chance for himself; "why,
Sweetheart could just batter your head against the
wall! And then when Mac-Guffog came in the morning
with his lantern, he'd find that old Hatteraick
hadn't any need to go and hang himself! But don't
you two squabble over it; _I_ will do Hatteraick
myself!"

"A very likely thing!" sneered Hugh John. "You

heard me say 'Bags Hatteraick,' Toady Lion! Every
one heard me--you can't go back on that. You know
you can't!"

This was unanswerable. It was felt that to palter

with such sacred formulas would be to renounce the
most sacred obligations and to unsettle the very
foundations of society.

Whereupon I hastened to keep his Majesty's peace by

proposing a compromise.

"The girls surely don't want to play the villains'

parts," I began.

"Oh, but just don't they!" ejaculated Maid

Margaret, with the eyes of a child-saint
momentarily disappointed of Paradise. "Why does a
cat not eat butter for breakfast every morning?
Because it jolly well can't get it."

"Well, at any rate," said I, severely, "girls

oughtn't to _want_ to play the villains' parts."

"No," said Sweetheart, with still, concentrated

irony, "they ought always to do just what boys tell
them to, of course--never think of wanting anything
that boys want, and always be thankful for boys'
leavings! U-m-m! _I_ know!"

"You should wait till you hear what I meant to say,

Sweetheart," I went on, with as much dignity as I
 could muster. "There are plenty of characters you
will like to be, in every one of the books, but I
think it would be fair always to draw lots for the
first choice!"

"Yes--yes--oh, yes!" came the chorus, from three of

the party. But Hugh John, strong in the
indefeasible rights of man, only repeated, "_I_
said 'Bags Hatteraick!'"

"Well, then," I said, "for this time Hatteraick is

yours, but for the future it will be fairer to draw
lots for first choice."

"All right," growled Hugh John; "then I suppose

I'll have to put up with a lot more heroes!
Milksops, I call them!"

"Which book shall we have next?" said Sweetheart,

who was beginning to be rather ashamed of her heat.
"I don't believe that you could tell us _Rob Roy!_"

"Well, I can try," said I, modestly. For so it

behooves a modern parent to behave in the presence
of his children.

"_She_," said Hugh John, pointing directly at his

sister, "she read nearly half the book aloud, and
we never came to Rob at all. That's why she asks
for _Rob Roy_."

"But there's all about Alan Breck in the

preface--ripping, it is!" interpolated Sir Toady,
who had been doing some original research, "tell us
about him."

But Alan Breck was quite another story, and I said

so at once. _Rob Roy_ they had asked for. _Rob Roy_
they should have. And then I would stand or fall by
their judgment.

RED CAP TALES

TOLD FROM

ROB ROY

THE FIRST TALE FROM "ROB ROY"

FRANK THE HIGHWAYMAN

FRANK OSBALDISTONE had come back from France to quarrel with his father.
A merchant he would not be. He hated the three-legged stool, and he used
the counting-house quills to write verses with.

His four years in Bordeaux had spoiled him for strict business, without
teaching him anything else practical enough to please his father, who,
when he found that his son persisted in declining the stool in the dark
counting-room in Crane Alley, packed him off to the care of his brother,
Sir Hildebrand Osbaldistone of Osbaldistone Hall in Northumberland,
there to repent of his disobedience.

"I will have no idlers about me," he said, "I will not ask even my own
son twice to be my friend and my partner. One of my nephews shall take
the place in the firm which you have declined."

And old Mr. Osbaldistone, of the firm of Osbaldistone and Tresham,

merchants in London town, being above all things a man of his word,
Master Frank took to the North Road accordingly, an exile from his home
and disinherited of his patrimony.

At first he was gloomy enough. He was leaving behind him wealth, ease,
society. As he looked back from the heights of Highgate, the bells of
the city steeples rang out their "Turn again, Whittington!" And to tell
the truth, Frank Osbaldistone felt half inclined to obey. But the
thought of his father's grave scorn held him to his purpose, and soon
the delights of travel and the quickly changing scene chased the sadness
from his heart. Indeed, as was natural to a young man, a good horse
under his thigh and fifty guineas in his pocket helped amazingly to put
him in the best humour with himself.

The company Frank met with on the North Road was commonplace and dull.
But one poor man, a sort of army officer in a gold-laced hat, whose
martial courage was more than doubtful, amused Frank Osbaldistone by
clinging desperately to a small but apparently very heavy portmanteau,
which he carried on the pillion before him, never parting from it for a
moment. This man's talk was all of well-dressed highwaymen, whose
conversation and manners induced the unwary to join company with them.
Then in some shady dell whistling up their men, the unlucky traveller
found himself despoiled--of his goods certainly, perhaps also of his
life.

It delighted Frank's boyish humour beyond measure to play upon the fears
of this gallant King's officer--which he proceeded to do by asking him
first whether his bag were heavy or not, then by hinting that he would
like to be informed as to his route, and finally by offering to take the
bag on his own pillion and race him with the added weight to the nearest
village.

This last audacious proposal almost took the man's breath away, and from
that moment he was convinced that Frank was none other than the "Golden
Farmer" himself in disguise.

At Darlington, the landlord of their inn introduced a Scotch cattle

dealer, a certain Mr. Campbell, to share their meal. He was a
stern-faced, dark-complexioned man, with a martial countenance and an
air of instinctive command which took possession of the company at once.
The lawyer, the doctor, the clergyman, even Frank himself, found
themselves listening with deference to the words of this plainly
dressed, unobtrusive, Scottish drover. As for the man with the weighty
bag, he fairly hung upon his words. And especially so when the landlord
informed the company that Mr. Campbell had with his own hand beaten off
seven highwaymen.

"Thou art deceived, friend Jonathan," said the Scot, "they were but two,
and as beggarly loons as man could wish to meet withal!"

"Upon my word, sir," cried Morris, for that was the name of the man with
the portmanteau, edging himself nearer to Mr. Campbell, "really and
actually did you beat two highwaymen with your own hand?"

"In troth I did, sir," said Campbell, "and I think it nae great thing to
mak' a sang about."

"Upon my word, sir," said Morris, eagerly, "I go northward, sir--I

should be happy to have the pleasure of your company on my journey."

And, in spite of short answers, he continued to press his proposal upon

the unwilling Scot, till Campbell had very unceremoniously to extricate
himself from his grip, telling him that he was travelling upon his own
private business, and that he could not unite himself to any stranger on
the public highway.

The next day Frank approached Osbaldistone Hall, which stood under the
great rounded range of the Cheviot Hills. He could already see it
standing, stark and grey, among its ancestral oaks, when down the ravine
streamed a band of huntsmen in full chase, the fox going wearily before,
evidently near the end of his tether. Among the rout and nearer to Frank
than the others, owing to some roughness of the ground, rode a young
lady in a man's coat and hat--which, with her vest and skirt, made the
first riding-habit Frank had ever seen.

The girl's cheeks were bright with the exercise. Her singular beauty was
the more remarkable, chanced upon in so savage a scene. And when, after
hearing the "Whoop--dead!" which told of poor Reynard's decease, she
paused to tie up her loosened locks, Master Frank stared most
undisguisedly and even impolitely.

One of the young huntsmen, clad in red and green, rode towards her,
waving the brush in his hand as if in triumph over the girl.

"I see," she replied, "I see. But make no noise about it. If Phoebe
here (patting the neck of her mare) had not got among the cliffs, _you_
would have had little cause for boasting."

Then the two of them looked at Frank and spoke together in a low tone.
The young man seemed sheepishly to decline some proposal which the girl
made to him.

"Then if you won't, Thornie," she said at last, "I must."

And turning to Frank she asked him if he had seen anything of a friend
of theirs, one Mr. Francis Osbaldistone, who for some days past had been
expected at the Hall.

Frank instantly and gladly claimed kindred.

"Then," said the girl, smiling, "as this young man's politeness seems to
have fallen asleep, I must e'en be master of the ceremonies, however
improper it may be. So I beg to present to you young Squire Thorncliff
Osbaldistone, your cousin, and Die Vernon, your accomplished cousin's
poor kinswoman."

The "accomplished cousin" finally decided to shake hands with mingled

awkwardness and an assumption of sulky indifference. This being done, he
immediately announced his intention of going to help the huntsmen couple
up the hounds, and so he took himself off.

"There he goes," said the young lady, following him with disdainful
eyes, "the prince of grooms and cock-fighters and blackguard
horse-racers. But truly there is not one of them to mend another!"

She turned sharply upon Frank.

"Have you read Markham?" she demanded.

Poor Frank had never even heard of that author. The girl held up her
hands in horror.

"Never to have heard of Markham--the Koran of this savage tribe--the

most celebrated author on farriery!" she cried. "Then I fear you are
equally a stranger to the more modern names of Gibson and Bartlett?"

"I am, indeed, Miss Vernon," answered Frank, meekly.

"And do you not blush to own it?" she cried. "Why, we will disown the
alliance. Then I suppose you can neither give a ball, nor a mash, nor a
horn?"

"I confess," said Frank, "I trust all these matters to my groom."

"Incredible carelessness!" she continued. "What was your father thinking

of? And you cannot shoe a horse, or cut his mane and tail. Or worm a
dog, or crop his ears, or cut his dew-claws; or reclaim a hawk or give
him casting-stones, or direct his diet when he is sealed! Or--"

Frank could only once for all profess his utter ignorance of all such
accomplishments.

"Then in the name of Heaven, Mr. Frank Osbaldistone, what _can_ you
do?"

"Very little to the purpose, I am afraid, Miss Vernon," answered Frank;

"only this--when my groom has dressed my horse I can ride him, and when
my hawk is in the field, I can fly him."

"Can you do this?" said Die Vernon, setting her horse to a rude gate
composed of pieces of wood from the forest, and clearing it at a bound.
In a moment Frank was at her side.

"There are hopes for you yet," she said. "I was afraid that you were a
very degenerate Osbaldistone. But what brings you to Cub Hall? I suppose
you could have stayed away if you had liked?"

"The Cubs of the Hall may be as you describe them," said Frank, looking
at his companion, "but I am convinced there is one exception that will
make amends for all their deficiencies."
"Oh, you mean Rashleigh!" said Die Vernon.

"Indeed, I do not," said Frank, who had not been four years in France
for nothing, "I never even heard of Rashleigh. I mean some one very much
nearer me."

"I suppose I should pretend not to understand you," she answered, "but
that is not my way. If I were not in the saddle, I would make you a
courtesy. But seriously, I deserve your exception, for besides Rashleigh
and the old priest, I am the only conversable being about Osbaldistone
Hall."

"And who, for Heaven's sake, is Rashleigh?"

"Your youngest cousin, about your own age, but not so--so well-looking.
Full of natural sense--learned, as being bred to the church, but in no
hurry to take orders--and in addition by all odds the cleverest man in a
country where such are scarce."

They rode back to the Hall, but as it was some time before Frank could
get any one to attend to his own horse and Diana's mare, which she had
left in his charge, he had time to look about him and take in the old
castle and its rough, wasteful prodigality of service. By and by,
however, there arrived Sir Hildebrand, who, among his sons, seemed, by
comparison at least, both intelligent and a gentleman. He gave Frank a
rough but hearty welcome to his mansion.

"Art welcome, lad!" he said. "I would have seen thee before but had to
attend to the kennelling of the hounds. So thy father has thought on the
old Hall and old Sir Hildebrand at last! Well, better late than never!
Here are thy cousins--Percie, Thornie, John, Dick, and Wilfred. But
where's Rashleigh? Ay, here's Rashleigh! Take thy long body aside,
Thornie, and let's see thy brother a bit. And here's my little Die, my
sister's daughter, the prettiest girl on our dales, be the next who she
may. And so now let's to the sirloin!"

The five elder brethren of Osbaldistone Hall were all cast in one
mould--tall, well-formed, athletic men, but dull of feature and
expression, and seemingly without any intellect whatever. Rashleigh, the
youngest, was the exact opposite of his brethren. Short in stature,
thick-set, and with a curious halt in his gait, there was something
about his dark irregular features--something evil, relentless, and
cruel, which even the assumed gentleness of his words and the melody of
his voice could not hide. His brothers were mere oafs in learning, none
of whom ever looked at printed paper save to make a fly-book of it. But
Rashleigh was learned, and, when he pleased, of manners exquisitely
refined.

It was, however, Miss Diana who really introduced Frank to his cousins,
and the ceremony took place that day at dinner, while the young men were
devoting themselves heartily to the meat which they piled up on their
platters. The clatter of knives and forks covered her voice.

"Your cousins," she said, "taken all together, form a happy compound of
the sot, the gamekeeper, the bully, the horse-jockey, and the fool. But
as no two leaves off the same tree are quite exactly alike, so these
ingredients are differently mingled in your kinsmen. Percie, the son and
heir, has more of the sot than of the gamekeeper, bully, horse-jockey,
or fool. My precious Thornie is more of the bully--John, who sleeps
whole weeks among the hills, has most of the gamekeeper. The jockey is
powerful with Dickon, who rides two hundred miles by day and night, to
be bought and sold himself at a race-meeting. And the fool so
predominates over Wilfred's other characteristics that he may be termed
a fool positive."

Though Frank pressed her, Die Vernon refused to add Sir Hildebrand to
her gallery of family portraits.

"I owe him some kindnesses," she said, "or what at least were meant for
such. And besides, I like him. You will be able to draw his picture
yourself when you know him better."

Having once before been successful with a compliment, when talking to

his beautiful companion, Frank now summoned his French breeding and
tried a second. He had been silent for a minute, and Miss Vernon,
turning her dark eyes on him, had said with her usual careless
frankness, "You are thinking of me!"

"How is it possible," answered Master Frank, "that I should think of

anything else, seated where I have the happiness to be."

But Diana only smiled with a kind of haughty scorn, and replied, "I must
tell you at once, Mr. Osbaldistone, that your pretty sayings are wholly
lost on me. Keep them for the other maids whom you will meet here in the
north. There are plenty who will thank you for them. As for me, I happen
to know their value. Come, be sensible! Why, because she is dressed in
silk and gauze, should you think that you are compelled to unload your
stale compliments on every unfortunate girl? Try to forget my sex. Call
me Tom Vernon. Speak to me as to a friend and companion, and you have no
idea how much I shall like you."

Frank's expression of amazement at these words egged on Diana to

further feats of daring.

"But do not misjudge me," she said, "as I see you are likely to do. You
are inclined to think me a strange bold girl, half coquette, half romp,
desirous, perhaps, of storming you into admiration. You never were more
mistaken. I would show as much favour to your father, as readily make
_him_ my confidant, if he were here--and if I thought he were capable of
understanding me. The truth is, I must speak of these things to some one
or die."

Frank changed the subject. "Will you not add Rashleigh to the family
gallery?" he said.

"No, no," she said hastily, "it is never safe to speak of Rashleigh--no,
not even when, as you now think, he has left the table. Do not be too
sure even of that--and when you speak of Rashleigh Osbaldistone, get up
to the top of Otterscope Hill, stand on the very peak, and speak in
whispers. And, after all, do not be too sure that a bird of the air may
not carry the matter. Rashleigh was my tutor for four years. We are
mutually tired of each other, and we shall heartily rejoice to be
separated!"

Nevertheless Rashleigh it was who had been selected in full family

conclave to take Frank's empty stool in the counting-house of
Osbaldistone, Tresham and Company in Crane Alley. Indeed, there was no
choice. His brothers were incapable even of the multiplication table.
Besides, they wished him away, with the feelings of mice who hear that
the family cat is going off to fill another situation. Even his father,
who stood no little in awe of his clever son, breathed more freely at
the thought of Osbaldistone Hall without Rashleigh.

It was not long before Mr. Frank Osbaldistone had a taste of his cousin
Rashleigh's quality. The very next morning his uncle and cousins looked
at him curiously when he came down early. Sir Hildebrand even quoted a
rhyme for his benefit,

"He that gallops his horse on Blackstone Edge,

May chance to catch a fall."

It was a fox-hunting morning, and during a long run Frank sustained his
character as a good and daring rider, to the admiration of Diana and Sir
Hildebrand, and to the secret disappointment of his other kind
kinsfolk, who had prophesied that he would certainly "be off at the
first burst," chiefly for the reason that he had a queer, outlandish
binding round his hat.

It was plain that Diana wanted to speak with him apart, but the close
attendance of Cousin Thornie for some time made this impossible. That
loutish youth's persistence finally fretted the girl, and having been
accustomed all her life to ride the straightest way to her desire, she
bade him be off to see that the earths above Woolverton Mill were duly
stopped.

After some objections Thornie was got safely out of the road, and Diana
led the way to a little hill whence there was a fine view in every
direction. She pointed, as Frank thought, somewhat significantly to the
north.

"Yonder whitish speck is Hawkesmore Crag in Scotland," she said, "the

distance is hardly eighteen miles, as the crow flies. Your horse will
carry you there in two hours--and I will lend you my mare if you think
her less blown."

"But," said Frank, quite mystified, "I have so little wish to be in

Scotland, that if my horse's head were in Scotland, I would not give his
tail the trouble of following. What should I do in Scotland, Miss
Vernon?"

"Why, provide for your safety--do you understand me now, Mr. Frank?"

"Less than ever, Miss Vernon," he answered. "I have not the most distant
conception of what you mean."

"Why, then," said Diana, "to be plain, there is an information lodged

with our nearest Justice of the Peace, Squire Inglewood, that you were
concerned in a robbery of government papers and money sent to pay the
troops in Scotland. A man with whom you travelled, and whom you
certainly frightened, has lodged such a complaint against you. His name
is Morris."

"Morris has been robbed?"

"Ay," said Diana, "and he swears you are the man who robbed him."
"Then Sir Hildebrand believes it?" cried Frank.

"He does," answered Diana, "and to tell the truth, so did I until this
moment."

"Upon my word, I am obliged to you and my uncle for your opinion of me."

"Oh, it is nothing to be ashamed of," she said, smiling, "no mere

highway robbery. The man was a government messenger. We are all
Jacobites about here, and no man would have thought the worse of you for
bidding him stand and deliver. Why, my uncle had a message from Squire
Inglewood himself, that he had better provide for your safety by
smuggling you over the border into Scotland."

"Tell me," said Frank, somewhat impatiently, "where does this Squire
Inglewood live? I will go and answer the charge instantly and in
person."

"Well said--I will go with you," said Diana, promptly, "it was never the
Vernon way to desert a friend in time of need."

Frank tried to dissuade her from this, but he could not combat the
girl's resolution. So they set off together for Inglewood Hall. As they
entered the courtyard, they met Rashleigh just coming out.

Miss Vernon instantly challenged him, before he got time to make up a

story.

"Rashleigh," she said, "you have heard of Mr. Frank's affair, and you
have been over to the Justice talking about it."

But Rashleigh was equally ready.

"Certainly," he answered, "I have been endeavouring to render my cousin

what service I could. But at the same time I am sorry to meet him here."

"As a friend and kinsman, Mr. Osbaldistone," said Frank, "you should
have been sorry to meet me anywhere else but where my character is at
stake, and where it is my intention to clear it."

However, it was evidently not Miss Vernon's purpose to quarrel with

Rashleigh at that time. She led him apart, and began talking to him--at
first quietly, then with obvious anger. From her manner she was charging
him with knowing who had really committed the robbery, and pressing upon
him in some way to make plain his cousin's innocence. He resisted long,
but at length gave way.

"Very well, then," he said, "you are a tyrant, Diana. Still, it shall be
as you desire. But you know that you ought not to be here. You must
return with me at once!"

"I will do no such thing," said the girl; "not a foot will I go back
till such time as I see Frank well out of the hands of the Philistines.
He has been bidding me to go back all the time, himself. But I know
better. Also, I know you, my cousin Rashleigh, and my being here will
give you a stronger motive to be speedy in performing your promise."

Rashleigh departed in great anger at her obstinacy, and Frank and Die
together sought the den of the Justice, to which they were guided by a
high voice chanting the fag-end of an old bottle-song:

"Oh, in Skipton-in-Craven
Is never a haven
But many a day foul weather,
And he that would say
A pretty girl nay
I wish for his cravat a tether."

"Hey day," said Die Vernon, "the genial Justice must have dined
already--I did not think it had been so late."

As Diana had supposed, the Justice had dined. But though both his clerk
Jobson and Frank's accuser Morris were with him, he showed himself as
pleased to see Diana as he was evidently disinclined for all further
legal business.

"Ah, ha, Die Vernon," he cried, starting up with great alacrity, "the
heath-bell of Cheviot and the blossom of the border, come to see how the
old bachelor keeps house? Art welcome, girl, as the flowers in May!"

Miss Vernon told him that on this occasion she could not stay. She had
had a long ride that morning, and she must return at once. But if he
were a good kind Justice, he would immediately despatch young Frank's
business and let them go.

This the "good Justice" was very willing to do, but Clerk Jobson, alert
in his office, pressed that the law should have its course, while Frank
himself demanded no better than that the mystery should be cleared up
once and for all.

Whereupon the man who had been robbed repeated his statement. He had, it
seemed, been first of all terrified by Frank's antics. And then on the
open moor, when he had found himself stopped, and relieved of his
portmanteau by two masked men, he had distinctly heard the name
"Osbaldistone" applied by one of his assailants in speaking to the
other. He furthermore certified that all the Osbaldistones had been
Papists and Jacobites from the time of William the Conquerer. From which
it was clear that Frank was the guilty man!

Frank replied that it was true that, like a foolish, gamesome youth, he
had certainly practised somewhat on the fears of the man Morris, but
that he had never seen him since he parted from him at Darlington, and
that, far from being a Papist and a Jacobite, he could easily prove that
he had been brought up in the strictest school of Presbyterianism and in
full obedience to the government of King George.

Clerk Jobson, however, was sharp enough to turn Frank's admissions

against him, and said that since he had voluntarily assumed the
behaviour of a robber or malefactor, he had by that very act brought
himself within the penalties of the law.

But at this moment a letter was handed to the Clerk, which informed him
that a certain old Gaffer Rutledge was at the point of death, and that
he, Clerk Jobson, must go immediately to his house in order to settle
all his worldly affairs.

The clerk, after offering to make out the warrant of commitment before
setting out, at last, and with great reluctance, rode away. Then the
Justice, who evidently still fully believed in Frank's guilt, counselled
him as a friend to let bygones be bygones, and to give Mr. Morris back
his portmanteau. Frank had hardly time to be indignant at this when a
servant announced--"A stranger to wait upon the Justice!"

"A stranger!" echoed the Justice, in very bad temper; "not upon
business, or I'll--" But his protestation was cut short by the entrance
of the stranger himself, and by the stern deep voice of Mr. Campbell,
who immediately produced his usual effect upon Squire Inglewood.

"My business is peculiar," said the Scot, "and I ask your Honour to give
it your most instant consideration."

Then Mr. Campbell turned on Morris such a look of ferocity that it made
that valiant gentleman shake visibly from head to foot.

"I believe you cannot have forgotten what passed between us at our last
meeting," he said, "and you can bear me witness to the Justice that I am
a man of fortune and honour. You will be some time resident in my
vicinity, and you know it will be in my power to do as much for you.
Speak out, man, and do not sit there chattering your jaws like a pair of
castanets."

At last an answer was extracted from the trembling Mr. Morris, but with
as much difficulty as if it had been a tooth.

"Sir--sir--," he stammered, "yes--I do believe you to be a man of

fortune and of honour--I do believe it!"

"Then," said Campbell, "you will bear me witness that I was in your
company when the valise was stolen, but did not think fit to interfere,
the affair being none of mine. Further you will tell the Justice that no
man is better qualified than I to bear testimony in this case."

"No man better qualified, certainly," assented Morris, with a heavy

sigh. In order to prove his character, Mr. Campbell put into the hands
of Justice Inglewood a certificate given under the seal and in the
handwriting of the great Duke of Argyle himself. The Justice, who had
stood by the Duke in 1714, was duly impressed, and told the Scot that
his additional testimonial was perfectly satisfactory.

"And now," he added, "what have you to say about this robbery?"

"Briefly this," said Mr. Campbell, "the robber for whom Mr. Morris took
Mr. Osbaldistone was both a shorter and a thicker man. More than that, I
saw under the false face he wore, when it slipped aside, that his
features were altogether different!"

Between terror and the determined attitude of Campbell, Morris was soon
forced to withdraw his information against Frank, and the Justice, glad
to be rid of so troublesome a case, instantly threw the papers into the
fire.

"You are now at perfect liberty, Mr. Osbaldistone," said Squire

Inglewood, "and you, Mr. Morris, are set quite at your ease."

In spite of this Mr. Morris did not seem exactly comfortable, especially
as Mr. Campbell expressed his intention of accompanying him to the next
highway, telling him that he would be as safe in his company as in his
father's kailyard.

"Zounds, sir," he said as they went out, "that a chield with such a
black beard should have no more heart than a hen-partridge. Come on wi'
ye, like a frank fellow, once and for all!"

The voices died away, the clatter of horses' hoofs was heard, and after
a few kindly words from the Justice, Diana and Frank set out on their
way home. On the road they met Clerk Jobson returning in great haste and
in a most villanous temper. The will-making, even the illness of Gaffer
Rutledge, had proved to be a "bam," that is to say, a hoax. The clerk's
language became so impertinent towards Miss Vernon, that, if she had not
prevented him, Frank would certainly have broken the rascal's head.

The revel was in full swing at Osbaldistone Hall when they returned. So
for the sake of peace Diana ordered some dinner to be brought to them in
the library. This was a large neglected room, walled about with great
books, into which hardly any of the Osbaldistones ever came, and which
accordingly Diana had appropriated as her peculiar sanctum.

To this chamber Rashleigh Osbaldistone penetrated after dinner had been

removed. He came to explain the events of the day, but except that he
had met Campbell by chance, and that, having learned that he had been an
eye-witness to the robbery, he had sent him on to Squire Inglewood's,
there was not much more that he seemed inclined to reveal.

Afterwards, however, in his own room, Rashleigh became more

communicative. He desired to know what kind of man Frank's father was,
with whom in future he was to be placed. And in return for this
information he told Frank what he wished to know as to Diana Vernon. She
was, said Rashleigh, to marry Thorncliff, according to a family compact
of long standing. But he intimated in addition that she would greatly
have preferred himself, and that, indeed, he had withdrawn from the care
of her studies on account of the too evident affection she had begun to
show towards one, who, as a son of the church, was destined never to
marry.

This information rankled in Frank's mind, and all the next day he was
sullen and even brutal in his manner towards Miss Vernon. But she did
not grow angry, and merely left him to fill up the measure of his
folly--which he presently did by an affray with Rashleigh and his other
cousins over the wine-cups in the evening, in which swords were drawn
and blows given.

The next morning, however, Miss Vernon called him to account.

"Upon my word, Mr. Francis Osbaldistone," she said, seating herself in

one of the great chairs in the library, like a judge upon the bench,
"your character improves upon us. Last night's performance was a
masterpiece. You contrived to exhibit in the course of one evening all
the various qualifications of your several cousins--the gentle and
generous temper of Rashleigh, the temperance of Percie, the cool courage
of Thorncliff, John's skill in dog-breaking, Dickon's aptitude for
betting--all these were exhibited by the same Mr. Francis, and with a
choice of time and place worthy of the taste and sagacity of Wilfred."

Frank expressed his shame and sorrow as best he could. He had been
troubled, he said, by some information that he had received.
Instantly Miss Vernon took him up.

"And now," she said, "please tell me instantly what it was that
Rashleigh said of me--I have a right to know and know I will!"

It was some time before Frank could bring himself to tell Diana what her
cousin had really hinted concerning herself, and when she heard that he
had affirmed her wish to marry him in preference to Thorncliff, she
shuddered from head to foot.

"No," she cried, all her soul instantly on fire, "any lot rather than
that--the sot, the gambler, the bully, the jockey, the insensate fool
were a thousand times preferable to Rashleigh! But the convent, the
jail--the grave--shall be welcome before them all!"

INTERLUDE OF DISCUSSION

At the abrupt close of the story the children

looked not a little surprised, nor did they
manifest their usual eagerness to rush out of doors
and instantly to reduce the tale to action.

The first difficulty was as to who the real

highwayman could be.

"Did Frank _really_ take the man's bag with the

money and things?" ventured Maid Margaret, a little
timidly. She knew that she would be promptly
contradicted.

"No, of course not," shouted Hugh John, "it was the

Scotch drover, Campbell,--for how else could he
know so well about it? Of course it was--_I_ knew
it from the first."

Meantime Sweetheart had been musing deeply.

"Do you know," she said gently, "I am most of all

sorry for Die Vernon. I don't think that I want to
play in this story. It is too real. I think Die
Vernon lived."

"Why--didn't they all live?" said Maid Margaret,

plaintively. For the world of books was still
quite alive for her. She had not lost the most
precious of all the senses. Dream-gold was as good
as Queen's-head-gold fresh out of the mint for her.
Happy Maid Margaret!

"I am sure Die Vernon was real," Sweetheart went

on; "last night when you were all out cycle-riding
and I was waiting for my Latin lesson, I read a bit
of the book--a chapter that father has not told us.
And it made me sorry for Die. She wished that she
had been born a man, so that she might say and do
the same things as others. She was alone in the
world, she said. She needed protection, yet if she
said or did anything naturally, every one thought
what a bold, forward girl she was! I have felt that
too!"

"Rubbish!" said Hugh John, in high remorseless

scorn, "_you_ are not 'alone in the world!' No, not
much. And if we say or do anything to you, you
jolly well whack us over the head. Why, the last
time I called you--"

"That will do, Hugh John," interrupted Sweetheart,

in very Die Vernonish voice.

"Well, when I called you--'Thinggummy'--_you

know_--you hit me with a stick and the mark lasted
three days!"

"And served you right!" said Sweetheart, calmly.

"Well, I'm not saying it didn't, am I?" retorted

honest Hugh John, "but anyway _you_ needn't go
about doing _wooly-woo_--

"'My nest it is harried,

My children all gone!'"

"Oh, you are a boy and can't understand--or

won't!" said Sweetheart, with a sigh, "I needn't
have expected it. But Diana Vernon did make me cry,
especially the bit about her being a
Catholic--stop--I will find it!"

And she foraged among the books on the shelf for

the big Abbotsford edition of _Rob Roy_, the one
with the fine old-fashioned pictures.

"Here it is," she said with her finger on the

place.

"'I belong to an oppressed sect and antiquated

religion (she read), and instead of getting credit
for my devotion, as is due to all other good girls,
my kind friend Justice Inglewood might send me to
the house of correction for it. . . . I am by
nature of a frank and unreserved disposition,--a
plain, true-hearted girl, who would willingly act
honestly and openly by all the world, and yet fate
has entangled me in such a series of nets and
toils and entanglements, that I dare not speak a
word for fear of consequences, not to myself but to
others.'"

Sweetheart sighed again and repeated thoughtfully,

"I _am_ sorry for Die Vernon!"

"Humph," said Hugh John, with dogged masculine

logic, "girls are always making up troubles, I
think. I don't see what she has to 'whimp'
about--everybody did just as she said at that
Hall--more than I would do for any silly girl, I
 bet! Just you try it on, only once, Miss
Sweetheart, that's all! She has all she can eat and
can order it herself--lots of horses and riding--a
gun--cricky, I only wish I had her chances! Think
of it--just oblige me by thinking of it--secret
passages to come and go by, night and day, right
plumb in the wall under your nose, mysterious
priests, Jesuits, Jacobites, and things. Why, it's
nearly as good as Crusoe's Island, I declare."

Sweetheart looked at Hugh John with the far-away

gentle compassion which always drove that
matter-of-fact warrior wild.

"All girls are the same," he asserted insultingly,

"they always get thinking they are going to die
right off, if only their little finger aches!"

"You'll be sorry!" said Sweetheart, warningly.

"Oh, will I?" said Hugh John, truculently, "isn't

what I say true, Toady Lion?"

But Toady Lion was sitting upon a buffet, in the

character of Morris upon his portmanteau. He was
shaking and chattering with such exaggerated terror
that Maid Margaret, wrapped in a dust-sheet for a
disguise and armed with the kitchen poker, could
not rob him for very laughter. So neither of them
paid any heed.

"You'll be sorry for speaking like that about Die

Vernon," Sweetheart went on; "I've looked and I
know. She was a true heroine. And she is worth a
whole pack of your heroes any day."

"And, indeed, that's not saying much!" said Hugh

John, who also had his sorrows. "But at any rate
that was no proper place to break off a story. And
I'll tell father so. Let's tease to have some more.
It's a wet day, and we can't do anything else!"

"Oh, yes--let's!" said Sweetheart. "Stop all that,

Toady Lion, and you, Maid Margaret. We are going to
ask for the second tale from _Rob Roy!_"

"Well," grumbled Hugh John, "I hope that there will

be more about Rob Roy in it this time. It's not too
soon."

And Sweetheart only continued to regard him with

the same quiet but irritating smile, and nodded
her head as who would say, "Those who live the
longest see the most!"

THE SECOND TALE FROM "ROB ROY"

I. IN THE TOILS OF RASHLEIGH

BUT it became more and more evident that Frank's time at Osbaldistone
Hall was growing short. A certain travelling merchant, a friend and
countryman of Andrew Fairservice, the Osbaldistone gardener, brought
news from London of how Frank's character had been attacked there in the
matter of Morris, and that in the high court of Parliament itself.

Moreover, Frank felt that he could not much longer remain in the same
house with Miss Vernon. His love for her daily increased. Yet she told
him plainly that she could and would only be a friend to him. He must
ask her no questions, however deep the mysteries which encircled her
might seem. One day he found a man's glove lying on the library table.
On another occasion, after Rashleigh's departure for London, he
distinguished two shadows on the windows of the library while he was
patrolling the garden after dark.

Last of all Frank received a letter through some secret channel of

Diana's written by his father's partner, Mr. Tresham. This informed him
that his father had been for some time in Holland on business of the
firm, and that Rashleigh had gone north to Scotland some time ago, with
a large amount of money to take up bills granted by his father to
merchants in that country. Since his setting out, nothing whatever had
been heard of Rashleigh, and Owen had gone north to find him. Frank was
urgently prayed to proceed to Glasgow for the same purpose as soon as
possible. For if Rashleigh were not found, it was likely that the great
house of Osbaldistone and Tresham might have to suspend payment.

At this news Frank was stricken to the heart. He saw now how his
foolishness had ruined his father, because it was through his obstinacy
that Rashleigh had gained admission to his father's confidence. Mr.
Osbaldistone, he knew, would never survive the disgrace of bankruptcy.
He must, therefore, instantly depart. And Diana willingly sped him on
his way, giving him a letter which he was only to open if all other
means of paying his father's debts had failed.

Frank resolved to quit Osbaldistone Hall by night secretly, leaving only

a letter of thanks for his uncle, and informing him that immediate and
urgent business called him to Glasgow. He found a willing guide ready to
his hand in the gardener Andrew Fairservice, who, as he said, had long
been awaiting such an opportunity of quitting his employment.

But this same Andrew came near to involving Frank in a fresh breach of
the law. For, as Squire Thorncliff owed him ten pounds which he refused
to pay, Andrew had mounted himself on Squire Thornie's good beast. And
it was not until the animal was safely arrested by the law in the first
Scotch town across the border, and Frank had written the whole story to
Sir Hildebrand, that he felt easy in his mind as to the irregular act of
his attendant.

They arrived at Glasgow, then a small but ancient town, on the eve of
the Sabbath day. It was impossible for Frank to discover Owen that
night, and it proved to be no more easy the following morning.

For when he proposed to his landlady to go to the dwelling-house of Mr.

MacVittie, or to the counting-house of that firm, in search of Owen,
she held up her hands in horror.
"There will not be a soul in either place," she cried; "they are all
serious men and will only be found where all good Christians ought to be
on the Lord's Day Morning, and that's in the Barony Laigh (Low) Kirk!"

So thither accordingly Frank betook himself, accompanied, of course, by

his faithful follower, Andrew Fairservice. They found the Laigh Kirk to
be a gloomy underground crypt into which light was but sparingly
admitted by a few Gothic windows. In the centre the pews were already
full to overflowing with worshippers, and Andrew and Frank had to take
their places in the ring of those who stood in the outer dark among the
gloomy ranges of pillars which stretched away into complete obscurity.

Frank listened to the sermon for some time with what attention he could
muster. But the thought of his father's loss and his own share in it
recurred often to his mind. Suddenly he was roused from his revery by a
whisper from the darkness behind, "Listen," a voice said, low but very
distinct, in his ear, "do not look back. You are in danger in this
place. So am I. Meet me to-night at the Brig, at twelve o'clock
precisely. Keep at home till the gloaming and avoid observation!"

Frank tried to find out who could be so well acquainted with his journey
as to give him this rendezvous. But all that he could see, vanishing
into the darkness of the vaulted arches, was a figure, wrapped in a long
cloak which revealed nothing whatever of its wearer. Instinctively Frank
attempted to pursue, but he had not gone many yards, when he fell over a
tombstone with such a clatter that it caused the preacher to stop and
order the officers to take into custody the author of the unseemly
disturbance.

There was nothing for it, therefore, but to wait with as much patience
as he could muster for the time appointed. He did, however, see Mr.
MacVittie, his father's correspondent, when as Andrew said the "kirk
scaled." But he did not take that worthy's advice to speak to the
merchant. The hard features of the man had in them something
disagreeable and even menacing which vaguely recalled Rashleigh
Osbaldistone. And Frank, remembering the warnings of his unknown friend,
resolved to refrain from making his presence in Glasgow known, at least
for the present, to that notable merchant Mr. MacVittie.

This Sunday was the longest day of Frank Osbaldistone's life. It seemed
as if the hours would never go past. Twilight came at last, however, and
he issued forth to walk up and down in the public park, among the
avenues of trees, till the time of his appointment should arrive.

As he marched to and fro, keeping as much as possible out of sight of

the passers-by, he heard the voice of Andrew Fairservice in close and
somewhat loud conversation with a man in a long cloak and a slouched
hat. Andrew was retailing the character of his master to the stranger,
and though Frank Osbaldistone promised to himself to break Andrew's pate
for his insolence on the first suitable occasion, he could not but
acknowledge the fidelity of the likeness which Andrew painted.

"Ay, ay, Mr. Hammorgaw," Andrew was saying, "the lad is a good lad. He
is not altogether void of sense. He has a gloaming sight of what is
reasonable, but he is crack-brained and cockle-headed about his
nipperty-tipperty poetry nonsense. A bare crag wi' a burn jawing over it
is unto him as a garden garnished with flowering knots and choice
pot-herbs. And he would rather claver with a daft quean they call Diana
Vernon, than hear what might do him good all the days of his life from
you or me, or any other sober and sponsible person. Reason, sir, he
cannot endure. He is all for the vanities and the volubilities. And he
even once told me, poor blinded creature, that the Psalms of David were
excellent poetry. As if the holy Psalmist thought of rattling rhymes in
blether, like his own silly clinkum-clankum that he calls verse! Gude
help him! Two lines of Davie Lindsay wad ding a' that he ever clerkit!"

At last, after a weary waiting, the bell of the church of St. Mungo
tolled the hour of midnight. The echoes had not ceased upon the air when
a figure approached across the bridge, coming from the southern side.
The man was strong, thick-set, and wore a horseman's cloak wrapped about
him. But he passed without speaking, and held on his way to the farther
end of the bridge. There he turned, and meeting Frank full in face, bade
him follow him and he would know his reasons for thus warning him.

Frank first demanded to know who he was, and what were his purposes with
him.

"I am a man," was the reply, "and my purpose is friendly to you."

More than that he would not say. Frank could follow him or not, just as
he chose. Only if he did not, he would rue it all his life.

Furthermore, he stung the young man, perhaps intentionally, with the

taunt of being afraid. Frank cast back his words in his teeth. He was
young, active, armed, of a good conscience. Why then had he need to be
afraid?

"But," said the stranger, "if you are not afraid of what I can do to
you, do you not fear the consequences of being found in the company of
one whose very name whispered in this lonely street would make the
stones themselves rise up to apprehend him--on whose head half the men
in Glasgow would build their fortune as on a found treasure, had they
the luck to grip him by the collar--the sound of whose apprehension were
as welcome at the Cross of Edinburgh as ever the news of a field
stricken and won in Flanders?"

"And who, then, are you?" cried Frank, "whose name should create so deep
a terror?"

"No enemy of yours, since I am taking you to a place where, if I were

recognised, cold iron for my heels and hemp for my throat would be my
brief dooming."

Instinctively Frank laid his hand on his sword.

"What," said the stranger, "on an unarmed man and your friend?"

"I am ignorant if you be either the one or the other!" said Frank, "and
indeed your language and manner lead me to doubt both."

"Manfully spoken," said the unknown; "well, I will be frank and free
with you--I am conveying you to prison!"

"To prison," cried Frank, "and by what warrant--for what offence? You
shall have my life sooner than my liberty. I defy you! I will not follow
you a step farther!"

The unknown drew himself up haughtily.

"I am not taking you there as a prisoner," he said. "I am neither
messenger nor sheriff's officer. _Your_ liberty is little risked by the
visit. _Mine_ is in some peril. But I care not for the risk. For I love
a free young blood, that kens no protector but the cross of his sword."

So saying he tapped at a low wicket, and was answered sharply from

within, as by one awakened suddenly from a dream.

"Fat's tat? Wha's that, I wad say? And what the deil want ye at this
hour o' the e'en? Clean again rules--clean again rules--as they call
them!"

The speaker seemed by the yawning drone of the last words again to be
composing himself to slumber.

Then the stranger, who had hitherto guided Frank, spoke in a loud
whisper, "Dougal man! hae ye forgotten _Ha nun Gregarach?_"

Instantly there was a bustle inside.

"Deil a bit, deil a bit!" said the voice within, briskly.

Bolts were drawn, whispers passed in Gaelic, and presently Frank and his
companion stood both of them in the vestibule of the tolbooth or public
prison of Glasgow. It was a small but strong guard-room, from which
passages led away to the right and left, and staircases ascended to the
cells of the prisoners. Iron fetters fitly adorned the walls. Muskets,
pistols, and partizans stood about, ready alike for defence or offence.
Still more strange was the jailer who greeted them.

This man was a wild, shock-headed savage with a brush of red hair, but
he knelt and almost worshipped Frank's guide. He could not take his
eyes off him.

"Oich--oich," grunted Dougal, for that was the turnkey's name, "to see
ye here! What would happen to ye if the bailies should come to get
witting of it?"

The guide, still wrapped in his cloak, placed his finger on his lip.

"Fear nothing, Dougal," he said, "your hands shall never draw a bolt on
me."

"That shall they no," said Dougal, emphatically, "she wishes them hacked
off by the elbows first. And when are ye gaun yonder again? When you
return, you will not forget to tell your poor cousin--only seven times
removed."

"I will let you know, Dougal," said the man, "as soon as my plans are
settled."

"And by my sooth," cried Dougal, "when you do, I will fling my keys at
the provost's head, and never gie them anither turn--see if I winna!"

But Frank's guide, who had listened to all this rhapsody very much with
the air of a prince accustomed to royal service and thinking little of
it, interrupted Dougal with some words in Gaelic.
Whereupon the turnkey, taking a lantern, led the young man up the
winding stair and introduced him to a cell, where, lying on a bed, he
recognised--no other than Owen, the head clerk of his father's house.

At first the good Owen could only bemoan the hardness of fate, thinking
that Frank also had met with the same treatment as himself, by being
sent to prison. He had, it seemed, as in duty bound, gone at once to
Messrs. MacVittie, MacFin, and Company and exposed to them his case,
stating the difficulty in which the house were placed by Rashleigh's
disappearance. Hitherto they had been most smooth and silver-tongued,
but at the first word of difficulty as to payment, they had clapped poor
Owen into prison on the charge of meditating flight out of the country.

He had, he continued, sent a note to Bailie Nicol Jarvie, the other

correspondent of the house in Glasgow. But, as he said, "If the civil
house in the Gallowgate used him thus, what was to be expected from the
cross-grained old crab-stock in the Salt Market?"

It had fallen out even as he had expected. Bailie Nicol Jarvie had not
so much as answered his letter, though it had been put into his hand as
he was on his way to church that morning.

Hardly were the words out of Owen's mouth, when from below came the
voice of Dougal the turnkey, evidently urging Frank's guide to conceal
himself.

"Gang upstairs and hide behind the Sassenach gentleman's bed. Ay,
ay--coming--coming!"

The Highlander hastily entered Owen's cell, and, stripping off his heavy
coat, stood at bay, evidently gathering himself for a leap at the
officers, should it indeed prove to be the provost, magistrates, and
guard of the city of Glasgow, as Dougal believed. It was obvious that he
meant to spring right at any who might be seeking to apprehend him. But
instead of a guard with fixed bayonets, it was only a good-looking young
woman in kilted petticoats holding a lantern in her hand, who ushered in
a magistrate, stout, bob-wigged, bustling, and breathless. At the sight
of his face Frank's conductor instantly drew back and resumed the
muffling cloak which hid the lower part of his features.

The chief captain of the jail now showed himself at the door, having
descended hastily to wait on the great man. But the Bailie's anger was
huge against all and sundry.

"A bonny thing, Captain Stanchells," he cried, "that I, a magistrate of

the city, should have been kept half an hour knocking as hard for
entrance into the tolbooth as the poor creatures within knock to get
out! And what, pray, is the meaning of this--strangers in the jail after
lock-up time? I will look after this, Stanchells, depend upon it. Keep
the door locked. By and by I will speak with these gentlemen. But first,
I must have a talk with an old acquaintance here. Mr. Owen, Mr. Owen,
how's all with you, man?"

"Well in body, I thank you, Mr. Jarvie," said poor Owen, "but sore
afflicted in spirit."

"Ay, ay--no doubt--no doubt," said the Bailie, briskly, "but we are all
subject to a downcome, and it comes hard on those that have held their
heads high. But I have not come out at twelve o'clock of a Sabbath night
to cast up to an unfortunate man his backslidings. That was never
Bailie Nicol Jarvie's way, nor yet was it his father the deacon's
before him. Why, man, even in the Kirk I was thinking on your letter.
And after supper I sat yawning wide enough to swallow St. Enoch's Kirk,
till twelve of the clock struck. Then I took a bit look at my ledger
just to see how matters stood between us. Syne I called up Mattie and
bade her light the lamp and convoy me down to the tolbooth. I have entry
here at any hour of the night and day, and so had my father before me,
God bless him!"

II. ROB ROY AT LAST

During this harangue Frank's mysterious guide had been gradually edging
toward the door, and showing signs of slipping away. But even when
looking carefully over Mr. Owen's papers, the keen eyes of the
magistrate detected the movement.

"Shut the door, Stanchells, and keep it locked!" he cried.

The Highlander took three or four steps across the room, muttered an
execration in Gaelic, and then with an air of careless defiance set
himself down on a table and proceeded to whistle a stave with all
possible assurance.

The Bailie soon arranged Mr. Owen's affairs. He would become his bail
himself, and promised to secure his liberation early next morning. Then
he took the lantern from his servant Mattie, and, holding it up,
proceeded to examine the stern, set countenance of Frank's guide. That
stout-hearted Celt did not move a muscle under the inspection, but with
his arms folded carelessly, his heel beating time to the lilt of his
whistled strathspey, he came very near to deceiving the acuteness of his
investigator.

"Eh--ah--no--it cannot be. It is! Eh, ye born deevil, ye robber--ye

catheran! Can this be you?"

"E'en as ye see me, Bailie!" was the short response.

"Ye cheat-the-gallows, ye reiving villain--what think you is the value

of your head now!" cried the Bailie.

"Umph! Fairly weighed and Dutch measure," came the answer, "it might
weigh down one provost's, four bailies', a town-clerk's, six deacons',
besides stent-masters'--!"

"Tell over your sins," interrupted Mr. Nicol Jarvie, "and prepare ye,
for if I speak the word--"

"But ye will _not_ speak the word," said the Highlander, coolly.

[Illustration: "HE took the lantern from his servant Mattie, and,
holding it up, proceeded to examine the stern, set countenance of
Frank's guide. That stout-hearted Celt did not move a muscle under the
inspection, but with his arms folded carelessly, his heel beating time
to the lilt of his whistled strathspey, he came very near to deceiving
the acuteness of his investigator."]
"And why should I not?" said the Bailie, "answer me that--why should I
not?"

"For three sufficient reasons, Bailie Jarvie," he retorted, "first, for

auld langsyne. Second, for the sake of the auld wife ayont the fire at
Stuckavrallachan, that made some mixture of our bloods--to my shame be
it spoken that _I_ should have a cousin a weaver. And lastly, Bailie,
because if I saw a sign of your betraying me, I would plaster the wall
there with your brains, long before any hand of man could rescue you!"

"Ye are a bold, desperate villain, sir," retorted the undaunted Bailie,
"and ye ken that I ken ye to be so--but that were it only my own risk, I
would not hesitate a moment."

"I ken well," said the other, "ye have gentle blood in your veins, and I
would be loath to hurt my own kinsman. But I go out of here free as I
came in, or the very walls of Glasgow tolbooth shall tell the tale these
ten years to come!"

"Well, well," said Mr. Jarvie, "after all, blood is thicker than water.
Kinsfolk should not see faults to which strangers are blind. And, as you
say, it would be sore news to the auld wife below the Ben, that you, ye
Hieland limmer, had knockit out my brains, or that I had got you strung
up in a halter. But, among other things, where is the good thousand
pound Scots that I lent you, and when am I to be seeing it?"

"Where is it?" said the unknown, grimly, "why, where last year's snow
is, I trow!"

"And that's on the tap o' Schehallion, ye Hieland dog," said Mr. Jarvie,
"and I look for payment from ye where ye stand."

"Ay," said the Highlander, unmoved, "but I carry neither snow nor silver
in my sporran. Ye will get it, Bailie--just when the King enjoys his ain
again, as the auld sang says!"

Then the magistrate turned to Frank.

"And who may this be?" he demanded, "some reiver ye hae listed, Rob? He
looks as if he had a bold heart for the highway, and a neck that was
made express for the hangman's rope!"

"This," said Owen, horrified at the Bailie's easy prediction as to the

fate of his young master, "this is Mr. Francis Osbaldistone, only son of
the head of our house--"

"Ay, I have heard of him," said the Bailie, still more contemptuously,
"he that ran away and turned play-actor, through pure dislike to the
work an honest man should live by!"

"Indeed," said the Highlander, "I had some respect for the callant even
before I kenned what was in him. But now I honour him for his contempt
of weavers and spinners, and sic-like mechanical persons."

"Ye are mad, Rob," said the Bailie, "mad as a March hare--though
wherefore a hare should be madder in the month of March than at
Martinmas is more than I can well say. But this young birkie here, that
ye are hounding the fastest way to the gallows--tell me, will all his
stage-plays and his poetries, or your broad oaths and drawn dirks tell
him where Rashleigh Osbaldistone is? Or Macbeth and all his kernes and
galloglasses, and your own to boot, procure him the five thousand pounds
to answer the bills that must fall due ten days hence--were they all
sold by auction at Glasgow Cross--basket hilts, Andrea Ferraras,
leathern targets, brogues, brechan, and sporrans?"

"Ten days!" said Frank, instinctively drawing Diana Vernon's letter out
of his pocket. The time had elapsed, and he was now free to open it.

A thin sealed enclosure fell out, and the wandering airs of the prison
wafted it to Bailie Jarvie's feet. He lifted it and at once handed it to
the Highlander, who, after glancing at the address, proceeded calmly to
open it.

Frank tried vainly to interpose.

"You must first satisfy me that the letter is intended for you, before I
can allow you to read it," he said.

"Make yourself easy, Mr. Osbaldistone," answered the Highlander, looking

directly at him for the first time, "remember Justice Inglewood, Clerk
Jobson, Mr. Morris--above all, remember your very humble servant, Robert
Campbell, and the beautiful Diana Vernon."

The vague resemblance which had been haunting Frank ever since he had
heard this man's voice was now at once made plain. The cloak being
dropped and the man's face turned full upon him, he saw that it was
indeed the same Highland drover who had borne unexpected testimony in
his favour when he was in danger of his life in the house of Mr. Justice
Inglewood.

"It is a difficult cast she has given me to play," said the Highlander,
looking at Die Vernon's letter, "but I daresay I shall be able to serve
you. Only you must come and visit me in my own country. I cannot hope to
aid you on the paving stones of Glasgow. And you, Bailie, if you will
come up with this young gentleman as far as the Clachan of Aberfoil, I
will pay you the thousand pounds Scots that I owe you."

"Such a journey ill becomes my place," said the Bailie, doubtfully, "but
if I did come, would you really and soothfully pay me the siller?"

"I swear to you," said the Highlander, "by him that sleeps beneath the
grey stane at Inch Cailleach!

"But," he continued, "I must be budging. For the air of the Glasgow
tolbooth is no that over salutary to a Highland constitution."

"Ohon," said the Bailie, "that I should be art and part in an escape
from justice--it will be a disgrace to me all the days of my life!
Aweel, we have all our backslidings to answer for. Stanchells, open the
door!"

The head jailor stared at the two visitors who had gotten into Mr.
Owen's cell without his leave, but he was reassured by the Bailie's
careless "Friends of mine, Stanchells, friends of mine!"

The party descended to the lower vestibule, and there called more than
once for Dougal, but without effect.
Whereupon Campbell observed, with a quiet smile, that "if Dougal was the
lad he kenned him, he would scarce wait to be thanked for his share of
that night's work, but would now be full trot for the pass of
Ballamaha--"

"And am I myself," cried the angry Bailie, "to be locked up in the

tolbooth all night? Send for fore-hammers, sledge-hammers, pincers! Send
for Deacon Yettlin, the smith. And as for that Hieland blackguard, he
shall hang as high as Haman--"

"When ye catch him," said Campbell, gravely, "but wait, surely the jail
door is not locked!"

And so it turned out.

"He has some glimmerings of sense, that Dougal creature," added the
Highlander; "he kenned that an open door might have served me at a
pinch!"

So saying he sprang into the darkness, and soon the street resounded to
low signal whistles, uttered and instantly replied to.

"Hear to the Hieland deevils," said Mr. Jarvie; "they think themselves
already on the skirts of Ben Lomond! But what's this?"

There was a clash of iron at his feet, and stooping to the causeway
cobbles, the Bailie lifted the keys of the jail which Dougal had carried
away in his flight.

"Indeed," he said, "and that's just as
siller, and there might have been some
loss of them, that I would little like
the first time they had cast up my kin
others should get wind of this night's
well. For they cost the burgh
talk in the council about the
to have heard. It would not be
to me, if Bailie Grahame and some
work."

The next morning at the Bailie's hospitable table, Frank Osbaldistone

met Mr. Owen--but altogether another Owen from him of the
tolbooth--neat, formal, and well brushed as ever, though still in the
lowest of spirits about the misfortunes of the house.

They had not long begun when Frank, who could be brusque enough upon
occasion, startled the Bailie by the question, "And pray, by the bye,
Mr. Nicol Jarvie, who is this Mr. Robert Campbell whom I met last
night?"

The question, abruptly put, seemed to knock the worthy Bailie all of a
heap. He stammered and repeated it over and over, as if he had no answer
ready.

"Wha's Mr. Robert Campbell? Ahem--ahay--! Wha's Mr. Robert Campbell,

quo' he?"

"Yes," repeated the young Englishman, "I mean who and what is he?"

"Why, he's--ahay! He's--ahem! Where did _you_ meet Mr. Robert Campbell,
as you call him yourself?"

"I met him by chance," Frank answered promptly, "some months ago, in the
north of England."

"Then, Mr. Osbaldistone," said the Bailie, doggedly, "ye ken just as
much about him as I do!"

"I should suppose not, Mr. Jarvie," said Frank, "since you are, it
seems, both his relation and his friend!"

"There is doubtless some cousinship between us," said the Bailie, with
reluctance, "but I have seen little of Rob since he left the
cattle-dealing. He was hardly used by those who might have treated him
better, poor fellow."

More than this for the moment Frank could not extract from Mr. Jarvie,
and indeed his father's affairs were naturally the first consideration.
As Frank could not help with their business matters and arrangements,
the Bailie dismissed him without ceremony, telling him that he might go
up to the College Yards, where he would find some that could speak Greek
and Latin, but that he must be back at one o'clock "_preceesely_" to
partake of the Bailie's family leg of mutton and additional tup's head.

It was while Frank Osbaldistone was pacing to and fro in the College
Yards, that, from behind a hedge, he saw three men talking together. At
first he could hardly believe his eyes. For one of them, the very sight
of whom caused a disagreeable thrill to pass through his body, was none
other than Rashleigh himself, while the other two were Morris and Mr.
MacVittie,--the very three men who could do him the most harm in the
world.

At the end of the avenue MacVittie and Morris left the gardens, while
Rashleigh returned alone, apparently pacing the walk in deep meditation.
Frank suddenly appeared before him, and challenged him to give up the
deeds and titles he had stolen from his father.

Rashleigh, whom no surprise could stir out of his cool native audacity,
answered that it would be better for his cousin to go and amuse himself
in his world of poetical imagination, and to leave the business of life
to men who understood and could conduct it.

Words grew hotter and hotter between the two young men, till Rashleigh,
stung by a reference to Diana Vernon, bade Frank follow him to a
secluded place where he would be able to chastise him for his boyish
insolence.

Accordingly Frank followed him, keeping a keen watch on his adversary

lest he should attempt any treachery. And it was well that he did so.
For Rashleigh's sword was at his breast before he had time to draw, or
even to lay down his cloak, and he only saved his life by springing a
pace or two backward in all haste.

In the matter of fence, Frank found Rashleigh quite his match--his own
superior skill being counterbalanced by Rashleigh's longer and more
manageable sword and by his great personal strength and ferocity. He
fought, indeed, more like a fiend than a man. Every thrust was meant to
kill, and the combat had all the appearance of being to the death.

At last Frank stumbled accidentally, and Rashleigh's sword passed

through his coat and out at the back, just grazing his side, whereupon
Frank, seizing the hilt of his antagonist's sword, shortened his grip
and was on the point of running him through the body. But the
death-grapple was put an end to in the nick of time, by the intervention
of Campbell, who suddenly appeared out of the bushes and threw himself
between them. Rashleigh demanded fiercely of the Highlander how he dared
to interfere where his honour was concerned.

But Campbell, with a whistle of his broadsword about his head, reminded
him that so far as "daring" went, he was ready to make mincemeat of the
pair of them. But though this cooled Rashleigh's temper at once, it was
far from appeasing Frank, who swore that he would keep hold of his
cousin till he had given up all he had stolen from his father.

[Illustration: "THE death-grapple was put an end to in the nick of time

by the intervention of Campbell, who suddenly appeared out of the bushes
and threw himself between them. Rashleigh demanded fiercely of the
Highlander how he dared to interfere where his honour was concerned."]

"You hear!" said Rashleigh to Campbell; "he rushes upon his fate. On his
own head be it!"

But the Highlander would not permit the young man to be ill treated,
only for standing up for his own father. He took hold of Frank, however,
and by a gigantic effort he caused him to release Rashleigh's coat which
he had seized in his anger.

"Let go his collar, Mr. Francis," he commanded. "What he says is true.

Ye are more in danger of the magistrate in this place than what he is.
Take the bent, Mr. Rashleigh. Make one pair of legs worth two pair of
hands. You have done that before now."

Rashleigh, with a last threat of future revenge, took up his sword,

wiped it, put it back in its sheath, and disappeared in the bushes.

In spite of his struggles the Highlander held Frank till it was vain for
him to pursue Rashleigh, and then Campbell had some advice to give him.

"Let him alone," he said. "I tell you, man, he has the old trap set for
you. And here I cannot give you the same help that I did in the house of
Justice Inglewood. Now go your ways home, like a good bairn. Keep out of
the sight of Rashleigh, and Morris, and that MacVittie animal. Mind the
Clachan of Aberfoil, and by the word of a gentleman I will not see you
wronged."

On his way back Frank had his slight wound dressed by a surgeon and
apothecary in the neighbourhood, who refused to believe his explanation
about the button of his adversary's foil slipping.

"There never was button on the foil that made this!" he said. "Ah, young
blood--young blood! But fear not--we surgeons are a secret generation!"

And so dismissed, Frank soon found his way back to Mr. Jarvie's family
leg of mutton and tup's head, only a few minutes after the appointed
stroke of one.

* * * * *
III. THE BAILIE FIGHTS WITH FIRE

When Frank Osbaldistone, the Bailie, and Andrew Fairservice, set forward
toward the Highlands, their way lay for the first stage over barren
wastes, with the blue line of the Grampian Hills continually before
their eyes.

Andrew had as usual tried to cheat his master by getting rid of his own
pony and buying another on Frank's account. But the Bailie soon caused
Andrew to recover his old horse on the penalty of being at once haled
off to prison.

Night came on before the little party of three arrived at the inn of the
Clachan of Aberfoil, having previously crossed the infant Forth by an
ancient bridge, high and narrow.

The inn was a mere hovel, but the windows were cheerfully lighted up.
There was a sound of revelry within that promised good cheer to hungry
men, and the party were on the point of entering, when Andrew
Fairservice showed them a peeled wand which was set across the half-open
door.

"That means," he said, "that some of their great men are birling at the
wine within, and will little like to be disturbed."

It proved to be even so. The landlady was most anxious to keep them out.
They could get rest and shelter, she promised them, within seven
Scottish miles--that is to say, within at least double that number of
English ones. Her house was taken up, and the gentlemen in possession
would ill like to be intruded on by strangers. Better gang farther than
fare worse.

But Frank, being an Englishman and hungry for his dinner, was ready to
do battle against all odds in order to get it.

The interior of the inn of Aberfoil was low and dark. The smoke of the
fire hung and eddied under the gloomy roof about five feet from the
ground. But underneath all was kept clear by the currents of air that
rushed about the house when the wind blew through the wicker door and
the miserable walls of stone plastered with mud.

Three men were sitting at an oak table near the fire. Two of these were
in Highland dress, the first small and dark, with a quick and irritable
expression of countenance. He wore the "trews" of tartan, which in
itself showed him a man of consideration. The other Highlander was a
tall, strong man, with the national freckled face and high cheekbones.
The tartan he wore had more of red in it than that of the other. The
third was in Lowland dress, a bold, stout-looking man, in a showily
laced riding-dress and a huge cocked hat. His sword and a pair of
pistols lay on the table before him.

All three were drinking huge draughts of the Highland drink called
"Usquebagh," and they spoke loudly and eagerly one to the other, now in
Gaelic, now in English. A third Highlander, wrapped in his plaid and
with his face hidden, lay on the floor, apparently asleep.

The three gentlemen were at first unconscious of the invasion. They

continued their loud conversation, and it was not until Frank
Osbaldistone called the landlady that they paused and looked at them,
apparently stricken dumb by his audacity.

"You make yourself at home," said the lesser Celt, in very good English,
which however he spoke with an air of haughty disdain.

"I usually do, sir," said Frank, "when I come into a house of public
entertainment."

"And did she not see," demanded the taller man, "by the white wand at
the door, that gentlemans had taken up the public house on their ain
business?"

"I do not pretend to understand the customs of this country," said

Frank, with firmness, "but I have yet to learn how any three persons are
entitled to exclude all other travellers from the only place of shelter
and refreshment for miles around."

The Bailie here offered a stoup of brandy as an appropriate means of

establishing a good understanding, but the three natives proceeded to
snuff the air and work themselves up into a passion with the evident
intention of ending the quarrel by a fray.

"We are three to three," said the lesser Highlander, glancing his eyes
at the intruding party. "If ye be pretty men, draw!"

And so saying, he drew his own broadsword and advanced upon Frank. The
young Englishman, knowing the superiority of his rapier to the claymore,
especially in the confined space, was in no fear as to the issue of the
combat. But when the gigantic Highlander advanced upon the worthy
magistrate of Glasgow, after trying in vain once or twice to draw his
father's _shabble_, as he called it, from its sheath,--a weapon which
had last seen the light at Bothwell Bridge,--the Bailie seized as a
substitute the red-hot coulter of a plough, which had been sticking in
the fire. At the very first pass he set the Highlander's plaid on fire,
and thereafter compelled him to keep a respectful distance. Andrew
Fairservice had, of course, vanished at the very first symptoms of a
storm, but the Lowlander, disappointed of an antagonist, drew honourably
off and took no share in the fight. Nevertheless the Bailie, built for
more peaceful pursuits, was quickly getting the worst of it, when from
the floor started up the sleeping Highlander, crying, "Hersel' has eaten
the town bread at the Cross of Glasgow, and by her troth, she will fight
for Bailie Jarvie at the Clachan of Aberfoil!"

And seconding words with blows, he fell upon his tall countryman. As
both were armed with targes made of wood and studded with brass, the
combat was more remarkable for noise and clatter than for serious
damage. And it was not long before the Lowlander cried out, taking upon
himself the office of peacemaker: "Hold your hands, gentlemen--enough
done, enough done! The strangers have shown themselves men of honour,
and have given reasonable satisfaction."

There was no wish to continue the fray, save perhaps on the part of the
Bailie's antagonist, who demanded to know who was going to pay for the
hole burnt in his bonnie plaid, through which, he declared, any one
might put a kail-pot.

But the Bailie, pleased with himself for having shown spirit, declared
that the Highlander should have a new plaid, especially woven, of his
own clan-colours. And he added that if he could find the worthy lad who
had taken his quarrel upon himself, he would bestow upon him a gill of
_aqua-vit�_.

But the Highlander who had been so ready on the Bailie's behalf was now
nowhere to be found. The supper was brought in presently, as if the
landlady had only been waiting for the end of the fray in order to serve
the repast.

The Bailie had from the first recognised the Lowlander as one to whom
the deacon his father had lent money, and with whose family there were
many ties of cordiality and confidence. So while the friendly converse
was thus proceeding indoors, Frank went out to find Andrew Fairservice,
and on his way the landlady gave him a folded scrap of paper, saying
that she was glad to be rid of it--what with Saxons, soldiers, and
robbers--life was not worth living on the Highland line!

By the light of a torch Frank read as follows, "For the honoured hands
of Mr. F. O., a Saxon young gentleman--These!"

The letter proved to be from Campbell, and informed Frank that as there
were night hawks abroad, he must hold no communication with any one lest
it should lead to future trouble. The person who gave him the letter
might be trusted, but that in the meantime it would be well to avoid a
meeting with "R. M. C."

Frank was much disappointed at this deferring of the hope of aiding his
father, by recovering the papers and titles which Rashleigh had stolen.
But still there was no help for it. And so, after dragging Andrew out of
the corner of the shed, where he was hidden behind a barrel of feathers,
he returned to the inn.

Here he found the Bailie high in dispute with his quondam friend, the
Lowlander Galbraith. The quarrel concerned the Duke of Argyle and the
Clan Campbell, but most of all a certain freebooter of the name of Rob
Roy, who, as it now appeared, they were all assembled to pursue and make
an end of.

North and east the passes were being held. The westland clans were out.
Southward Major Galbraith was in command of a body of Lennox horse, and
to a certainty Rob Roy would swing in a rope by the morrow's morn.

Scarcely were the words spoken when the ordered tramp of infantry on the
march was heard, and an officer, followed by two or three files of
soldiers, entered the apartment. It gave Frank a thrill of pleasure to
remark his English accent, after the Scotch which he had been listening
to ever since he left Osbaldistone Hall.

But he liked somewhat less what he was next to hear. The English officer
had received instructions to place under arrest two persons, one young
and the other elderly, travelling together. It seemed to him that Frank
and the Bailie answered fairly well to this description.

In spite of the protests and threats of the honourable magistrate, he

ordered them both to follow him in his advance into the Highland
country, upon which he was immediately to set out.

The letter which Frank had received from the landlady of the inn, being
found upon him, was held to be evidence that he had been in treasonable
correspondence with Rob Roy, whose usual initials, indeed, were at the
bottom of the note. Next the shock-headed Highlander who had taken the
Bailie's quarrel upon him, having been captured, was brought before the
officer, and commanded, on pain of being instantly hanged, to lead them
to the place where he had left the Mac-Gregor. After long persuasion,
some of it of the roughest sort, poor Dougal consented for five guineas
to act as guide to the party of soldiers under Captain Thornton--for
such was the name of the English officer.

This sinful compliance of Dougal's angered the Bailie so much that he

cried to the soldiers to take Dougal away, because now he deserved
hanging for his treachery more than ever.

This drew the retort from the Corporal who was acting as hangman, that
if it were the Bailie who was going to be hanged, he would be in no
such desperate hurry!

But Dougal promised to be faithful, and in a few minutes the English

officer had paid the reckonings of the three gentlemen whom Frank had
found drinking at the inn of Aberfoil. The hot and smoky atmosphere of
the miserable inn was exchanged for the wide hill breezes. But on their
passage through the villages the hatred of the natives, mostly women and
children, for the "red soldiers" broke forth into shrill cursing. Andrew
Fairservice, who alone of the three understood Gaelic, grew pale with
terror at the threats which were lavished upon them.

"And the worst of all is," he said, trembling, "that the owercome o'
their sang is that we are to gang up the glen and see what we are to
get."

IV. THE DROWNING OF THE SPY

Whereupon the Bailie took it on himself to warn Captain Thornton that

the Highlanders, especially under a leader so daring as Rob Roy, were in
the habit of attacking their enemies in narrow passes where regular
troops had no chance against them. But the officer was not to be turned
aside. He had his orders and he meant to carry them out. Rob Roy was
certainly trapped, he said. All the upper passes were in the hands of
the Highlanders of the western clans. Garschattachin had closed in on
the south with the Lennox Horse. The latest tidings of the freebooter
were in accordance with the information so reluctantly given by Dougal,
and were to the effect that Rob Roy had sent away the larger part of his
clan, and was seeking escape alone, or with very few in his company,
trusting most likely to his superior knowledge of the passes.

Meanwhile Dougal their guide answered with a natural impatience to all

complaints that he was leading them by difficult or dangerous roads.

"If," he said, with an appearance of reason, "gentlemans were seeking

the Red Gregarach, they must expect some wee danger. And if they likit
grand roads, they should hae bided at Glasgow."

The party was continuing to follow the narrow path by the lake, till
they came to a halt at a place where the path left the water and climbed
upward by several zigzags to the top of a rock, on which the advance
guard reported that they had seen the bonnets of the Highlanders as well
as the shining barrels of their long muskets.
The officer now ordered the Corporal with three files to dislodge the
enemy from this stronghold. The soldiers accordingly moved forward while
Captain Thornton, with the rest of his party, followed in support. But
immediate attack was prevented by the appearance of a woman on the top
of the rock.

"Stand!" she cried in commanding tones, "and tell me what you seek in
Mac-Gregor's country."

[Illustration: "THE soldiers accordingly moved forward while Captain

Thornton, with the rest of his party, followed in support. But immediate
attack was prevented by the appearance of a woman on the top of the
rock.

"'Stand!' she cried in commanding tones, 'and tell me what you seek in
Mac-Gregor's country.'"]

She was tall and imposing in figure. Her features had once been
handsome, but were now wasted with grief and passion. She wore a man's
plaid and belt, a man's bonnet was on her head, and she held a naked
sword in her hand.

"That's Helen Mac-Gregor, Rob's wife," said the Bailie, in a whisper of

alarm; "there will be broken heads before long!"

"What seek ye here?" she demanded again of Captain Thornton, who had
advanced to reconnoitre.

"We seek the outlaw Rob Roy Mac-Gregor Campbell," said the officer; "we
make no war upon women. Therefore offer no opposition to the King's
troops and assure yourself of civil treatment."

"I am no stranger to your tender mercies," the woman said, "you have
left me neither name nor fame--neither house nor hold, blanket nor
bedding, cattle to feed us, nor flocks to clothe us! Ye have taken from
us all--all! The very name of our ancestors ye have taken away, and now
ye come for our lives!"

"I seek no man's life," said the officer. "I only execute my orders.
Forward there--march!"

"Hurrah, boys--for Rob Roy's head and a purse of gold!" cried the
Corporal, taking the word from his officer.

He quickened his pace to a run, followed by his six men. But as they
reached the first loop of the ascent of the cliff, there came the flash
of a dozen muskets from both sides of the pass. The Corporal, shot
through the body, still struggled to reach the summit. He clung to the
rock, but after a desperate effort his grasp relaxed. He slipped from
the bare face of the cliff into the deep lake, where he perished. Of the
soldiers three fell with him, while the others retired as best they
could upon their main body.

"Grenadiers, to the front!" cried the steady voice of Captain Thornton,

"open your pouches--handle your grenades--blow up your matches--fall
on!"

The whole party advanced with a shout, headed by Captain Thornton, the
grenadiers preparing to throw their grenades among the bushes, and the
rank and file ready to support them in a close and combined assault.

Dougal, finding himself forgotten in the scuffle, had wisely crept into
the thicket which overhung the road, and was already mounting the cliff
with the agility of a wild-cat. Frank hastily followed his example. For
the spattering fire, directed on the advancing party of soldiers, the
loud reports of muskets, and the explosion of the grenades, made the
path no comfortable place for those without arms. The Bailie, however,
had only been able to scramble about twenty feet above the path when,
his foot slipping, he would certainly have fallen into the lake had not
the branch of a ragged thorn caught his riding-coat and supported him in
mid-air, where he hung very like a sign in front of a hostelry. Andrew
Fairservice had made somewhat better speed, but even he had only
succeeded in reaching a ledge from which he could neither ascend nor yet
come down. On this narrow promontory he footed it up and down, much like
a hen on a hot girdle, and roared for mercy in Gaelic and English
alternately, accordingly as he thought the victory inclined toward the
soldiers or went in favour of the outlaws.

But on this occasion it was the Highlanders who were destined to win.
They fought altogether under cover, and, from the number of musket
flashes they held also a great superiority in point of numbers. At all
events Frank soon saw the English officer stripped of his hat and arms,
and his men, with sullen and dejected countenances, delivering up their
muskets to the victorious foe.

The Bailie was, however, rescued by "the Dougal cratur," as the

magistrate called him, who cut off the tails of his coat and lowered him
to the ground. Then, when at last he was somewhat appeased, on account
of Frank's seeming desertion, he counselled that they should be in no
hurry to approach Mac-Gregor's wife, who would certainly be most
dangerous in the moment of victory.

Andrew Fairservice had already been espied on his airy perch, from which
the Highlanders soon made him descend, by threatening him with their
guns and even firing a stray shot or two over his head, so that
presently he fell to the earth among them. The outlaws stood ready to
receive him, and ere he could gain his legs, they had, with the most
admirable celerity, stripped him of periwig, hat, coat, doublet,
stockings, and shoes. In other circumstances this might have been
amusing for Frank to watch. For though Andrew fell to the earth a
well-clothed and decent burgher--he arose a forked, uncased, bald-pated,
and beggarly-looking scarecrow.

And indeed Frank and the Bailie would soon have shared the same fate,
had not Dougal appeared on the scene in the nick of time, and compelled
the plunderers to restore their spoil. So to Helen Mac-Gregor they were
taken, Dougal fighting and screaming all the way, evidently determined
to keep his captives to himself, or at least to prevent others from
claiming them.

With many but (considering the time and occasion) somewhat ill-chosen
words of familiarity, the Bailie claimed kindred with Rob Roy's wife.
But in this he did himself more harm than good, for his ill-timed
jocularity grated on Helen Mac-Gregor's ear, in her present mood of
exaltation, and she promptly commanded that the Sassenachs should one
and all be bound and thrown into the deeps of the lake.

But here Dougal threw himself between the angry woman and her prisoners
with such vehemence that he was able to stave off, at least for a time,
the execution of the supreme sentence. These men were, he said, friends
of the Chief and had come up on his assurance to meet him at the Clachan
of Aberfoil.

But at that very moment the wild strains of the pibroch were heard
approaching, and a strong body of Highlanders in the prime of life
arrived on the scene. It now appeared that those who had fought and
beaten the troops were either beardless boys or old men scarcely able to
hold a musket. But there was no joy of victory on the faces of the
newcomers. The pipes breathed a heart-breaking lament.

_Rob Roy was taken!_

"Taken," repeated Helen Mac-Gregor, "taken!--And do you live to say so?

Did I nurse you for this, coward dogs--that you should see your father
prisoner, and come back to tell it?"

The sons of Rob Roy, the elder James, tall and handsome, the younger
Robin Oig, ruddy and dark, both hung their heads. And after the first
burst of her indignation was over, the elder explained how Rob Roy had
been summoned to bide tryst with--(here Frank Osbaldistone missed the
name, but it sounded like his own). Having, however, some suspicion of
treachery, Rob Roy had ordered the messenger to be detained, and had
gone forth attended by only Angus Breck and little Rory. Within half an
hour Angus Breck came back with the tidings that the Chief had been
captured by a party of the Lennox militia under Galbraith of
Garschattachin, who were in waiting for him.

Helen Mac-Gregor had now two purposes to carry out. First, she sent
messengers in every direction to gather assistance for an immediate
attack on the Lowlanders, in order to effect the rescue of her husband.
Second, she ordered the spy, whose false message had sent her husband to
his doom, to be brought before her. For him there was no pity.

When he was haled, pale and trembling before the enraged wife of the
Mac-Gregor, what was Frank's astonishment to discover that he was none
other than Morris, the very same man who had accused him of the robbery
of his portmanteau at Squire Inglewood's, and whom he had last seen in
the Glasgow College Yards, walking and talking with Rashleigh
Osbaldistone.

A brief command to her followers--and the wretched man was bound. A

heavy stone was tied about his neck in a plaid, and he was hurled
instantly into the depths of the lake, where he perished, amid the loud
shouts of vindictive triumph which went up from the clan.

INTERLUDE OF EXPOSTULATION

"Oh, do go on," said Sweetheart, actually pushing

the narrator's arm, as if to shake more of the tale
out of him. "What a perfectly horrid place to stop
at! Tell us what happened after."

"Nothing more happened to Morris, I can promise

you that!" I replied.

"That's not nice of you," said Sweetheart. "I am

quite sorry for the poor man--in spite of all he
had done!"

"Well, I'm not," said Sir Toady Lion, truculently,

"he deserved it all, and more. He has done nothing
but tell lies and betray people all through the
story--right from the very beginning."

"Besides, he was afraid!" said Hugh John, with whom

this was the sin without forgiveness.

"Well," said Sweetheart, "so am I afraid often--of

mice, and rats, and horrid creeping things."

"Huh," said Sir Toady, crinkling up his nose, "you

are a girl--of course you are afraid!"

"And I know," retorted Sweetheart, "two noble,

brave, gallant, fearless, undaunted BOYS, who
daren't go up to the garret in the dark--_there!_"

"That's not fair," said Hugh John; "that was only

once, after father had been telling us about the
Hand-from-under-the-Bed that pulled the bedclothes
off! Anybody would have been frightened at that.
You, yourself--"

"Oh, but I don't pretend," cried Sweetheart; "I

don't need to. I am only a girl. But for all that,
I went up and lit the candle in a bedroom belonging
to two boys, who dared not even go up the stair
holding each other by the hand!"

"If you say that, I'll hit you," said Sir Toady.

"Will you!" said Sweetheart, clearing for action;

"we'll see about that. It's only mice _I_ am afraid
of--not cowardly boys!"

I hastened to still the rising storm, and in order

to bring the conversation back to the subject of
Rob Roy, I asked Hugh John if this were not more to
his taste in the matter of heroes.

"Oh, Rob Roy's all right," he said; "that is, when

once you get to him. But Frank Osbaldistone is just
like the rest--always being tied up, or taken round
where he doesn't want to go. Besides, he ran away
at the battle!"

"Well," said I, "he had no arms, and besides it was

not his quarrel. He couldn't fight either for the
soldiers or for the Highlanders. At any rate, you
can't deny that he did fight with Rashleigh in the
College Yards of Glasgow!"

"Yes, and he got wounded. And then Rob Roy

threatened to lick them both--I don't count that
much!" said the contemner of heroes. "But, at any
 rate, it was something. And he didn't go spooning
about after girls--that's good, anyway."

"Don't be too sure," said Sweetheart; "there's Die

Vernon in the background."

"Well, of course, a fellow _has_ to do some of it

if he's a hero," said Hugh John, who has always
high ideas of the proper thing; "it's in his part,
you see, and he has to--else he wouldn't be
respected. But I think if ever I had to be a hero,
I would dress up Sir Toady for the girl's part.
Then if he monkeyed too much, why--I could welt him
well after. But (he added with a sigh), with a
girl, you can't, of course."

"Well, anyway," said Sweetheart, thinking that

possibly the tale-teller might feel aggrieved at
these uncomplimentary remarks, "_I_ think it is
just a beautiful story, and I love the dear Bailie
for being willing to go all that way with Frank,
and get hung up in the tree by the coat-tails and
all!"

"Rats!" said Hugh John, contemptuously, "think if

he had known _that_, he would ever have left
Glasgow--not much!"

"Well, it was beautiful, I think," said Sweetheart,

"but I _am_ sorry that they drowned the poor man
Morris, especially when he was so very frightened."

But the instant indignant outcry of the boys

silenced her. Lochs twelve feet deep, it speedily
appeared, ought to be provided by law everywhere
over the kingdoms three, for the accommodation of
such "sweeps" and "sneaks" and "cowards."

Then Mistress Margaret spoke up for the first time.

She had been sitting with her eyes fixed dreamily
on the sparkle of the logs in the library
fireplace.

"What a blessing it is," she said, "that this is a

rainy Saturday, and so we do not need to wait for
more. Please go on with the story--JUST where you
left off."

And Maid Margaret's form of government being

absolute monarchy, I did so, and the result was

THE THIRD TALE FROM "ROB ROY"

I. IN THE HANDS OF THE PHILISTINES

AFTER the victory of the Highlanders and the drowning of Morris the spy,
it was for some little while touch-and-go whether the Bailie and Frank
should be made to follow him to the bottom of the loch. But at last
Frank was ordered to go as an ambassador to those who had captured Rob
Roy, while the Bailie with Captain Thornton and all the other prisoners
remained as hostages in the hands of the victorious Helen.

This was the message he was to carry to the Sassenach.

The whole district of the Lennox would be ravished if the Mac-Gregor

were not set free within twelve hours. Farmhouses would be burned,
stack-yard and byre made desolate. In every house there would be a
crying of the death wail--the coronach of sorrow. Furthermore, to begin
with, Helen Mac-Gregor promised that if her request was not granted
within the time specified, she would send them this Glasgow Bailie, with
the Saxon Captain, and all the captive soldiers, bundled together in a
plaid, and chopped into as many pieces as there were checks in the
tartan!

When the angry Chieftainess paused in her denunciations, the cool level
voice of the soldier struck in: "Give my compliments--Captain Thornton's
of the Royal's--to the commanding officer, and tell him to do his duty
and secure his prisoner, without wasting a thought on me. If I have been
fool enough to let myself be led into this trap, I am at least wise
enough to know how to die for it without disgracing the service. I am
only sorry for my poor fellows," he added, "fallen into such butcherly
hands!"

But the Bailie's message was far different in tone.

"Whisht, man, whisht," he cried, "are ye weary of your life? Ye'll gie
_my_ service, Bailie Nicol Jarvie's service--a magistrate o' Glasgow, as
his father was before him--to the commanding officer, and tell him that
there are here a wheen honest men in sore trouble, and like to come to
mair. And tell him that the best thing he can do for the common good is
just to let Rob come his ways up the glen, and nae mair about it! There
has been some ill done already, but as it has lighted mostly on the
exciseman Morris it will not be muckle worth making a stir about!"

So young Hamish Mac-Gregor led Frank Osbaldistone across the mountains

to the place where his father's captors, the horsemen of the Lennox, had
taken up their position on a rocky eminence, where they would be safe
from any sudden attack of the mountaineers.

Before parting he made Frank promise not to reveal, either who had
guided him thither, or where he had parted from his conductor. Happily
Frank was not asked either of these questions. He and Andrew (who, in a
tattered cloak and with a pair of brogues on his feet, looked like a
Highland scarecrow) were soon perceived by the sentries and conducted to
the presence of the commanding officer, evidently a man of rank, in a
steel cuirass, crossed by the ribband of the Thistle, to whom the
others seemed to pay great deference. This proved to be no other than
his Grace the Duke of Montrose, who in person had come to conduct the
operations against his enemy, Rob Roy.

Frank's message was instantly listened to, and very clearly and
powerfully he pointed out what would occur if Rob Roy were not suffered
to depart. But the Duke bade him return to those who sent him, and tell
them that if they touched so much as a hair upon the heads of their
hostages, he would make their glens remember it for a hundred years. As
for Rob Roy, he must surely die!

But Frank Osbaldistone pointed out that to return with such a message
would be to go to certain death, and pleaded for some reply which might
save the lives of Captain Thornton, the Bailie, and the soldiers who
were captive in Helen Mac-Gregor's hands upon the hostile shores of Loch
Ard.

"Why, if you cannot go yourself, send your servant!" returned the Duke.
At which Andrew burst forth. He had had, he said, enough and to spare of
Highland hospitality.

"The deil be in my feet," quoth Andrew, "if I go the length of my toe

on such an errand. Do the folk think I have a spare windpipe in my
pocket, after John Highlandman has slit this one with his jocteleg? Or
that I can dive down at one side of a Highland loch and come up at the
other like a sheldrake? Na, na, every one for himself, and God for us
all! Folk may just go on their own errands. Rob Roy is no concern of
mine. He never came near my native parish of Dreepdaily to steal either
pippin or pear from me or mine!"

The Duke seemed much affected by the hard case of the King's officer,
but he replied that the state of the country must come first, and it was
absolutely necessary that Rob Roy should die. He held to this resolution
even when Galbraith of Garschattachin and others of his followers seemed
inclined to put in a good word for Rob. He was about to examine the
prisoner further, when a Highlander brought him a letter which seemed to
cause the great man much annoyance. It announced that the Highland
clans, on whom the Lowlanders had been relying, had made a separate
peace with the enemy and had gone home.

As the night was now fast coming on, the Duke ordered Garschattachin to
draw off his party in one direction, while he himself would escort the
prisoner to a place called Duchray.

"Here's auld ordering and counter-ordering," growled Garschattachin

between his teeth, "but bide a wee--we may, ere long, play at Change
Seats--for the King's coming!"

The two divisions of cavalry began to move down the valley at a slow
trot. One party, that commanded by Galbraith, turned to the right, where
they were to spend the night in an old castle, while the other, taking
along with them Frank Osbaldistone, escorted the prisoner to a place of
safety. Rob Roy was mounted behind one of the strongest men present, one
Ewan of Brigglands, to whom he was fastened by a horse-belt passed round
both and buckled before the yeoman's breast. Frank was set on a
troop-horse and placed immediately behind. They were as closely
surrounded by soldiers as the road would permit, and there were always
one or two troopers, pistol in hand, riding on either side of Rob Roy.

Nevertheless the dauntless outlaw was endeavouring all the time to

persuade Ewan of Brigglands to give him a last chance for his life.

"Your father, Ewan," he said, so low that Frank had difficulty in

catching the words, "would not thus have carried an old friend to the
shambles, like a calf, for all the dukes in Christendom!"

To this Ewan returned no answer--only shrugging his shoulders as a sign

that what he was doing was by no choice of his own.

"And when the Mac-Gregors come down the glen," the voice of the tempter
went on in Ewan's ear, "and ye see empty folds, a bloody hearthstone,
and the fire flashing out between the rafters of your house, ye may be
thinking then, Ewan, that were your friend Rob Roy to the fore, you
might have had that safe, which it will make your heart sore to lose!"

They were at this time halted on the river-bank, waiting for the signal
to bring over the Mac-Gregor. Rob made one last attempt.

"It's a sore thing," said Rob Roy, still closer in the ear of his
conductor, "that Ewan of Brigglands, whom Rob Roy has helped with hand,
sword, and purse, should mind a gloom from a great man more than a
friend's life."

Ewan, sorely agitated, was silent.

Then came the Duke's loud call from the opposite bank, "Bring over the
prisoner!"

Dashing forward precipitately, Ewan's horse, with the two men on his
back, entered the water. A soldier kept back Frank from following. But
in the waning light he could see the Duke getting his people into order
across the river, when suddenly a splash and a cry warned him that Rob
had prevailed on Ewan of Brigglands to give him one more chance for
life.

II. THE ESCAPE

In a moment all was confusion. The Duke shouted and ordered. Men rode
hither and thither in the fast-falling darkness, some really anxious to
earn the hundred guineas which the Duke promised to the captor of his
foe, but the most part trying rather by shouting and confusion to cover
Rob's escape. At one time, indeed, he was hardly pressed, several shots
coming very near him before he could lose himself in the darkness. He
was compelled to come to the surface to breathe, but in some way he
contrived to loosen his plaid, which, floating down the stream, took off
the attention of his more inveterate pursuers while he himself swam into
safety.

In the confusion Frank had been left alone upon the bank, and there he
remained till he heard the baffled troopers returning, some with vows of
vengeance upon himself.

"Where is the English stranger?" called one; "it was he who gave Rob the
knife to cut the belt!"

"Cleave the pock-pudding to the chafts!" said another.

"Put a brace of balls into his brain-pan!" suggested yet another.

"Or three inches of cold iron into his briskit!"

So, in order to nullify these various amiable intentions, Frank

Osbaldistone leaped from his horse, and plunged into a thicket of alder
trees, where he was almost instantly safe from pursuit. It was now
altogether dark, and, having nowhere else to go, Frank resolved to
retrace his way back to the little inn at which he had passed the
previous night. The moon rose ere he had proceeded very far, bringing
with it a sharp frosty wind which made Frank glad to be moving rapidly
over the heather. He was whistling, lost in thought, when two riders
came behind him, ranging up silently on either side. The man on the
right of Frank addressed him in an English tongue and accent strange
enough to hear in these wilds.

"So ho, friend, whither so late?"

"To my supper and bed at Aberfoil!" replied Frank, curtly.

"Are the passes open?" the horseman went on, in the same commanding tone
of voice.

"I do not know," said Frank; "but if you are an English stranger, I
advise you to turn back till daybreak. There has been a skirmish, and
the neighbourhood is not perfectly safe for travellers."

"The soldiers had the worst of it, had they not?"

"They had, indeed--an officer's party was destroyed or made prisoners."

"Are you sure of that?" persisted the man on horseback.

"I was an unwilling spectator of the battle!" said Frank.

"Unwilling! Were not you engaged in it?"

"Certainly not," he answered, a little nettled at the man's tone. "I was
held a prisoner by the King's officer!"

"On what suspicion? And who and what are you?"

"I really do not know, sir," said Frank, growing quickly angry, "why I
should answer so many questions put to me by a stranger. I ask you no
questions as to your business here, and you will oblige me by making no
inquiries as to mine."

But a new voice struck in, in tones which made every nerve in the young
man's body tingle.

"Mr. Francis Osbaldistone," it said, "should not whistle his favourite

airs when he wishes to remain undiscovered."

And Diana Vernon, for it was she, wrapped in a horseman's cloak,

whistled in playful mimicry the second part of the tune, which had been
on Frank's lips as they came up with him.

"Great heavens, can it be you, Miss Vernon," cried Frank, when at last
he found words, "in such a spot--at such an hour--in such a lawless
country!"

While Frank was speaking, he was trying to gain a glimpse of her

companion. The man was certainly not Rashleigh. For so much he was
thankful, at least, nor could the stranger's courteous address proceed
from any of the other Osbaldistone brothers. There was in it too much
good breeding and knowledge of the world for that. But there was also
something of impatience in the attitude of Diana's companion, which was
not long in manifesting itself.

"Diana," he said, "give your cousin his property, and let us not spend
time here."

Whereupon Miss Vernon took out a
graver tone of feeling she said,
your better angel. Rashleigh has
and had we reached Aberfoil last
messenger to give you these. But
small case, and with a deeper and
"Dear cousin, you see I was born to be
been compelled to give up his spoil,
night, I would have found some
now I have to do the errand myself."

"Diana," said the horseman, "the evening grows late, and we are yet far
from our home."

"Pray consider, sir," she said, lightly answering him, "how recently I
have been under control. Besides, I have not yet given my cousin his
packet--or bidden him farewell--farewell forever! Yes, Frank, forever.
(She added the last words in a lower tone.) There is a gulf fixed
between us! Where I go, you must not follow--what we do, you must not
share in--farewell--be happy!"

In the attitude in which she bent from her Highland pony, the girl's
face, perhaps not altogether unintentionally, touched that of Frank
Osbaldistone. She pressed his hand, and a tear that had gathered on Die
Vernon's eyelash found its way to the young man's cheek.

That was all. It was but a moment, yet Frank Osbaldistone never forgot
that moment. He stood dumb and amazed with the recovered treasure in his
hand, mechanically counting the sparkles which flew from the horses'
hoofs which carried away his lost Diana and her unknown companion.

* * * * *

Frank was still dreaming over his almost unbelievable encounter with
Miss Vernon--more concerned perhaps, be it said, about the fact that she
had wept to part with him than about the recovery of his father's
papers, when another traveller overtook him, this time on foot.

"A braw nicht, Mr. Osbaldistone," said a voice which there was no
mistaking for that of the Mac-Gregor himself; "we have met at the mirk
hour before now, I am thinking!"

Frank congratulated the Chieftain heartily on his recent wonderful

escape from peril.

"Ay," said Rob Roy, coolly, "there is as much between the throat and the
halter as between the cup and the lip. But tell me the news!"

[Illustration: "IN the attitude in which she bent from her Highland
pony, the girl's face, perhaps not altogether unintentionally, touched
that of Frank Osbaldistone. She pressed his hand, and a tear that had
gathered on Die Vernon's eyelash found its way to the young man's
cheek."]

He laughed heartily at the exploits of the Bailie and the red-hot

coulter in the inn of Aberfoil, and at the apprehension of Frank and his
companion by the King's officer.
"As man lives by bread," he cried, "the buzzards have mistaken my friend
the Bailie for his Excellency, and you for Diana Vernon--oh, the most
egregious night owlets!"

"Miss Vernon," said Frank, trying to gain what information he could,

"does she still bear that name?"

But the wary Highlander easily evaded him.

"Ay, ay," he said, "she's under lawful authority now; and it's time, for
she's a daft hempie. It's a pity that his Excellency is a thought
elderly for her. The like of you or my son Hamish would have sorted
better in point of years."

This blow, which destroyed all Frank's hopes, quite silenced him--so
much so that Rob Roy had to ask if he were ill or wearied with the long
day's work, being, as he said, "doubtless unused to such things."

But in order to divert his attention Mac-Gregor asked him as to the

skirmish, and what had happened afterwards. It was with genuine agony
that Rob Roy listened to the tale which Frank had to tell--though he
modified, as far as he could, the treatment the Bailie and himself had
met with from the Mac-Gregors.

"And the excise collector," said Rob Roy; "I wish he may not have been
at the bottom of the ploy himself! I thought he looked very queer when I
told him that he must remain as a hostage for my safe return. I wager he
will not get off without ransom!"

"Morris," said Frank, with great solemnity, "has paid the last great
ransom of all!"

"Eh--what?" cried the Mac-Gregor, "what d'ye say? I trust it was in the
skirmish that he was killed?"

"He was slain in cold blood, after the fight was over, Mr. Campbell!"

"Cold blood!" he muttered rapidly between his teeth, "how fell this?
Speak out, man, and do not Mister or Campbell me--my foot is on my
native heath, and my name is Mac-Gregor!"

Without noticing the rudeness of his tone, Frank gave him a distinct
account of the death of Morris. Rob Roy struck the butt of his gun with
great vehemence on the ground, and broke out, "I vow to God, such a deed
might make one forswear kin, clan, country, wife, and bairns! And yet
the villain wrought long for it. He but drees the doom he intended for
me. Hanging or drowning--it is just the same. But I wish, for all that,
they had put a ball or a dirk through the traitor's breast. It will
cause talk--the fashion of his death--though all the world knows that
Helen Mac-Gregor has deep wrongs to avenge."

Whereupon he quitted the subject altogether, and spoke of Frank

Osbaldistone's affairs. He was glad to hear that he had received the
stolen papers from Diana Vernon's own hands.

"I was sure you would get them," he said; "the letter you brought me
contained his Excellency's pleasure to that effect, and it was for that
purpose I asked ye to come up the glen in order that I might serve you.
But his Excellency has come across Rashleigh first."
Rob Roy's words made much clear to the young man, yet some things
remained mysterious. He remembered that Diana Vernon had left the
library and immediately returned with the letter which was afterwards
claimed by Rob Roy in the tolbooth of Glasgow. The person whom he now
called his Excellency must therefore have been in Osbaldistone Hall at
the same time as himself, and unknown to all except Diana and possibly
to her cousin Rashleigh. Frank remembered the double shadows on the
windows, and thought that he could now see the reason of those.

But Rob would give him no clew as to who or what his Excellency was.

"I am thinking," he said cautiously, "that if you do not know that

already, it cannot be of much consequence for you to know at all. So I
will e'en pass over that part of it. But this I will tell you. His
Excellency was hidden by Diana Vernon in her own apartment at the Hall,
as best reason was, all the time you were there. Only Sir Hildebrand and
Rashleigh knew of it. You, of course, were out of the question, and as
for the young squires, they had not enough wit among the five of them to
call the cat from the cream!"

The two travellers, thus talking together, had approached within a

quarter of a mile from the village, when an outpost of Highlanders,
springing upon them, bade them stand and tell their business. The single
word _Gregarach_, pronounced in the deep commanding tones of Frank's
companion, sufficed to call forth an answering yell of joyous
recognition. The men threw themselves down before the escaped Chief,
clasping his knees, and, as it were, worshipping him with eyes and lips,
much as poor Dougal had done in the Glasgow tolbooth.

The very hills resounded with the triumph. Old and young, both sexes and
all ages, came running forth with shouts of jubilation, till it seemed
as if a mountain torrent was hurrying to meet the travellers. Rob Roy
took Frank by the hand, and he did not allow any to come near him till
he had given them to understand that his companion was to be well and
carefully treated.

So literally was this command acted upon, that for the time being Frank
was not even allowed the use of his limbs. He was carried--will he, nill
he--in triumph toward the inn of Mrs. MacAlpine. It was in Frank's heart
that he might possibly meet there with Diana Vernon, but when he entered
and looked around, the only known face in the smoky hovel was that of
the Bailie, who, with a sort of reserved dignity, received the greetings
of Rob Roy, his apologies for the indifferent accommodation which he
could give him, and his well-meant inquiries after his health.

"I am well, kinsman," said the Bailie, "one cannot expect to carry the
Salt Market of Glasgow at one's tail, as a snail does his shell. But I
am blithe to see that ye have gotten out of the hands of your
unfriends!"

The Bailie, however, cheered by Highland refreshment, presently unbent

and had many things to say. He would also have spoken concerning Helen
Mac-Gregor. But Rob stopped him.

"Say nothing of my wife," he said sternly; "of me, ye are welcome to

speak your full pleasure."

Next the Bailie offered to bind Rob's two sons as apprentices to the
weaving trade, which well-meant proposition produced from the outlaw the
characteristic anathema, mostly (and happily) conceived in Gaelic,
"_Ceade millia diaoul!_ My sons weavers! _Millia molligheart!_ But I
would rather see every loom in Glasgow, beam, traddles, and shuttles,
burnt in the deil's ain fire sooner!"

However Rob Roy honestly paid the Bailie his thousand merks, principal
and interest, in good French gold. And Frank quite won the outlaw's
heart by the suggestion that the foreign influence of the house of
Osbaldistone and Tresham could easily push the fortune of Hamish and
Robin in the service of the King of France or in that of his Majesty of
Spain. Rob could not for the present accept, he said. There was other
work to be done at home. But all the same he thanked him for the offer,
with, as it seemed, some considerable emotion. Already Frank was
learning the truth that a hard man is always more moved by what one may
do for his children, than with what one does for himself.

Lastly he sent "the Dougal cratur," dressed in Andrew Fairservice's

ancient garments, to see them safe upon their way. He had a boat in
waiting for them on Loch Lomond side, and there on the pebbles the
Bailie and his cousin bade each other farewell. They parted with much
mutual regard, and even affection--the Bailie at the last saying to Rob
Roy that if ever he was in need of a hundred "or even twa hundred pounds
sterling," he had only to send a line to the Salt Market. While the
chief answered that if ever anybody should affront his kinsman, the
Bailie had only to let him ken, and he would pull the ears out of his
head if he were the best man in Glasgow!

With these assurances of high mutual consideration, the boat bore away
for the southwest angle of the lake. Rob Roy was left alone on the
shore, conspicuous by his long gun, waving tartans, and the single tall
feather in his bonnet which denoted the chieftain.

The travellers arrived safely in Glasgow, when the Bailie went instantly
home, vowing aloud that since he had once more gotten within sight of
St. Mungo's steeple, it would be a long day and a short one before he
ventured out of eye-shot of it again.

As for Frank, he made his way to his lodgings in order to seek out Owen.
The door was opened by Andrew Fairservice, who set up a joyous shout,
and promptly ushered the young man into the presence of the Head Clerk.
But Mr. Owen was not alone. Mr. Osbaldistone the elder was there also,
and in another moment Frank was folded in his father's arms.

III. THE DEATH OF RASHLEIGH

* * * * *

Mr. Osbaldistone's first impulse seemed to be to preserve his dignity.

But nature was too strong for him.

"My son--my dear son!" he murmured.

The head of the firm of Osbaldistone and Tresham had returned from
Holland sooner than was expected, and with the resources which he had
gathered there, and being now in full credit, he had no difficulty in
solving the financial problems which had weighed so heavily upon the
house in his absence. He refused, however, every tender of apology from
MacVittie and Company, settled the balance of their account, and
announced to them that that page of their ledger, with all the
advantages connected with it, was closed to them forever.

Soon after the home-coming of Frank Osbaldistone from the Highlands and
his reconciliation with his father, the great Jacobite rebellion of 1715
broke out, in which the greater part of the Highlands burst into a
flame, as well as much of the more northerly parts of England. Sir
Hildebrand led out his sons to battle--all, that is to say, with the
exception of Rashleigh, who had changed his politics and become a spy on
behalf of the government of King George.

But it was not the will of Fate that the name of Osbaldistone should
make any figure in that short and inglorious campaign. Thorncliff was
killed in a duel with one of his brother officers. The sot Percie died
shortly after, according to the manner of his kind. Dickon broke his
neck in spurring a blood mare beyond her paces. Wilfred the fool died
fighting at Proud Preston on the day of the Barricades; and his
gallantry was no less that he could never remember an hour together for
which king he was doing battle.

John also behaved boldly and died of his wounds a few days after in the
prison of Newgate, to the despair of old Sir Hildebrand, who did not
long survive him. Indeed he willingly laid himself down to die, after
having first disinherited Rashleigh as a traitor, and left his much
encumbered estates to his nephew, Frank Osbaldistone.

Mr. Osbaldistone the elder now took an unexpected view of his son's
prospects. He had cared nothing for his family in the past--indeed,
never since he had been expelled from Osbaldistone Hall to make way for
his younger brother. But now he willingly spent his money in taking up
the mortgages upon the Osbaldistone estates, and he urged upon Frank the
necessity of going down at once to the Hall, lest Rashleigh should get
before him in that possession which is nine points of the law.

So to Osbaldistone Hall went Frank once more, his heart not a little
sore within him for the good days he had spent in it, and especially
because of the thought that he would now find there no madcap Die
Vernon to tease and torment him out of his life.

First of all, to make his title clear, Frank had been desired to visit
the hospitable house of old Justice Inglewood, with whom Sir Hildebrand
had deposited his will. As it chanced, it was in that good gentleman's
power to give the young man some information which interested him more
than the right of possession to many Osbaldistone Halls.

After dinner in the evening Frank and the Justice were sitting together,
when all of a sudden Squire Inglewood called upon his companion to
pledge a bumper to "dear Die Vernon, the rose of the wilderness, the
heath-bell of Cheviot, that blossom transported to an infamous convent!"

"Is not Miss Vernon, then, married?" cried Frank, in great astonishment,
"I thought his Excellency--"

"Pooh--pooh! His Excellency and his Lordship are all a humbug now, you
know," said the Justice; "mere St. Germains titles--Earl of Beauchamp
and ambassador plenipotentiary from France, when the Duke Regent scarce
knew that he lived, I daresay. But you must have seen old Sir Frederick
Vernon at the hall, when he played the part of Father Vaughan?"
"Good Heavens," cried Frank, "then Father Vaughan was Miss Vernon's
father?"

"To be sure he was," said the Justice, coolly; "there's no use keeping
the secret now, for he must be out of the country by this
time--otherwise no doubt it would be my duty to apprehend him. Come, off
with your bumper to my dear lost Die!"

So Frank fared forth to Osbaldistone Hall, uncertain whether to be glad

or sorry at Squire Inglewood's news. Finally he decided to be glad--or
at least as glad as he could. For Diana, though equally lost to him, was
at least not wedded to any one else.

Syddall, the old butler of Sir Hildebrand, seemed at first very

unwilling to admit them, but Frank's persistence, together with Andrew
Fairservice's insolence, made a way into the melancholy house. Frank
ordered a fire to be lighted in the library. Syddall tried to persuade
him to take up his quarters elsewhere, on the plea that the library had
not been sat in for a long time, and that the chimney smoked.

To the old man's confusion, however, when they entered the room, a fire
was blazing in the grate. He took up the tongs to hide his confusion,
muttering, "It is burning clear now, but it smoked woundily in the
morning!"

Next Frank ordered Andrew to procure him two stout fellows of the
neighbourhood on whom he could rely, who would back the new proprietor,
in case of Rashleigh attempting any attack during Frank's stay in the
home of his fathers.

Andrew soon returned with a couple of his friends--or, as he described

them, "sober, decent men, weel founded in doctrinal points, and, above
all, as bold as lions."

Syddall, however, shook his head at sight of them.

"I maybe cannot expect that your Honour should put confidence in what I
say, but it is Heaven's truth for all that. Ambrose Wingfield is as
honest a man as lives, but if there be a false knave in all the country,
it is his brother Lancie. The whole country knows him to be a spy for
Clerk Jobson on the poor gentlemen that have been in trouble. But he's a
dissenter, and I suppose that's enough nowadays."

The evening darkened down, and trimming the wood fire in the old library
Frank sat on, dreaming dreams in which a certain lady occupied a great
place. He chanced to lift his eyes at a sound which seemed like a sigh,
and lo! Diana Vernon stood before him. She was resting on the arm of a
figure so like the portrait on the wall that involuntarily Frank raised
his eyes to the frame to see whether it was not indeed empty.

But the figures were neither painted canvas nor yet such stuff as dreams
are made of. Diana Vernon and her father--for it was they--stood before
the young man in actual flesh and blood. Frank was so astonished that
for a while he could not speak, and it was Sir Frederick who first broke
the silence.

"We are your suppliants, Mr. Osbaldistone," he said; "we claim the
refuge and protection of your roof, till we can pursue a journey where
dungeons and death gape for me at every step!"

"Surely you cannot suppose--" Frank found words with great

difficulty--"Miss Vernon cannot suppose that I am so ungrateful--that I
could betray any one--much less you!"

"I know it," said Sir Frederick, "though I am conferring on you a

confidence which I would have been glad to have imposed on any one else.
But my fate, which has chased me through a life of perils, is now
pressing me hard, and, indeed, leaving me no alternative."

At this moment the door opened, and the voice of Andrew Fairservice was
heard without. "I am bringing in the candles--ye can light them when ye
like--'can do' is easy carried about with one!"

Frank had just time to rush to the door and thrust the officious rascal
out, shutting the door upon him. Then, remembering the length of his
servant's tongue, he made haste to follow him to the hall to prevent his
gabbling of what he might have seen. Andrew's voice was loud as Frank
opened the door.

"What is the matter with you, you fool?" he demanded; "you stare and
look wild as if you had seen a ghost."

"No--no--nothing," stammered Andrew, "only your Honour was pleased to be

hasty!"

Frank Osbaldistone immediately dismissed the two men whom Andrew had
found for him, giving them a crown-piece to drink his health, and they
withdrew, apparently contented and unsuspicious. They certainly could
have no further talk with Andrew that night, and it did not seem
possible that in the few moments which Andrew had spent in the kitchen
before Frank's arrival, he could have had time to utter two words.

But sometimes only two words can do a great deal of harm. On this
occasion they cost two lives.

"You now know my secret," said Diana Vernon; "you know how near and dear
is the relative who has so long found shelter here. And it will not
surprise you, that, knowing such a secret, Rashleigh should rule me with
a rod of iron."

But in spite of all that had happened, Sir Frederick was a strict and
narrow Catholic, and Frank found him more than ever determined to
sacrifice his daughter to the life of the convent.

"She has endured trials," he said, "trials which might have dignified
the history of a martyr. She has spent the day in darkness and the night
in vigil, and never breathed a syllable of weakness or complaint. In a
word, Mr. Osbaldistone, she is a worthy offering to that God to whom I
dedicate her, as all that is left dear or precious to Frederick Vernon!"

Frank felt stunned and bewildered when at last they retired. But he had
sufficient forethought to order a bed to be made up for him in the
library, and dismissed Syddall and Andrew with orders not to disturb him
till seven o'clock in the morning.

That night Frank lay long awake, and was at last dropping over to sleep
when he was brought back to consciousness by a tremendous noise at the
front door of Osbaldistone Hall. He hastened downstairs only in time to
hear Andrew Fairservice bidding Syddall stand aside.

"We hae naething to fear if they come in King George's name," he was
saying; "we hae spent baith bluid and gold for him."

In an agony of terror Frank could hear bolt after bolt withdrawn by the
officious scoundrel, who continued to boast all the while of his
master's loyalty to King George. He flew instantly to Diana's room. She
was up and dressed.

"We are familiar with danger," she said with a sad smile. "I have the
key of the little garden door. We will escape by it. Only keep them a
few moments in play! And dear, dear Frank, again--for the last time,
farewell!"

By this time the men were on the stairway, and presently rapping on the
library door.

"You robber dogs!" cried Frank, wilfully misunderstanding their purpose;

"if you do not instantly quit the house, I will fire a blunderbuss upon
you through the door!"

"Fire a fool's bauble," returned Andrew Fairservice; "it's Clerk Jobson

with a legal warrant--"

"To search for, take, and apprehend," said the voice of that abominable
pettifogger, "the bodies of certain persons in my warrant named, charged
of high treason under the 13th of King William, chapter third."

The violence on the door was renewed.

"I am rising, gentlemen," said Frank, trying to gain as much time as

possible; "commit no violence--give me leave to look at your warrant,
and if it is formal and legal, I shall not oppose it."

"God save great George our King," cried Andrew Fairservice, "I telled ye
that ye would find no Jacobites here!"

At last the door had to be opened, when Clerk Jobson and several
assistants entered. The lawyer showed a warrant for the arrest of Diana
Vernon, her father,--and, to his surprise, of Frank himself.

Clerk Jobson, evidently well-informed, went directly to Diana's chamber.

"The hare has stolen away," he said brutally, "but her form is still
warm. The greyhounds will have her by the haunches yet."

A scream from the garden announced that he had prophesied too truly. In
five minutes more Rashleigh entered the library with Diana and her
father, Sir Frederick, as his prisoners.

"The fox," he said, "knew his old earth, but he forgot it could be
stopped by a careful huntsman. I had not forgot the garden gate, Sir
Frederick--or, if the title suits you better, my most noble Lord
Beauchamp!"

"Rashleigh," said Sir Frederick, "thou art a most detestable villain!"

"I better deserved the name, my Lord," said Rashleigh, turning his eyes
piously upward, "when under an able tutor I sought to introduce civil
war into a peaceful country. But I have since done my best to atone for
my errors."

Frank Osbaldistone could hold out no longer.

"If there is one thing on earth more hideous than another," he cried,
"it is villainy masked by hypocrisy!"

"Ha, my gentle cousin," said Rashleigh, holding a candle toward Frank

and surveying him from head to foot, "right welcome to Osbaldistone
Hall. I can forgive your spleen. It is hard to lose an estate and a
sweetheart in one night. For now we must take possession of this poor
manor-house in the name of the lawful heir, Sir Rashleigh Osbaldistone!"

But though Rashleigh braved it out thus, he was clearly far from
comfortable, and especially did he wince when Diana told him that what
he had now done had been the work of an hour, but that it would furnish
him with reflections for a lifetime.

"And of what nature these will be," she added, "I leave to your own
conscience, which will not slumber forever!"

So presently the three prisoners were carried off. Syddall and Andrew
were ordered to be turned out of the house, the latter complaining
bitterly.

"I only said that surely my master was speaking to a ghost in the
library--and that villain Lancie--thus to betray an auld friend that has
sung aff the same Psalm-book wi' him for twenty years!"

However, Andrew had just got clear of the avenue when he fell among a
drove of Highland cattle, the drivers of which questioned him tightly as
to what had happened at the Hall. They then talked in whispers among
themselves till the lumbering sound of a coach was heard coming down the
road from the house. The Highlanders listened attentively. The escort
consisted of Rashleigh and several peace-officers.

So soon as the carriage had passed the avenue gate, it was shut behind
the cavalcade by a Highlandman, stationed there for the purpose. At the
same time the carriage was impeded in its further progress by some
felled trees which had been dragged across the road. The cattle also got
in the way of the horses, and the escort began to drive them off with
their whips.

"Who dares abuse our cattle," said a rough voice; "shoot him down,
Angus!"

"A rescue--a rescue!" shouted Rashleigh, instantly comprehending what

had taken place, and, firing a pistol, he wounded the man who had
spoken.

"_Claymore!_" cried the leader of the Highlanders, and an affray

instantly engaged. The officers of the law, unused to such prompt
bloodshed, offered little real resistance. They galloped off in
different directions as fast as their beasts would carry them.
Rashleigh, however, who had been dismounted, maintained on foot a
desperate and single-handed conflict with the leader of the band. At
last he dropped.

"Will you ask forgiveness for the sake of God, King James, and auld
friendship?" demanded a voice which Frank knew well.

"No, never!" cried Rashleigh, fiercely.

"Then, traitor, die in your treason!" retorted Mac-Gregor, and plunged

his sword into the prostrate antagonist.

Rob Roy then drew out the attorney Clerk Jobson from the carriage, more
dead than alive, and threw him under the wheel.

"Mr. Osbaldistone," he said in Frank's ear, "you have nothing to fear.

Your friends will soon be in safety. Farewell, and forget not the
Mac-Gregor!"

* * * * *

"_And that_," I said, "_is all!_"

But I was instantly overwhelmed by the rush of a

living wave.

"No, no," cried the children, throwing themselves

upon me, "you must tell us what became of Rob
Roy--of the Bailie--of Dougal!"

These demands came from the boys.

"And if Diana married Frank, or went to the

convent?" interjected Sweetheart.

"Well," I said, "I can soon answer all these

questions. Sir Frederick died soon after, but
before his end he relieved his daughter from her
promise to enter a convent. She married Mr. Frank
Osbaldistone instead."

"And lived happy ever after?" added Maid Margaret,

who was at the "fairy princess" stage of
literature.

"Except when she got cross with him," commented Sir

Toady, an uncompromising realist, with pessimistic
views on womenkind.

"And Rob Roy held his ground among his native

mountains until he died."

"Tell us about the Bailie," said Hugh John; "I

liked the Bailie--he's jolly!"

I told him that he was far from being alone in that

opinion.

"The Bailie," I answered, "lived, as the Maid says,

happily ever after, having very wisely married his
servant Mattie. He carried on all the northern
 affairs of Osbaldistone and Tresham, now a greater
commercial house than ever, and lived to be Lord
Provost of the city of Glasgow."

"Let Glasgow flourish!" cried Sir Toady,

spontaneously. And the audience concluded the
fourth tale and last from _Rob Roy_ with a very
passable imitation of a Highland yell.

THE END OF THE LAST TALE FROM "ROB ROY."

RED CAP TALES

TOLD FROM

THE ANTIQUARY

THE FIRST TALE FROM "THE ANTIQUARY"

THE children lay prone on the floor of the library

in various positions of juvenile comfort, watching
the firewood in the big wide grate sparkle and
crackle, or the broad snowflakes "spat" against the
window-panes, where they stuck awhile as if gummed,
and then began reluctantly to trickle down. As Sir
Toady Lion said, "It was certainly a nice day on
which to stop IN!"

The choice of the book from which to tell the next

Red Cap Tale had been a work of some difficulty.
Hugh John had demanded _Ivanhoe_, chiefly because
there was a chapter in it about shooting with the
bow, the which he had read in his school reader
when he ought to have been preparing his Latin. Sir
Toady wanted _The Fortunes of Nigel_, because the
title sounded adventurous. Sweetheart, who has been
sometimes to the play, was insistent for _The Bride
of Lammermoor_, while as to Maid Margaret, she was
indifferent, so long as it was "nice and eecitin'."

But the tale-teller, being in the position of the

Man-with-the-Purse (or in that of the House of
Commons with regard to the granting of supplies),
held to it that, in spite of its "growed-up" title,
_The Antiquary_ would be the most suitable. First,
because we had agreed to go right through the
Scottish stories; secondly, because _The Antiquary_
was one of the first which Sir Walter wrote; and
thirdly and lastly, because he, the tale-teller
aforesaid, "felt like it."
 At this, I saw Hugh John look at his brother with
the quick glance of intelligence which children
exchange when they encounter the Superior Force.

That unspoken message said clearly and neatly,

"Pretty thing asking us to select the book, when he
had it all settled from the start!"

Nevertheless, I made no remark, but with my eyes on

the click of Sweetheart's knitting needles (for in
the intervals of nursery wars Sweetheart grows a
diligent housewife), I began in the restful silence
of that snowy Saturday my first tale from _The
Antiquary_.

I. THE MYSTERIOUS MR. LOVEL

As though all the tin pots on a tinker's wagon had been jolted and
jangled, the bells of St. Giles's steeple in Edinburgh town, had just
told the hour of noon. It was the time for the Queensferry diligence
(which is to say, omnibus) to set out for the passage of the Firth, if
it were to catch the tide of that day, and connect with the boat which
sets passengers from the capital upon the shores of Fife.

A young man had been waiting some time. An old one had just bustled up.
"Deil's in it!" cried the latter, with a glance at the dial of the
church clock, "I am late, after all!"

But the young man, saluting, informed him that, instead of being late,
he was early--so far, that is, as the coach was concerned. It had not
yet appeared upon the stand. This information first relieved the mind of
the old gentleman, and then, after a moment or two, began (no difficult
matter) to arouse his anger.

"Good woman! good woman!" he cried down one of the area stairs, common
in the old town of Edinburgh. Then he added in a lower tone, "Doited old
hag! she's deaf as a post. I say, Mrs. Macleuchar!"

But Mrs. Macleuchar, the proprietress of the Queensferry diligence, was

in no hurry to face the wrath of the public. She served her customer
quietly in the shop below, ascended the stairs, and when at last on the
level of the street, she looked about, wiped her spectacles as if a mote
upon them might have caused her to overlook so minute an object as an
omnibus, and exclaimed, "Did ever anybody see the like o' this?"

"Yes, you abominable woman," cried the traveller, "many have seen the
like before, and all will yet see the like again, that have aught to do
with your trolloping sex!"

And walking up and down the pavement in front of Mrs. Macleuchar's

booth, he delivered a volley of abuse each time he came in front of it,
much as a battleship fires a broadside as she passes a hostile fortress,
till the good woman was quite overwhelmed.

"Oh! man! man!" she cried, "take back your three shillings and make me
quit o' ye!"
"Not so fast--not so fast," her enemy went on; "will three shillings
take me to Queensferry according to your deceitful programme? Or will it
pay my charges there, if, by your fault, I should be compelled to tarry
there a day for want of tide? Will it even hire me a pinnace, for which
the regular price is five shillings?"

But at that very moment the carriage lumbered up, and the two travellers
were carried off, the elder of them still leaning out of the window and
shouting reproaches at the erring Mrs. Macleuchar.

The slow pace of the broken-down horses, and the need to replace a shoe
at a wayside smithy, still further delayed the progress of the vehicle,
and when they arrived at Queensferry, the elder traveller, Mr. Jonathan
Oldbuck by name, saw at once, by the expanse of wet sand and the number
of the black glistening rocks visible along the shore, that the time of
tide was long past.

But he was less angry than his young companion, Mr. Lovel, had been led
to expect from the scolding he had bestowed upon Mrs. Macleuchar in the
city. On the way the two had discovered a kindred taste for antique
literature and the remains of the past, upon which last Mr. Jonathan
Oldbuck was willing to discourse, as the saying is, till all was blue.

The Hawes Inn sat (and still sits) close by the wash of the tides which
scour the Firth of Forth on its southern side. It was then an
old-fashioned hostelry, overgrown on one side with ivy, and with the
woods of Barnbogle growing close down behind it. The host was very
willing to provide dinner and shelter for the two guests, and, indeed,
there was a suspicion that Mr. Mackitchinson of the Hawes was in league
with Mrs. Macleuchar of the Tron, and that this fact went far to explain
the frequent late appearance of the coach with "the three yellow wheels
and a black one" belonging to that lady, upon the High Street of
Edinburgh.

At the Hawes Inn, therefore, the time of waiting before dinner was
sufficient for young Mr. Lovel to step out and discover who his amusing
and irascible companion of voyage might be. At South Queensferry every
one knew Mr. Oldbuck of Monkbarns. Bred a lawyer, he had never
practised, being ever more interested in the antiquities of his native
country than in sitting in an office among legal documents and quill
pens. The death of his brother had made him heir to all his father's
property, and in due time he had settled comfortably down to country
life and Roman inscriptions at the family seat of Monkbarns, near by to
the town of Fairport, the very town to which Mr. Lovel was at that
moment making his way.

Mr. Oldbuck, though equally anxious, was unable to discover anything

about his travelling companion. He had, however, discussed the elder
dramatists with him, and found him so strong in the subject, that his
mind, always searching for the reasons of things, promptly set the young
man down as an actor travelling to Fairport, to fulfil an engagement at
the theatre there.

"Yes," he said to himself, "Lovel and Belville--these are just the names
which youngsters are apt to assume on such occasions--on my life I am
sorry for the lad!"

It was this thought which made Mr. Oldbuck, though naturally and of
habit very careful of his sixpences, slip round to the back of the Hawes
Inn and settle the bill with the landlord. It was this which made him
propose to pay two-thirds of the post-chaise which was to carry them
across to Fairport, when at last they set foot on the northern side of
the Firth. Arrived at their destination, Mr. Oldbuck recommended Lovel
to the care of a decent widow, and so left him with many friendly
expressions, in order to proceed to his own house of Monkbarns.

But no Mr. Lovel appeared on the boards of the theatre at Fairport. On

the contrary, not even the town gossips, who, having no business of
their own to attend to, take charge of other people's, could find out
anything about him. Furthermore they could say no evil. The Sheriff
called upon him, but the stranger had evidently fully satisfied the man
of law, for on his return home he sent him an invitation to dinner,
which was, however, civilly declined. He paid his bills and meddled with
no one. All which being reported, more or less faithfully, to the
proprietor of Monkbarns, caused the young man to rise in his estimation,
as one who had too much good sense to trouble himself with the "bodies"
of Fairport.

It was five days before Lovel made his way out to the House of Monkbarns
to pay his respects. The mansion had once on a time been the storehouse
of the vanished Abbey. There the monks had stored the meal which the
people dwelling on their lands brought to them instead of rent. Lovel
found it a rambling, hither-and-thither old house, with tall hedges of
yew all about it. These last were cut into arm-chairs, crowing cocks,
and St. Georges in the act of slaying many dragons, all green and
terrible. But one great yew had been left untouched by the shears, and
under it Lovel found his late fellow-traveller sitting, spectacles on
nose, reading the _London Chronicle_.

The old gentleman immediately rose to welcome his guest, and having
taken him indoors, he guided him with some difficulty to the "den," as
he called his study. Here Mr. Oldbuck found his niece in company with a
serving-maid, both in the midst of a thick cloud of dust, endeavouring
to reduce the place to some order and cleanliness.

The Antiquary instantly exploded, as is the manner of all book-lovers

when their "things" are disarranged.

"How dare you, or Jenny either, presume to meddle with my private

affairs? Go sew your sampler, you monkey, and do not let me find you
here again as you value your ears--"

"Why, uncle," said the girl, who still stood her ground, "your room was
not fit to be seen, and I just came to see that Jenny laid everything
down where she took it up."

In the midst of a second discharge of great guns the young lady made her
escape, with a half-humorous courtesy to Lovel. It was, indeed, some
time before the young man could see, through the dense clouds of dust
(which, as the Antiquary said, had been ancient and peaceful enough only
an hour ago) the chamber of Mr. Oldbuck, full of great books, littered
with ancient maps, engravings, scraps of parchment, old armour,
broadswords, and Highland targets.

In the midst of all crouched a huge black cat, glaring steadily with
great yellow eyes out of the murky confusion, like the familiar spirit
of this wizard's den.
So, after showing Lovel many of his most valuable antiquities, and in
especial his treasured books, Mr. Oldbuck gladly led the way into the
open air. He would take his visitor, he said, to the Kaim of Kinprunes.
It was on his own land, he affirmed, and not very far away. Arrived at a
little barren eminence, the Antiquary demanded of his friend what he
saw.

"A very fine view!" said Lovel, promptly.

But this was not the response for which the proud owner was waiting. He
went on to ask Lovel if he did not see anything remarkable on the
surface of the ground.

"Why, yes," said Lovel, readily, "I do see something like a ditch,
indistinctly marked."

At this, however, the Antiquary was most indignant.

"Indistinct!" he cried, "why, the indistinctness must be in your own

eyes. It was clear even to that light-headed lassie, my niece, at the
first glance. Here on this very Kaim of Kinprunes was fought out the
final conflict between Agricola and the Caledonians! The record
says--let me remind you--'in sight of the Grampian Hills.' Yonder they
are! _In conspectu classis_,--'in sight of the fleet,'--and where will
you find a finer bay than that on your right hand? From this very
fortification, doubtless, Agrippa looked down on the immense army of
Caledonians occupying the slopes of the opposite hill, the infantry
rising rank over rank, the cavalry and charioteers scouring the more
level space below. From this very _pr�torium_--"

But a voice from behind interrupted the Antiquary's poetic description,

for his voice had mounted almost into a kind of ecstasy.

"_Pr�torian here--Pr�torian there--I mind the bigging o't!_"

Both at once turned round, Lovel surprised, and the Antiquary both
surprised and angry. An old man in a huge slouched hat, a long white
grizzled beard, weather-beaten features of the colour of brick-dust, a
long blue gown with a pewter badge on the right arm, stood gazing at
them. In short, it was Edie Ochiltree, the King's Blue-Gownsman, which
is to say, privileged beggar.

"What is that ye say, Edie?" demanded Oldbuck, thinking that his ears
must have deceived him.

"About this bit bower, Monkbarns," said the undaunted Edie, "I mind the
biggin' (building) o' it!"

"The deil ye do!" said the Antiquary with scorn in his voice; "why, you
old fool, it was here before ye were born, and will be here after ye are
hanged."

"Hanged or drowned, alive or dead," said Edie, sticking to his guns, "I
mind the biggin' o't!"

"You--you--you," stammered the Antiquary, between confusion and anger,

"you strolling old vagabond, what ken ye about it?"

"Oh, I ken just this about it, Monkbarns," he answered, "and what profit
have I in telling ye a lie? It was just some mason-lads and me, with
maybe two or three herds, that set to work and built this bit thing here
that ye call the pr�torian, to be a shelter for us in a sore time
of rain, at auld Aiken Drum's bridal. And look ye, Monkbarns, dig down,
and ye will find a stone (if ye have not found it already) with the
shape of a spoon and the letters A.D.L.L. on it--that is to say Aiken
Drum's Lang Ladle."

The Antiquary blushed crimson with anger and mortification. For indoors
he had just been showing that identical stone to Lovel as his chiefest
treasure, and had interpreted the ladle as a Roman sacrificing vessel,
and the letters upon it as a grave Latin inscription, carved by Agrippa
himself to celebrate his victory.

Lovel was inclined to be amused by the old beggar's demolishing of all

the Antiquary's learned theories, but he was speedily brought to himself
by Edie Ochiltree's next words.

"That young gentleman, too, I can see, thinks little o' an auld carle
like me, yet I'll wager I could tell him where he was last night in the
gloaming, only maybe he would not like to have it spoken of in company!"

It was now Lovel's turn to blush, which he did with the vivid crimson of
two-and-twenty.

"Never mind the old rogue," said Mr. Oldbuck, "and don't think that I
think any the worse of you for your profession. They are only prejudiced
fools and coxcombs who do that."

For, in spite of Lovel's interest in ancient history, it still remained

in the Antiquary's mind that his young friend must be an actor by
profession.

But to this Lovel paid no attention. He was engaged in making sure of

Edie's silence by the simple method of passing a crown-piece out of his
own pocket into the Blue-Gown's hand; while Monkbarns, equally willing
to bridle his tongue as to the building of the pr�torian, was
sending him down to the mansion house for something to eat and a bottle
of ale thereto.

* * * * *

II. THE NIGHT OF STORM

The Antiquary continued to hear good reports of his young friend, and,
as it struck him that the lad must be lonely in such a place as
Fairport, he resolved to ask Lovel to dinner, in order to show him the
best society in the neighbourhood--that is to say, his friend, Sir
Arthur Wardour of Knockwinnock, and his daughter Isabella.

Sir Arthur was something of an antiquary also, but far less learned and
serious than Mr. Oldbuck. Living so near each other the two quarrelled
often about the Pictish Kings of Scotland, the character of Queen Mary,
and even other matters more modern--such as the lending of various sums
of money. For Sir Arthur always wanted to borrow, whereas the Antiquary
did not always want to lend. Sir Arthur was entirely careless as to
paying back, while Mr. Oldbuck stood firmly rooted upon the rights of
principal and interest. But on the whole they were good friends enough,
and the Baronet accordingly accepted, in a letter written by his
daughter, the invitation to Monkbarns.

Lovel arrived punctually on the afternoon appointed, for, in the

Antiquary's day, dinners took place at four o'clock! It was a brooding,
thundery day, sultry and threatening--the 17th of July, according to the
calendar.

Mr. Oldbuck had time to introduce his "most discreet sister Griselda" as
he called her, who came arrayed in all the finery of half a century
before, and wearing a mysterious erection on her head, something between
a wedding-cake and the Tower of Babel in a picture Bible, while his
niece, Miss MacIntyre, a pretty young woman with something of bright wit
about her, which came undoubtedly from her uncle's family, was arrayed
more in the fashion of the day.

Sir Arthur, with his daughter on his arm, presently arrived, and
respects, compliments, and introductions were interchanged. The dinner
was made up chiefly of Scottish national dainties, and everything went
well, save that the solan goose, a fragrant bird at all times, proved so
underdone that Mr. Oldbuck threatened to fling it at the head of the
housekeeper.

As soon as the ladies left the dining room, Sir Arthur and the Antiquary
plunged into their controversies, with a bottle of good port wine
between them, while Lovel set himself to listen with much amusement.

The language of the Picts, the building of the earliest Edinburgh

Castle, with other subjects, on none of which they agreed, made the two
wiseacres grow hotter and hotter, till at last the wrath of the man of
pedigree was roused by a chance statement of the Antiquary's that the
Baronet's famous ancestor, Gamelyn de Guardover, who had signed the
Ragman Roll, showed thereby a mean example of submitting to Edward of
England.

"It is enough, sir," said Sir Arthur, starting up fiercely. "I shall
hereafter take care how I honour with my company one who shows himself
so ungrateful for my condescension."

"In that you will do as you find most agreeable, Sir Arthur," returned
the Antiquary. "I hope that, as I was not aware of the full extent of
the obligation you had done me by visiting my poor house, I may be
excused for not having carried my gratitude to the extent of
servility."

"Mighty well--mighty well, Mr. Oldbuck--I wish you a good evening,

Mr.--ah--ah--Shovel--I wish you a very good evening."

And so saying Sir Arthur flounced out, and with long strides traversed
the labyrinth of passages, seeking for the drawing-room of Monkbarns.

"Did you ever see such a tup-headed old ass?" said the Antiquary, "but I
must not let him burst in on the ladies in this mad way either."

So Mr. Oldbuck ran after his adversary, who was in great danger of
tumbling down the back stairs and breaking his shins over various
collections of learned and domestic rubbish piled in dark corners.

"Stay a minute, Sir Arthur," said the Antiquary, at last capturing him
by the arm; "don't be quite so hasty, my good old friend! I _was_ a
little rude to you about Sir Gamelyn--why, he is an old acquaintance of
mine--kept company with Wallace and Bruce, and only subscribed the
Ragman Roll with the just intention of circumventing the Southern--'twas
right Scottish craft--hundreds did it! Come, come--forget and
forgive--confess we have given the young fellow here a right to think us
two testy old fools."

"Speak for yourself, Mr. Jonathan Oldbuck," said Sir Arthur, with much
majesty.

"Awell--awell," said the Antiquary, with a sigh, "a wilful man must have
his way!"

And the Baronet accordingly stalked into the drawing-room, pettishly

refused to accept either tea or coffee, tucked his daughter under his
arm, and, having said the driest of good-byes to the company at large,
off he marched.

"I think Sir Arthur has got the black dog on his back again!" said Miss
Oldbuck.

"Black dog! Black deil!" cried her brother; "he's more absurd than
womankind. What say you, Lovel? Why, the lad's gone too."

"Yes," said Miss MacIntyre, "he took his leave while Miss Wardour was
putting on her things."

"Deil's in the people!" cried the Antiquary. "This is all one gets by
fussing and bustling, and putting one's self out of the way to give
dinners. O Seged, Emperor of Ethiopia," he added, taking a cup of tea in
one hand and a volume of the _Rambler_ in the other, "well hast thou
spoken. No man can presume to say, 'This shall be a day of happiness.'"

Oldbuck had continued his studies for the best part of an hour, when
Caxton, the ancient barber of Fairport, thrusting his head into the
room, informed the company--first, that it was going to be "an awfu'
nicht," secondly, that Sir Arthur and Miss Wardour had started out to
return to Knockwinnock Castle _by way of the sands!_

Instantly Miss MacIntyre set off to bear the tidings to Saunders

Mucklebackit, the old fisherman, while the Antiquary himself, with a
handkerchief tied round his hat and wig to keep them from being blown
away, searched the cliffs for any signs of his late guests.

Nor was the information brought by Caxton one whit exaggerated. Sir
Arthur and his daughter had indeed started out to reach their home by
the sands. On most occasions these afforded a safe road enough, but in
times of high tide or when the sea was driven shoreward by a wind, the
waves broke high against the cliffs in fury.

Talking earnestly together as they walked, Sir Arthur and Miss Wardour
did not observe the gathering of the tempest till it had broken upon
them. They had reached a deep sickle-shaped bay, and having with
difficulty passed one headland, they were looking with some anxiety
toward the other, hoping to reach and pass it before the tide closed in
upon them, when they saw a tall figure advancing toward them waving
hands and arms. Their hearts rejoiced, for, they thought, where that man
had passed, there would still be a road for them.
But they were doomed to be disappointed. The figure was no other than
that of the old Blue-Gown Edie Ochiltree. As he advanced he continued to
sign to them and to shout words which were carried away by the blast,
till he had arrived quite close.

"Turn back! Turn back!" he cried, when at last they could hear. "Why did
you not turn back when I waved to you?"

"We thought," said Sir Arthur, much disturbed, "that we could still get
round Halket Head."

"Halket Head!" cried the vagrant; "why, the tide will be running on
Halket Head by this time like the Falls of Foyers. It was all I could
do to get round it twenty minutes since."

[Illustration: "THE figure was no other than that of the old Blue-Gown
Edie Ochiltree. As he advanced he continued to sign to them and to shout
words which were carried away by the blast, till he had arrived quite
close.

"'Turn back! Turn back!' he cried, when at last they could hear. 'Why
did you not turn back when I waved to you?'"]

It was now equally impossible to turn back. The water was dashing over
the skerries behind them, and the path by which Miss Wardour and her
father had passed so recently was now only a confusion of boiling and
eddying foam.

There was nothing for it but to try to climb as far up the cliffs as
possible, and trust that the tide would turn back before it reached
them. With the help of the old beggar, they perched themselves upon the
highest shelf to which, on that almost perpendicular wall of rock, they
could hope to attain. But, nevertheless, as the waves leaped white
beneath, it seemed very far indeed from safety.

Sir Arthur, struck with terror, offered lands and wealth to the
Blue-Gownsman if he would only guide them to a place of safety.

But the old beggar could only shake his head and answer sadly: "I was a
bold enough cragsman once. Many a kittywake's and seagull's nest have I
taken on these very cliffs above us. But now my eyesight and my footstep
and my handgrip all have failed this many and many a day! But what is
that?" he cried, looking eagerly upward. "His Name be praised! Yonder
comes some one down the cliff, even now."

And taking heart of grace, he cried directions up through the gathering

darkness to the unseen helper who was descending toward them.

"Right! Right! Fasten the rope well round the Crummie's Horn--that's the
muckle black stone yonder. Cast two plies about it! That's it! Now creep
a little eastwards, to that other stone--the Cat's Lug, they call it.
There used to be the root of an old oak tree there. Canny now! Take
time! Now ye maun get to Bessie's Apron--that's the big, blue, flat
stone beneath ye! And then, with your help and the rope, I'll win at ye,
and we will be able to get up the young lady and Sir Arthur!"

The daring adventurer, no other than Lovel himself, soon reached the
place pointed out, and, throwing down the rope, it was caught by Edie
Ochiltree, who ascended to the flat blue stone formerly spoken of. From
this point of vantage the two of them were able by their united strength
to raise Miss Wardour to safety. Then Lovel descended alone, and
fastening the rope about Sir Arthur (who was now utterly unable, from
fear and cold, to do anything for himself), they soon had him beside
them on Bessie's Apron.

Yet, even so, it seemed impossible that they could remain there all
night. The wind and the dashing spray every moment threatened to sweep
them from the narrow ledge they had reached. Besides, how was one so
delicate as Miss Wardour to stand out such a night? Lovel offered, in
spite of the gathering darkness, once more to climb the cliff, and to
seek further assistance. But the old Blue-Gown withheld him.

No cragsman in broadest daylight could do such a thing, he asserted.

Even he himself, in the fullest of his strength, would never have
attempted the feat. It was death to ascend ten yards. Miss Wardour
begged that neither of them should try. She was already much better, she
said. Besides, their presence was needed to control her father, who was
clearly not responsible for his actions.

Just then a faint halloo came from high above. Edie answered it with a
shout, waving at the same time Miss Wardour's handkerchief at the end of
his long beggar's staff, as far out from the cliff as possible. In a
little while the signals were so regularly replied to, that the forlorn
party on Bessie's Apron knew that they were again within hearing, if not
within reach, of friendly assistance.

On the top of the cliffs Monkbarns was heading the party of searchers.
Saunders Mucklebackit, an old fisherman and smuggler, had charge of the
rescue apparatus. This consisted of the mast of a boat, with a yard
firmly fixed across it. Through the ends of the yard a rope ran in two
blocks, and by this Saunders hoped to lower a chair down the cliffs, by
means of which (said the old smuggler) the whole party would presently
be "boused up and landed on board, as safe as so many kegs of brandy."

The chair was accordingly let down, together with a second rope--which,
being held by some one below, would keep the chair from dashing about in
the wind against the rock. This Saunders called the "guy" or guide rope.

Miss Wardour, after some persuasion, mounted first, being carefully

bound in the rude seat by means of Lovel's handkerchief and neckcloth,
in addition to the mendicant's broad leathern belt passed about her
waist.

Sir Arthur, whose brain appeared quite dazed, continued loudly to

protest. "What are you doing with my bairn?" he cried. "What are you
doing? She shall not be separated from me. Isabel, stay with me--I
command you!"

But the signal being given to hoist away, the chair mounted, intently
watched by Lovel, who stood holding the guide rope, to the last flutter
of the lady's white dress. Miss Wardour was duly and safely landed. Sir
Arthur and Edie followed, and it remained for Lovel to make the more
hazardous final ascent. For now there was no one left below to help him
by holding the "guy" rope. Nevertheless, being young and accustomed to
danger, he managed, though much banged and buffeted about by the wind,
to fend himself off the rocks with the long pike-staff belonging to the
beggar, which Edie had left him for that purpose.
It was only when Lovel reached the safety of the cliff that he felt
himself for a moment a little faint. When he came to himself Sir Arthur
had already been removed to his carriage, and all that Lovel saw of the
girl he had rescued from death was the last flutter of her dress
vanishing through the storm.

"She did not even think it worth while waiting to see whether I was dead
or alive--much less to thank me for anything I had done!"

And he resolved to leave Fairport on the morrow, without visiting

Knockwinnock, or again seeing Miss Wardour. But what he did not know was
that Miss Wardour had waited till she had been assured that Lovel was
safe and sound, having sent Sir Arthur on before her to the carriage.

But as the young man was not aware that she had shown him even this
limited sympathy, his heart continued to be bitter within him.

It was arranged that he was to sleep that night at Monkbarns. Indeed Mr.
Oldbuck would hear of no other way of it. The Antiquary had looked
forward to the chicken pie and the bottle of port which Sir Arthur had
left untasted when he bounced off in a fume. What then was his wrath
when his sister, Miss Grizel, told him how that the minister of
Trotcosey, Mr. Blattergowl, having come down to Monkbarns to sympathise
with the peril of all concerned, had so much affected Miss Oldbuck by
his show of anxiety that she had set the pie and the wine before
him--which he had accordingly consumed to show his good-will.

But after some very characteristic grumbling, cold beef and hard-boiled
eggs did just as well for the two friends, and while Lovel partook of
them, Miss Grizel entertained him with tales of the Green Room in which
he was to sleep. This apartment was haunted, it seemed, by the spirit of
the first Oldenbuck, the celebrated printer of the Augsburg Confession.
He had even appeared in person to a certain town-clerk of Fairport, and
showed him (at the point of his toe) upstairs to an old cabinet in which
was stored away the very document for the want of which the lairds of
Monkbarns were likely to be worsted in a famous lawsuit before the Court
of Session in Edinburgh. Furthermore, a famous German professor, a very
learned man, Dr. Heavysterne by name, had found his rest so much
disturbed in that very room that he could never again be persuaded to
sleep there.

Lovel, however, laughed at such fears, and was accordingly shown by the
Antiquary up to the famous Green Room, a large chamber with walls
covered by a tapestry of hunting scenes,--stags, boars, hounds, and
huntsmen, all mixed together under the greenwood tree, the boughs of
which, interlacing above, gave its name to the room.

Lovel fell asleep after a while, still bitterly meditating on how

unkindly Miss Wardour had used him, and his thoughts, mixed with the
perilous adventures of the evening, made him not a little feverish. At
first his dreams were wild, confused, and impossible. He flew like a
bird. He swam like a fish. He was upborne on clouds, and dashed on rocks
which yet received him soft as pillows of down. But at last, out of the
gloom a figure approached his bedside, separating himself from the wild
race of the huntsmen upon the green tapestry,--a figure like that which
had been described to him as belonging to the first laird of Monkbarns.
He was dressed in antique Flemish garb, a furred Burgomaster cap was on
his head, and he held in his hands a black volume with clasps of brass.
Lovel strove to speak, but, as usual in such cases, he could not utter a
word. His tongue refused its office. The awful figure held up a warning
finger, and then began deliberately to unclasp the volume he held in his
hands. He turned the leaves hastily for a few minutes; then, holding the
book aloft in his left hand, he pointed with his right to a line which
seemed to start forth from the page glowing with supernatural fire.
Lovel did not understand the language in which the book was printed, but
the wonderful light with which the words glowed impressed them somehow
on his memory. The vision shut the volume. A strain of music was heard,
and Lovel awoke. The sun was shining full into the Green Room, and
somewhere not far away a girl's voice was singing a simple Scottish air.

INTERLUDE OF WARNING

It was the spinner of yarns himself who broke the

silence which fell on the party at the close of the
first tale told out of the treasure-house of _The
Antiquary_.

"If I catch you," were the words of warning which

fell from his lips, "you, Hugh John, or you, Toady
Lion, trying to hoist one another up a cliff with a
rope and a chair--well, the rope will most
certainly be used for quite another purpose, and
both of you will just hate to look at a chair for a
fortnight after! Do you understand?"

They understood perfectly.

"It was me they were going to hoist," confided Maid

Margaret, coming a little closer. "I saw them
looking at me all the time you were telling the
story!"

"Well," I said, "just let me catch them at it,

that's all!"

This caution being necessary for the avoidance of

future trouble, I went on to read aloud the whole
of the Storm chapters, to the children's
unspeakable delight. Hugh John even begged for the
book to take to bed with him, which privilege he
was allowed, on the solemn promise that he would
not "peep on ahead." Since Sweetheart's prophecies
as to Die Vernon, such conduct has been voted
scoundrelly and unworthy of any good citizen of the
nursery.

On the whole, however, I could not make out

whether _The Antiquary_ promised to be a favourite
or not. The storm scene was declared "famous," but
the accompanying prohibition to break their own or
their family's necks, by pulling chairs up and down
rocks, somewhat damped the ardour of the usual
enthusiasts.

As, however, the day was hopeless outside, the snow

 beating more and more fiercely on the windows, and
hanging in heavy fleecy masses on the smallest
twigs of the tree-branches and leafless rose stems,
it was decided that nothing better could be
imagined, than just to proceed with our second tale
from _The Antiquary_. But before beginning I
received two requests, somewhat difficult to
harmonize the one with the other.

"Tell us all about Miss Wardour and Lovel. He's

nice!" said Sweetheart.

"Skip ALL the love-making!" cried Hugh John and Sir

Toady in a breath.

* * * * *

THE SECOND TALE FROM "THE ANTIQUARY"

I. LOVEL FIGHTS A DUEL

THE Antiquary, to whom Lovel told his dream, promptly pulled out a
black-letter volume of great age and, unclasping it, showed him the very
motto of his vision. So far, however, from glowing with fire now, the
words remained in the ordinary calm chill of type. But when the
Antiquary told him that these words had been the Printer's Mark or
Colophon of his ancestor, Aldobrand Oldenbuck, the founder of his house,
and that they meant "SKILL WINS FAVOUR," Lovel, though half ashamed of
giving any credit to dreams, resolved to remain in the neighbourhood of
Knockwinnock Castle and of Miss Wardour for at least some time longer.

In vain Oldbuck made light of his vision of the Green Room. In vain he
reminded him that he had been showing that very volume to Sir Arthur the
night before in his presence, and had even remarked upon the appropriate
motto of old Aldobrand Oldenbuck.

Lovel was resolved to give his love for Miss Wardour one more chance.
And indeed at that very moment, under the lady's window at Knockwinnock
Castle, a strange love messenger was pleading his cause.

Miss Wardour had been trying to persuade old Edie Ochiltree to accept a
garden, a cottage, and a daily dole, for his great services in saving
her own and her father's life. But of this Edie would hear nothing.

"I would weary," he said, "to be forever looking up at the same beams
and rafters, and out upon the same cabbage patch. I have a queer humour
of my own, too, and I might be jesting and scorning where I should be
silent. Sir Arthur and I might not long agree. Besides, what would the
country do for its gossip--the blithe clatter at e'en about the fire?
Who would bring news from one farm-town to another--gingerbread to the
lassies, mend fiddles for the lads, and make grenadier caps of rushes
for the bairns, if old Edie were tied by the leg at his own cottage
door?"

"Well, then, Edie," said Miss Wardour, "if this be so, if you feel that
the folk of the countryside cannot do without you, you must just let me
know when you feel old enough to settle, and in the meantime take this."

And she handed him a sum of money. But for the second time again the
beggar refused.

"Na, na," he said, "it is against our rule to take so muckle siller at
once. I would be robbed and murdered for it at the next town--or at
least I would go in fear of my life, which is just as bad. But you might
say a good word for me to the ground-officer and the constable, and
maybe bid Sandy Netherstanes the miller chain up his big dog, and I will
e'en come to Knockwinnock as usual for my alms and my snuff."

Edie paused at this point, and, stepping nearer to the window on which
Miss Wardour leaned, he continued, speaking almost in her ear.

"Ye are a bonny young leddy, and a good one," he said, "and maybe a
well-dowered one. But do not you sneer away the laddie Lovel, as ye did
a while syne on the walk beneath the Briery bank, when I both saw ye
and heard ye too, though ye saw not me. Be canny with the lad, for he
loves ye well. And it's owing to him, and not to anything I could have
done, that you and Sir Arthur were saved yestreen!"

Then, without waiting for an answer, old Edie stalked toward a low
doorway and disappeared. It was at this very moment that Lovel and the
Antiquary entered the court. Miss Wardour had only time to hasten
upstairs, while the Antiquary was pausing to point out the various
features of the architecture of Knockwinnock Castle to the young man.

Miss Wardour met the two gentlemen in the drawing-room of the castle
with her father's apology for not being able to receive them. Sir Arthur
was still in bed, and, though recovering, he continued to suffer from
the fatigues and anxieties of the past night.

"Indeed," said the Antiquary, "a good down pillow for his good white
head were a couch more meet than Bessie's Apron, plague on her! But what
news of our mining adventure in Glen Withershins?"

"None," said Miss Wardour, "or at least no good news! But here are some
specimens just sent down. Will you look at them?"

And withdrawing into a corner with these bits of rock, the Antiquary
proceeded to examine them, grumbling and pshawing over each ere he laid
it aside to take up another. This was Lovel's opportunity to speak alone
with Miss Wardour.

"I trust," he said, "that Miss Wardour will impute to circumstances

almost irresistible, this intrusion of one who has reason to think
himself so unacceptable a visitor."

"Mr. Lovel," said Miss Wardour, in the same low tone, "I am sure you are
incapable of abusing the advantages given you by the services you have
rendered us--ah, if I could only see you as a friend--or as a sister!"

"I cannot," said Lovel, "disavow my feelings. They are well known to
Miss Wardour. But why crush every hope--if Sir Arthur's objections could
be removed?"

"But that is impossible," said Miss Wardour, "his objections cannot be

removed, and I am sure you will save both of us pain by leaving
Fairport, and returning to the honourable career which you seem to have
abandoned!"

"Miss Wardour," said Lovel, "I will obey your wishes, if, within one
little month I cannot show you the best of reasons for continuing to
abide at Fairport."

At this moment Sir Arthur sent down a message to say that he would like
to see his old friend, the Laird of Monkbarns, in his bedroom. Miss
Wardour instantly declared that she would show Mr. Oldbuck the way, and
so left Lovel to himself. It chanced that in the interview which
followed Sir Arthur let out by accident that his daughter had already
met with Lovel in Yorkshire, when she had been there on a visit to her
aunt. The Antiquary was at first astonished, and then not a little
indignant, that neither of them should have told him of this when they
were introduced, and he resolved to catechise his young friend Lovel
strictly upon the point as soon as possible. But when at last he bade
farewell to his friend Sir Arthur and returned below, another subject
occupied his mind. Lovel and he were walking home over the cliffs, and
when they reached the summit of the long ridge, Oldbuck turned and
looked back at the pinnacles of the castle--at the ancient towers and
walls grey with age, which had been the home of so many generations of
Wardours.

"Ah," he muttered, sighing, half to himself, "it wrings my heart to say

it--but I doubt greatly that this ancient family is fast going to the
ground."

Then he revealed to the surprised Lovel how Sir Arthur's foolish

speculations, and especially his belief in a certain German swindler,
named Dousterswivel, had caused him to engage in some very costly mining
ventures, which were now almost certain to result in complete failure.

As the Antiquary described Dousterswivel, Lovel remembered to have seen

the man in the inn at Fairport, where he had been pointed out to him as
one of the _illuminati_, or persons who have dealings with the dwellers
in another world. But while thus talking and tarrying with his friend
Monkbarns, an important letter was on its way to call Lovel back to
Fairport. Oldbuck had so far taken his young friend to his heart, that
he would not let him depart without making sure that the trouble he read
on Lovel's face was not the want of money.

"If," he said, "there is any pecuniary inconvenience, I have fifty, or a

hundred, guineas at your service--till Whitsunday--or indeed as long as
you like!"

But Lovel, assuring him that the letter boded no difficulty of the
kind, thanked him for his offer, and so took his leave.

It was some weeks before the Antiquary again saw Lovel. To the great
astonishment of the town the young man hardly went out at all, and when
he called upon him in his lodgings at Fairport, Mr. Oldbuck was
astonished at the change in his appearance. Lovel was now pale and thin,
and his black dress bore the badge of mourning. The Antiquary's gruff
old heart was moved toward the lad. He would have had him come instantly
with him to Monkbarns, telling him that, as they agreed well together,
there was no reason why they should ever separate. His lands were in his
own power of gift, and there was no reason why he should not leave them
to whom he would.

Lovel, touched also by this unexpected affection, answered that he could

not at present accept, but that before leaving Scotland he would
certainly pay Monkbarns a long visit.

While the Antiquary remained talking thus to Lovel in his lodgings, a

letter was brought from Sir Arthur Wardour inviting the young man to be
a member of a party which proposed to visit the ruins of St. Ruth's
Priory on the following day, and afterward to dine and spend the
evening at Knockwinnock Castle. Sir Arthur added that he had made the
same proposal to the family at Monkbarns. So it was agreed that they
should go together, Lovel on horseback, and Oldbuck and his womenkind
(as he called them) in a hired post-chaise.

The morning of the next day dawned clear and beautiful, putting Lovel in
better spirits than he had known of late. With the Wardour party there
came the German adept, Mr. Dousterswivel, to whom, after offering his
thanks to his preserver of the night of storm, Sir Arthur introduced
Lovel. The young man's instinctive dislike at sight of the impostor was
evidently shared in by the Antiquary, for the lowering of his shaggy
eyebrow clearly proclaimed as much.

Nevertheless, the first part of the day went well on the whole. Oldbuck
took upon himself the office of guide, explaining and translating all
the while, leading the company from point to point till they were almost
as much at home as himself among the ruins of the Priory of St. Ruth.

But the peaceful occupations of the day were interrupted by the arrival
of a young horseman in military undress, whom the Antiquary greeted with
the words, "Hector, son of Priam, whence comest thou?"

"From Fife, my liege," answered Captain Hector MacIntyre, Mr. Oldbuck's

nephew, who saluted the company courteously, but, as Lovel thought,
seemed to view his own presence with a haughty and disapproving eye.
Captain MacIntyre attached himself immediately to Miss Wardour, and even
appeared to Lovel to take up a privileged position with regard to her.
But Miss Wardour, after submitting to this close attendance for some
time, presently turned sharply round, and asked a question of the
Antiquary as to the date at which the Priory of St. Ruth was built. Of
course Mr. Oldbuck started off like a warhorse at the sound of the
trumpet, and, in the long harangue which ensued, mixed as it was with
additions and contradictions from Sir Arthur and the minister, Captain
MacIntyre found no further chance of appropriating Miss Wardour. He left
her, accordingly, and walked sulkily by his sister's side.

From her he demanded to know who this Mr. Lovel might be, whom he found
so very much at home in a circle in which he had looked forward to
shining alone.

Mary MacIntyre answered sensibly that, as to who he was, her brother had
better ask his uncle, who was in the habit of inviting to his house such
company as pleased him; adding that, so far as she knew, Mr. Lovel was a
very quiet and gentlemanly young man.

Far from being satisfied, however, from that moment Captain MacIntyre,
with the instinct of a dog that returns home to find a stranger making
free with his bone and kennel, set himself almost openly to provoke
Lovel. When by chance the latter was called on by the Antiquary to state
whether or not he had been present at a certain battle abroad,
MacIntyre, with an accent of irony, asked the number of his regiment.
And when that had been told him, he replied that he knew the regiment
very well, but that he could not remember Mr. Lovel as an officer in it.

Whereupon, blushing quickly, Mr. Lovel informed Captain MacIntyre that

he had served the last campaign on the staff of General Sir Blank Blank.

"Indeed," said MacIntyre, yet more insolently, "that is still more

remarkable. I have had an opportunity of knowing the names of all the
officers who have held such a situation, and I cannot recollect that of
Lovel among them."

Lovel took out of his pocket-book a letter, from which he removed the
envelope before handing it to his adversary.

"In all probability you know the General's hand," he said, "though I own
I ought not to show such exaggerated expressions of thanks for my very
slight services."

Captain MacIntyre, glancing his eye over it, could not deny that it was
in the General's hand, but drily observed, as he returned it, that the
address was wanting.

"The address, Captain MacIntyre," answered Lovel, in the same tone,

"shall be at your service whenever you choose to inquire for it."

"I shall not fail to do so," said the soldier.

"Come, come," exclaimed Oldbuck, "what is the meaning of this? We'll

have no swaggering, youngsters! Are you come from the wars abroad to
stir up strife in a peaceful land?"

Sir Arthur, too, hoped that the young men would remain calm. But Lovel,
from that moment, felt that he was to some extent under suspicion, and
so, in a short time, he took the opportunity of bidding the company
good-bye, on the plea of the return of a headache which had lately
troubled him. He had not ridden far--rather loitering, indeed, to give
MacIntyre a chance of overtaking him--when the sound of horse's hoofs
behind told him that his adversary had returned to find him. The young
officer touched his hat briefly, and began in a haughty tone, "What am I
to understand, sir, by your telling me that your address was at my
service?"

"Simply," answered Lovel, "that my name is Lovel, and that my residence

is, for the present, Fairport, as you will see by this card!"

"And is this," said the soldier, "all the information you are disposed
to give me?"

"I see no right you have to require more."

"I find you, sir, in company with my sister," said MacIntyre, "and I
have a right to know who is admitted to her society."

"I shall take the liberty of disputing that right," replied Lovel, to
the full as haughty in tone and manner.

"I presume then," said the young officer, "since you _say_ you have
served in his Majesty's army, you will give me the satisfaction usual
among gentlemen."

"I shall not fail," said Lovel.

"Very well, sir," rejoined Hector, and turning his horse's head he
galloped off to rejoin the party.

But his uncle suspected his purpose, and was determined to prevent a
duel at all risks. He demanded where his nephew had been.

"I forgot my glove, sir," said Hector.

"Forgot your glove! You mean that you went to throw it down. But I will
take order with you, young gentleman. You shall return with me this
night to Monkbarns."

Yet in spite of the Antiquary the duel was easily enough arranged
between these two over-hasty young men. It was the custom of the time to
fight about trifles, and it seemed to Lovel that as a soldier he had
really no honourable alternative. He was fortunate enough to find a
second in the Lieutenant-commander of one of the King's gun-brigs,
which was stationed on the coast to put down smuggling. Lieutenant
Taffril only put one question to Lovel before offering him every
assistance. He asked if there was anything whereof he was ashamed, in
the circumstances which he had declined to communicate to MacIntyre.

"On my honour, no," said Lovel, "there is nothing but what, in a short
time, I hope I may be able to communicate to the whole world."

The duel thus insolently provoked was to be fought with pistols within
the ruins of St. Ruth, and as Lovel and his second came near the place
of combat, they heard no sound save their own voices mingling with those
of the sheep bleating peacefully to each other upon the opposite hill.
On the stump of an old thorn tree within the ruins sat the venerable
figure of old Edie Ochiltree. Edie had a message to deliver.

He told Lovel that he had been at the Sheriff's that very day, and had
got it from the clerk himself that a warrant had been issued on
Monkbarns's demand for the apprehension of Lovel. The old beggar had
come hastily to warn the young man, thinking that perhaps it might be
some matter of debt. But the appearance of Captain MacIntyre and his
second, Mr. Lesley, soon informed him otherwise.

The antagonists approached and saluted with the stern civility of the
place and occasion. MacIntyre instantly ordered the old fellow off the
field.

"I _am_ an auld fellow," said Edie, "but I am also an auld soldier of
your father's, and I served with him in the 42nd."

"Serve where you please," said MacIntyre, hotly, "you have no title to
intrude on us. Be off with you--or--"

He lifted his cane as if to threaten the old man. But the insult roused
Edie's ancient courage.

"Hold down your switch, Captain MacIntyre! I am an auld soldier, and

I'll tak' muckle from your father's son--but not a touch o' the wand
while my pike-staff will hold together!"

"I was wrong--I was wrong," said MacIntyre, relenting, "here is a crown
for you--go your ways."

But Edie refused the money, exhorting the young men to go and fight the
French instead of each other, if they were so fighting hot. But neither
his words nor the efforts of the seconds could reconcile MacIntyre to
the man with whom he had from the first resolved to quarrel.

The ground was measured out by the seconds, while old Edie stood
unheeded at the side muttering, "Bairns, bairns--madmen, I should rather
say! Weel, your blood be on your heads!"

The fatal signal was given. Both fired almost at the same moment.
Captain MacIntyre's ball grazed the side of his opponent, but failed to
draw blood. That of Lovel was more true to the aim. MacIntyre reeled and
fell. Raising himself on his arm, his first exclamation was: "It is
nothing--it is nothing! Give us the other pistols!"

But the moment after he added in a lower tone: "I believe I have enough,
and what's worse, I fear I deserve it. Mr. Lovel, or whatever your name
is, fly and save yourself. Bear witness all of you, I alone provoked the
quarrel."

Then raising himself on his arm, he added: "Shake hands, Lovel. I

believe you to be a gentleman--forgive my rudeness, and I forgive you my
death!"

Lovel stood dizzy and bewildered, while the ship's surgeon approached to
do his part. But presently his arm was grasped by Edie, who hurried him
off the field with the assistance of Lieutenant Taffril, his late
second.

"He is right--he is right!" exclaimed Taffril, "go with him--there, into

the wood--not by the highroad. Let him bring you to the sands at three
of the morning. A boat will be in waiting to take you off to my brig,
which will sail at once."

"Yes--fly--fly!" said the wounded man, his voice faltering as he spoke.

"It is madness to stay here," added Taffril.

"It was worse than madness ever to have come!" said Lovel, following his
uncouth guide into the thicket. As he went up the valley he realised the
bitterness of remorse that comes too late. He had passed that way in the
morning, innocent, and now--he had the stain of blood upon his hands.

II. THE SEEKERS OF TREASURE

Edie guided him along a deep ravine till they came to a precipice of
rock overhung with brushwood and copse. Here completely concealed was
the mouth of a cave, where, as Edie said, they would be in perfect
safety. Only two other persons knew of its existence, and these two were
at present far away. The cavern was in the shape of a cross, and had
evidently been the abode of some anchorite of a time long past. In the
corner was a turning stair, narrow but quite passable, which
communicated with the chapel above--and so, by a winding passage in the
thickness of the wall, with the interior of the priory of St. Ruth.

Twilight faded into night, and the night itself wore away, while Edie
sat telling Lovel all the old-world tales he could lay his tongue to, in
order to keep the mind of the young man from brooding over his
situation. They sat close together on a little watch-tower niched deep
in the wall, and breathed the night air, while waiting for the hour at
which they must betake them to the beach, to meet the boat which
Lieutenant Taffril was to have in readiness.

Midnight approached, the moon rose high in the sky above, but the voice
of the Blue-Gown still droned on, telling his tales of old time, when
suddenly Lovel, whose ears were quicker, laid his hand on his
companion's arm.

"Hush," he whispered, "I hear some one speaking!"

So saying Lovel pointed in the direction of the sound,--toward the door

of the chancel at the west end of the building, where a carved window
let in a flood of moonlight upon the floor.

Two human figures detached themselves from the darkness and advanced.
The lantern which one of them carried gleamed pale in the bright
moonlight. It was evident in a moment by their motions that they could
not be officers searching for Lovel. As they approached nearer, the
beggar recognised the two figures as those of Dousterswivel and Sir
Arthur.

Lovel was about to retreat, but a touch on the arm from the old
Blue-Gown convinced him that his best course was to remain quiet where
he was. In case of any alarm, there was always the passage behind, and
they could gain the shelter of the wood long before any pursuit would be
possible.

Dousterswivel was evidently making some proposition about which Sir

Arthur was uncertain.

"Great expense--great expense!" were the first words they heard him
mutter.

"Expenses--to be sure," said Dousterswivel; "there must be great

expenses. You do not expect to reap before you do sow the seed. Now, Sir
Arthur, you have sowed this night a little pinch of ten guineas, and if
you do not reap the big harvest, it is because you have only sowed a
little pinch of seed. Much seed sown, much harvest reaped. That is the
way to find treasure. You shall see, Sir Arthur, mine worthy patron!"

The German now put before his dupe a little silver plate engraved
with strange signs, squares of nine times nine figures, flying
serpents with turkey-cocks' heads, and other wonderful things.
Then having professed to lay out the baronet's ten guineas in what he
called "suffumigations,"--that is, to scare away the demons which kept
guard over the treasures,--he informed him that he was ready to proceed.
The treasure itself could not be obtained till the stroke of midnight.
But in the meanwhile he was willing to show Sir Arthur the guardian
demon of the treasure-house, which, "like one fierce watchdog" (as the
pretended wizard explained), could be called up by his magic power.

But Sir Arthur was not particularly keen to see such marvels. He thought
they had little enough time as it was, and if he could get the
treasures, he preferred, supposing it to be the same thing to his guide,
to let sleeping demons lie.

"But I could show you the spirit very well," said Dousterswivel. "I
would draw a circle with a pentagon, and make my suffumigation within
it, while you kept the demon at bay with a drawn sword. You would see
first a hole open in the solid wall. Then through it would come one stag
pursued by three black greyhounds. They would pull him down, and then
one black ugly negro would appear and take the stag from them. Then,
paff! all would be gone. After that horns would be winded, and in would
come the great Peolphan, the Mighty Hunter of the North, mounted on his
black steed--but you are sure that you do not care to see all this?"

"Why, I am not afraid," said the poor baronet, "that is, if--do any
mishaps ever happen on such occasions?"

"Bah--mischiefs, no!" said the German. "Sometimes if the circle be no

quite just, or the beholder be frightened and not hold the sword firm
and straight toward him, the Great Hunter will take his advantage, and
drag him exorcist out of the circle and throttle him. That happen
sometimes."

This was quite enough for Sir Arthur, who did not desire any intercourse
with demons on such terms.

Whereupon Dousterswivel, the time of midnight being near, set fire to a

little pile of chips, which instantly burned up with a bright light.
Then when the flame was at its highest, he cast into the blaze a handful
of perfumes which smoked with a strong and pungent odour. This made both
Dousterswivel and his pupil cough and sneeze heartily, and by and by,
the vapour mounting upward, it found out Lovel and Edie in their high
watch-tower, making them also sneeze loudly in their turn.

"Was that an echo? Or are there others present in this place?" cried the
baronet, astonished at the sound.

"No, no," said the German, who had so long employed himself with magic
that he had grown half to believe in it, "no--at least, I hope not!"

Here a complete fit of sneezing, together with a kind of hollow

grunting cough from Edie Ochiltree, so alarmed the wizard that he would
have fled at once, had not Sir Arthur prevented him by force.

"You juggling villain," cried the baronet, whom impending ruin made
desperate, "this is some trick of yours to get off fulfilling your
bargain. Show me the treasure you have promised, or by the faith of a
ruined man, I will send you where you will see spirits enough!"

"Consider, my honoured patron," said the now thoroughly frightened

treasure-seeker, "this is not the best treatment. And then the demons--"

[Illustration: "AT this moment Edie Ochiltree, entering fully into the
spirit of the scene, gave vent to a prolonged and melancholy howl.

Dousterswivel flung himself on his knees.

'Dear Sir Arthurs,' he cried, 'let us go--or at least let _me_ go!'
'No, you cheating scoundrel,' cried the knight, unsheathing his sword,
'that shift shall not serve you. I will see the treasure before I leave
this place--or I will run my sword through you as an impostor, though
all the spirits of the dead should rise around us!'"]

At this moment Edie Ochiltree, entering fully into the spirit of the
scene, gave vent to a prolonged and melancholy howl.

Dousterswivel flung himself on his knees.

"Dear Sir Arthurs," he cried, "let us go--or at least let _me_ go!"

"No, you cheating scoundrel," cried the knight, unsheathing his sword,
"that shift shall not serve you. I will see the treasure before I leave
this place--or I will run my sword through you as an impostor, though
all the spirits of the dead should rise around us!"

"For the love of Heaven, be patient, mine honoured patron," said the
German, "you shall have all the treasure I knows of--you shall, indeed!
But do not speak about the spirits. It makes them angry!"

Muttering exorcisms and incantations all the while, Dousterswivel

proceeded to a flat stone in the corner, which bore on its surface the
carved likeness of an armed warrior.

He muttered to Sir Arthur: "Mine patrons, it is here! God save us all!"

Together they managed to heave up the stone, and then Dousterswivel with
a mattock and shovel proceeded to dig. He had not thrown out many
spadefuls, when something was heard to ring on the ground with the sound
of falling metal. Then the treasure-seeker, snatching up the object
which his mattock had thrown out, exclaimed: "On mine dear word, mine
patrons, this is all. I mean all that we can do to-night!"

"Let me see it," said Sir Arthur, sternly, "I will be satisfied--I will
judge with my own eyes!"

He held the object up in the light of the lantern. It was a small case
of irregular shape, which, from the joyful exclamation of the baronet,
seemed to be filled with coin.

"Ah!" said Sir Arthur; "this is good luck, indeed. This is a beginning.
We will try again at the very next change of the moon. That six hundred
pounds I owe to Goldieword would be ruin indeed unless I can find
something to meet it. But this puts new hope into me!"

But now Dousterswivel was more than ever eager to be gone, and he
hurried Sir Arthur away with his treasure, having only taken time to
thrust back the earth and replace the tombstone roughly in its place, so
as to leave no very obvious traces of the midnight search for treasure.

III. MISTICOT'S GRAVE

The hour of going to meet the boat was now approaching, and Edie
conducted Lovel by a solitary path through the woods to the sea-shore.
There in the first level beams of the rising sun, they saw the little
gun-brig riding at anchor in the offing. Taffril himself met his friend,
and eased Lovel's mind considerably by telling him that Captain
MacIntyre's wound, though doubtful, was far from desperate, and that he
trusted a short cruise would cover all the consequences of his
unfortunate encounter.

Lovel offered gold to the beggar, but Edie once more refused it,
declaring that he thought all the folk had "gone clean daft."

"I have had more gold offered to me these last two or three weeks," he
said, "than I have seen in all my life before. Na, na, take back your
guineas, and for luck let me have but one lily-white shilling!"

The boat put off toward the lieutenant's brig, impelled by six stout
rowers. Lovel saw the old beggar wave his blue bonnet to him, before
turning slowly about as if to resume his customary wanderings from farm
to farm, and from village to village.

* * * * *

So excellently well did Captain MacIntyre progress toward recovery that

in a little while the Antiquary declared it clean impossible for him to
get a single bite of breakfast, or have his wig made decent, or a slice
of unburnt toast to eat--all because his womenfolk were in constant
attendance upon the wounded Captain, whose guns and spaniels filled the
house, and for whom even the faithful Caxon ran messages, while his own
master waited for him in his chamber, fuming and stamping the while.

But as his sister often said, and as all who knew him,
knew--"Monkbarns's bark was muckle waur than his bite."

But an unexpected visit from Sir Arthur soon gave the Antiquary other
matters to think about. The Baronet came, so he said, to ask his old
friend's advice about the disposal of a sum of money. The Antiquary
drew from a right-hand corner of his desk a red-covered book, of which
Sir Arthur hated the very sight, and suggested that if he had money to
dispose of, it might be as well to begin by clearing off encumbrances,
of which the debt marked in his own red book accounted for no less than
eleven hundred and thirteen pounds. But Sir Arthur put away the red book
as if Monkbarns had offered him so much physic, and hastened to say that
if the Antiquary would wait a few days, he would have the sum in
full--that is, if he would take it in bullion.

The Antiquary inquired from what Eldorado this treasure was forthcoming.

"Not far from here," said Sir Arthur, confidently, "and now I think of
it, you shall see the whole process in working, on one small condition."

"And what is that?" inquired the Antiquary.

"That it will be necessary to give me your friendly assistance, by

advancing the small sum of one hundred pounds."

The Antiquary, who had been rejoicing in the hope of getting both
principal and interest of a debt which he had long thought desperate,
could only gasp out the words, "Advance one hundred pounds!"

"Yes, my good sir," said Sir Arthur, "but upon the best possible
security of having it repaid in the course of a few days."

To this the Antiquary said nothing. He had heard the like before from
Sir Arthur's lips. So the Baronet went on to explain. "Mr. Dousterswivel
having discovered--"

But the Antiquary would not listen. His eyes sparkled with indignation.
"Sir Arthur," he said, "I have so often warned you against that rascally
quack, that I wonder you quote him to me!"

But this time Sir Arthur had something to show for his faith in the
expert. He placed a large ram's horn with a copper cover in his friend's
hand. It contained Scottish, English, and foreign coins of the fifteenth
and sixteenth centuries. Most were silver but some were of gold, and, as
even the Antiquary allowed, of exceeding rarity.

"These," said the Baronet, "were found at midnight, at the last full
moon, in the ruins of St. Ruth's Priory, in the course of an experiment
of which I was myself the witness."

"Indeed," said Oldbuck, "and what means of discovery did you employ?"

"Only a simple suffumigation," said the Baronet, "accompanied by

availing ourselves of a suitable planetary hour."

"Simple suffumigation! Simple nonsensification! Planetary

hour--planetary fiddlestick! My dear Sir Arthur, the fellow has made a
gull of you under ground, and now he would make a gull of you above
ground!"

"Well, Mr. Oldbuck," said the Baronet, "I am obliged to you for your
opinion of my discernment, but you will at least give me credit for
seeing what I say I saw!"

"I will give you credit for saying that you saw what you _thought_ you
saw!"

"Well, then," said the Baronet, "as there is a heaven above us, Mr.
Oldbuck, I saw with my own eyes these coins dug out of the chancel of
St. Ruth's at midnight! And if I had not been there, I doubt if
Dousterswivel would have had the courage to go through with it!"

The Antiquary inquired how much the discovery had cost.

"Only ten guineas," said the Baronet, "but this time it is to cost a
hundred and fifty pounds, but of course the results will be in
proportion. Fifty I have already given him, and the other hundred I
thought you might be able to assist me with."

The Antiquary mused.

"This cannot be meant as a parting blow," he said; "it is not of

consequence enough. He will probably let you win this game also, as
sharpers do with raw gamesters. Sir Arthur, will you permit me to speak
to Dousterswivel? I think I can recover the treasure for you without
making any advance of money."

Dousterswivel had on his part no desire to see the Laird of Monkbarns.

He was more in fear of him than even of the spirits of the night. Still
he could not refuse, when summoned to leave Sir Arthur's carriage and
face the two gentlemen in the study at Monkbarns.
The Antiquary then and there told him that he and Sir Arthur proposed to
trench the whole area of the chancel of St. Ruth, in plain daylight,
with good substantial pickaxes and shovels, and so, without further
expense, ascertain for themselves the truth as to the existence of this
hidden treasure.

"Bah," said the German, "you will not find one copper thimble. But it is
as Sir Arthur likes--once I have showed him the real method. If he likes
to try others, he only loses the gold and the silver, that is all!"

The journey to the Priory was made in silence, each of the party having
enough on his mind to employ his thoughts. Edie Ochiltree joined them at
the ruins, and when the Antiquary pulled out of his pocket the ram's
horn in which the coins had been found, Edie claimed it at once for a
snuff-box of his which he had bartered with a miner at Mr.
Dousterswivel's excavations in Glen Withershins.

"And that brings it very near a certain friend of ours," said the
Antiquary to Sir Arthur. "I trust we shall be as successful to-day
without having to pay for it."

It was decided to begin operations at the tomb with the carven figure
on top--the same which Sir Arthur and Dousterswivel had disturbed on a
former occasion, but which neither the Antiquary nor Edie ever
remembered to have seen before. It appeared, however, that a large pile
of rubbish, which had formerly filled up the corner of the ruins, must
have been dispersed in order to bring it to light.

But the diggers reached the bottom of the grave, without finding either
treasure or coffin.

"Some cleverer chield has been before us," said one of the men.

But Edie pushed them impatiently aside, and leaping into the grave, he
cried, "Ye are good seekers, but bad finders!"

For the first stroke of his pike-staff into the bottom of the pit hit
upon something hard and resisting.

All now crowded around. The labourers resumed their task with good-will,
and soon a broad surface of wood was laid bare, and a heavy chest was
raised to the surface, the lid of which, being forced with a pickaxe,
displayed, beneath coarse canvas bags and under a quantity of oakum, a
large number of ingots of solid silver.

The Antiquary inspected them one by one, always expecting that the lower
layers would prove to be less valuable. But he was at last obliged to
admit that the Baronet had really and truly possessed himself of
treasure to the amount of about one thousand pounds.

It chanced that Edie Ochiltree had observed Dousterswivel stand somewhat

disconsolate and sad, looking into the open grave. Age had not dulled
Edie's wit, nor caused him to relish less a boyish prank. His quick eye
had caught some writing on the lid of the box of treasure, and while all
were admiring the solid ingots of precious metal laid bare before them,
Edie kicked the piece of wood aside without being observed by any one.

Then, with all due caution, he whispered to Dousterswivel that there

must certainly be more and better treasure yet to be brought to light in
the place where the silver had been found, and that if he would wait
only a little behind the others he would show him proof of it. When they
were alone he showed him on the lid of the treasure-chest the words,
written in black letter:

"=Search--Number One="

Dousterswivel at once agreed to meet Edie at midnight within the ruins

of the Priory, and he kept his word. It was a stormy night, great clouds
being hurried across the face of the moon, and the woods were bending
and moaning in the fierce blast. Edie marched up and down while he
waited for the German, shouldering his pike-staff, and dreaming that he
was back again on the outposts with a dozen hostile riflemen hidden in
front of him.

After a little, Dousterswivel arrived, having brought with him a horse

and saddle-bags in which to carry away the expected treasure. Edie led
him once more to the place of the former search--to the grave of the
Armed Knight. On the way he told his companion the tale of that Malcolm
Misticot whose treasure was supposed to have been found and rifled that
day.

"There is a story that the Misticot walks," said Edie; "it's an awesome
nicht and an uncanny to be meeting the like of him here. Besides he
might not be best pleased to come upon us when we were trying to lift
his treasure!"

"For the love of Heaven," said Dousterswivel, "say nothing at all,

either about somebodies or nobodies!"

Edie leaped into the grave and began to strike; but he soon tired or
pretended to tire. So he called out to the German that turn and turn
about was fair play. Whereupon, fired with the desire for wealth,
Dousterswivel began to strike and shovel the earth with all his might,
while Edie encouraged him, standing very much at his ease by the side of
the hole.

"At it again," he cried; "strike--strike! What for are ye stopping,

man?"

"Stopping," cried the German, angrily, looking out of the grave at his
tormentor; "I am down at the bed-rock, I tell you!"

"And that's the likeliest place of any," said Edie; "it will just be a
big broad stone laid down to cover the treasure. Ah, that's it! There
was a Wallace stroke indeed! It's broken! Hurrah, boys, there goes
Ringan's pickaxe! It's a shame o' the Fairport folk to sell such frail
gear. Try the shovel; at it again, Maister Dousterdeevil!"

But this time the German, without replying, leaped out of the pit, and
shouted in a voice that trembled with anger, "Does you know, Mr. Edie
Ochiltree, who it is you are putting off your gibes and your jests upon?
You base old person, I will cleave your skull-piece with this shovels!"

"Ay," said Edie, "and where do ye think my pike-staff would be a' the
time?"

But Dousterswivel, growing more and more furious, heaved up the broken
pickaxe to smite his tormentor dead--which, indeed, he might have done
had not Edie, suddenly pointing with his hand, exclaimed in a stern
voice, "Do ye think that heaven and earth will suffer ye to murder an
auld man that gate--a man that might be your father? _Look behind you,
man!_"

Dousterswivel turned, and beheld, to his utter astonishment, a tall dark

figure standing close behind him. Whether this was the angry Misticot or
not, the newcomer certainly lifted a sturdy staff and laid it across the
rascal's back, bestowing on him half-a-dozen strokes so severe that he
fell to the ground, where he lay some minutes half unconscious with pain
and terror.

When the German came to himself, he was lying close to Misticot's open
grave on the soft earth which had been thrown out. He began to turn his
mind to projects of revenge. It must, he thought, be either Monkbarns or
Sir Arthur who had done this, in order to be revenged upon him. And his
mind finally deciding upon the latter, as most likely to have set Edie
Ochiltree on to deceive him, he determined from that moment to achieve
the ruin of his "dear and honoured patron" of the last five years.

As he left the precincts of the ruined Priory, he continued his vows of

vengeance against Edie and all associated with him. He had, he declared
aloud, been assaulted and murdered, besides being robbed of fifty pounds
as well. He would, on the very next day, put the law in motion "against
all the peoples"--but against Edie Ochiltree first of all.

A QUITE SUPERFLUOUS INTERLUDE

The snow was now deep in the woods about the

library. It lay sleek and drifted upon the paths,
a broad-flaked, mortar-like snow, evidently
produced on the borderland between thawing and
freezing.

"It is fine and buttery," said Hugh John, with a

glance of intention at Sir Toady Lion, which was
equal to any challenge ever sent from Douglas to
Percy--or even that which Mr. Lesley carried for
Hector MacIntyre to Mr. Lovel's Fairport lodgings.

Sir Toady nodded with fierce willingness. He

scented the battle from afar.

"Ten yards then, twenty snowballs made before you

begin, and then go as you please. But no rushing
in, before first volley!"

"And no holding the balls under the drip of the

kitchen roof!" said Hugh John, who had suffered
from certain Toady Lionish practices which
personally he scorned.

"Well, then," said I, "out you go in your jerseys

for one hot half-hour. But no standing about,
mind!"

Sweetheart and Maid Margaret looked exceedingly

wistful.
"Of course," I said, "Sweetheart will want to go on
with her knitting, but if she likes, the Maid can
watch them from the window."

"Oo-oh!" said Maid Margaret, "I _should_ like to go

too!"

"And I should not mind going either," admitted

Sweetheart, "just to see that they did not hurt the
Maid. They are such rough boys!"

So it was arranged, as I had known it would be from

the first. The snow was still falling, but the wind
had gone down. There was to be no standing still,
and afterward they were to change immediately for
dinner. These were the conditions of permitted
civil strife.

"Please, is rolling in the snow permitted?" said

Hugh John, to whom this was a condition of
importance.

"Why, yes," said I, "that is, if you catch the

enemy out of his intrenchments."

"Um-m-m-m!" said Hugh John, grimly rubbing his

hands, "I'll catch him." In a lower tone he added,
"And I'll teach him to put snowballs in the drip!"

As he spoke, he mimicked the motions of one who

shoves snow down inside the collar of his
adversary.

The cover of a deal box, with a soap advertisement

on it, made a very fair intrenching tool, and soon
formidable snow-works could be seen rising rapidly
on the slopes of the clothes' drying ground,
making a semicircle about that corner which
contained the big iron swing, erect on its two tall
posts. Hugh John and Maid Margaret, the attacking
party, were still invisible, probably concocting a
plan. But Sweetheart and Sir Toady, laughing and
jesting as at some supreme stratagem, were busily
employed throwing up the snow till it was nearly
breast-high. The formation of the ground was in
their favour. It fell away rapidly on all sides,
except to the north, where the position was made
impregnable by a huge prickly hedge.

Nominally they were supposed to be enacting _The

Antiquary_, but actually I could not see that the
scene without bore any precise relation to what
they had been hearing within. Perhaps, however, the
day was too cold and stormy for standing upon the
exactitudes of history.

I did not remain all the time a spectator of the

fray. The stated duel of twenty balls was over
before I again reached the window. The combatants
had entered upon the go-as-you-please stage.
Indeed, I could gather so much even at my desk, by
the confusion of yells and slogans emitted by the
contending parties.

Presently the cry of "It's not fair!" brought me to

the window.

Hugh John and Maid Margaret had evidently gained a

certain preliminary success. For they had been able
to reach a position from which (with long poles
used at other times for the protection of the
strawberry beds) they were enabled, under shelter
themselves, to shake the branches of the big tree
which overshadowed the swing and the position of
the enemy. Every twig and branch was, of course,
laden with snow, and masses fell in rapid
succession upon the heads of the defenders. This
was annoying at first, but at a word from Sir
Toady, Sweetheart and he seized their intrenching
tools, calling out: "Thank you--thank you! It's
helping us so much! We've been wanting that badly!
All our snow was gone, and we had to make balls off
the ramparts. But now it's all right. Thank
you--thank you!"

The truth of this grew so evident that the baffled

assailants retired to consult. Nothing better than
a frontal attack, well sustained and driven home to
the hilt, occurred to Hugh John; and, indeed, after
all, that was the best thing that could happen on
such a day. A yell, a charge, a quick batter of
snowballs, and then a rush straight up the
bank--Maid Margaret, lithe as a deer-hound,
leading, her skirts kilted "as like a boy" as on
the spur of the moment she could achieve with a
piece of twine. Right on Sweetheart she rushed,
who,--as in some sort her senior and legal
protector,--of course, could not be very rough with
her, nor yet use the methods customary and licensed
between embattled brothers.

But while the Maid thus held Sweetheart in play,

Hugh John developed his stratagem. Leaning over the
ramparts he seized Sir Toady by the collar, and
then, throwing himself backward down the slope,
confident in the thick blanketing of snow
underneath, he dragged Sir Toady Lion along with
him.

"A prisoner--a prisoner!" he cried, both of them,

captor and captive alike, being involved in a misty
flurry of snow, which boiled up from the snowbank,
in the midst of which they fraternally embraced, in
that intimate tangle of legs and arms which only
boys can achieve without breaking bones.

"Back--come back!" rang out the order of the

victorious Hugh John. "Sit on him--sit on him
hard!"

Thus, and not otherwise, was Sir Toady captured

and Sweetheart left alone in the shattered
intrenchments, which a little before had seemed so
impregnable. Now in these snow wars, and, indeed,
in all the combattings of the redoubtable four, it
was the rule that a captive belonged to the side
which took him, from the very moment of his giving
in. He must utterly renounce his former allegiance,
and fight for his new party as fiercely as formerly
he had done against them. This is the only way of
decently prolonging strife when the combatants are
well matched, but various prejudices stand in the
way of applying it to international conflicts.

In this fashion was Sweetheart left alone in the

fort which she and Sir Toady had constructed with
such complete confidence. She did not, however,
show the least fear, being a young lady of a
singularly composed mind. On the other hand, she
set herself to repair the various breaches in the
walls, and so far as might be to contract them, so
that she would have less space to defend. Then she
sat sedately down on the swing and rocked herself
to and fro to keep warm, till the storm should
break on her devoted head.

It broke! With unanimous yell, an army, formidable

by being exactly three times her own numbers,
rushed across the level space, waving flags and
shouting in all the stern and headlong glory of the
charge. Snowballs were discharged at the bottom of
the glacis, the slope was climbed, and the enemy
arrived almost at the very walls, before Sweetheart
made a motion. There was something uncanny about
it. She did not even dodge the balls. For one thing
they were very badly aimed, and her chief safety
was in sitting still. They were, you see, aiming at
her.

It soon became evident, however, that the works

must be stormed. Still Sweetheart had made no
motion to resist, except that, still seated on the
broad board of the swing, she had gradually pushed
herself back as far as she could go without losing
her foothold on the ground.

"She's afraid!--She is retreating! On--on!"

No, Hugh John, for once your military genius has

been at fault. For at the very moment when the
snowy walls were being scaled, Sweetheart suddenly
lifted her feet from the ground. The swing, pushed
back to the limit of its chains, glided smoothly
forward. One solidly shod boot-sole took Hugh John
full on the chest. Another "plunked" Sir Toady in a
locality which he held yet more tender, especially,
 as now, before dinner. Both warriors shot backward
as if discharged from a petard, disappearing from
view down the slope into the big drifts at the
foot. Maid Margaret, who had not been touched at
all, but who had stood (as it were) in the very
middle of affairs, uttered one terrified yell and
bolted.

"Time!" cried the umpire, appearing in the

doorway.

The baffled champions entered first. While

changing, they had got ready at least twenty
complete explanations of their downfall.
Sweetheart, coming in a little late, sat down to
her sewing, and listened placidly with a faint,
sweet, far-away smile which seemed to say that
knitting, though an occupation despised by boys,
does not wholly obscure the intellect. But she did
not say a word.

Her brothers somehow found this attitude

excessively provoking.

* * * * *

Thus exercised in mind and body, and presently also

fortified by the mid-day meal, the company declared
its kind readiness to hear the rest of _The
Antiquary_. It was not _Rob Roy_, of course--but a
snowy day brought with it certain compensations. So
to the crackle of the wood fire and the click and
shift of the knitting needles, I began the final
tale from _The Antiquary_.

THE THIRD TALE FROM "THE ANTIQUARY"

I. THE EARL'S SECRET

ON the seashore not far from the mansion-house of Monkbarns stood the
little fisherman's cottage of Saunders Mucklebackit. Saunders it was who
had rigged the mast, by which Sir Arthur and his daughter were pulled to
the top of the cliffs on the night of the storm. His wife came every day
to the door of Monkbarns to sell fish to Miss Griselda, the Antiquary's
sister, when the pair of them would stand by the hour "skirling and
flyting beneath his window like so many seamaws," as Oldbuck himself
said.

Besides Steenie Mucklebackit, the eldest son, the same who had assisted
Edie Ochiltree to bestow a well-deserved chastisement upon
Dousterswivel, and a number of merry half-naked urchins, the family
included the grandmother, Elspeth Mucklebackit--a woman old, but not
infirm, whose understanding appeared at most times to be asleep, but the
stony terror of whose countenance often frightened the bairns more than
their mother's shrill tongue and ready palm.
Elspeth seldom spoke. Indeed, she had done little for many years except
twirl the distaff in her corner by the fire. Few cared to have much to
do with her. She was thought to be "far from canny," and certainly she
knew more about the great family of Glenallan than it was safe to speak
aloud.

It chanced on the very night when Edie and Steenie had given a skinful
of sore bones to the German impostor Dousterswivel, that the Countess of
Glenallan, mother of the Earl, was brought to be buried at midnight
among the ruins of St. Ruth.

Such had been the custom of the family from ancient times--indeed, ever
since the Great Earl fell fighting at the Red Harlaw against Donald of
the Isles. More recently there had been another reason for such a
strange fashion of burial. For the family were Catholics, and there had
long been laws in Scotland against the holding of popish ceremonials
even on an occasion so solemn.

The news of the death of her ancient mistress, coming at last to the
ears of old Elspeth, took such hold upon her, that she could not rest
till she had sent off Edie Ochiltree to the Earl of Glenallan, at
Glenallan House, with a ring for a token and the message that Elspeth of
the Craigburnfoot must see him before she died. She had, Edie was to
say, a secret on her soul, without revealing which she could not hope to
die in peace.

Accordingly Edie set off for the castle of Glenallan, taking the ring
with him, but with very little hope of finding his way into the Earl's
presence; for Lord Glenallan had been long completely withdrawn from the
world. His mother was Countess in her own right, and so long as she
lived, her son had been wholly dependent upon her. In addition to which
some great sorrow or some great crime, the countryside was not sure
which, pressed sore upon his mind, and being a strict Catholic he passed
his time in penance and prayer.

However, by the help of an old soldier, one Francie Macraw, who had been
his rear-rank man at Fontenoy, Edie Ochiltree was able after many delays
to win a way to the Earl's presence--though the priests who were about
his person evidently tried to keep everything connected with the outer
world from his knowledge. The Earl, a tall, haggard, gloomy man, whose
age seemed twice what it really was, stood holding the token ring in his
hand. At first he took Edie for a father of his own church, and demanded
if any further penance were necessary to atone for his sin. But as soon
as Edie declared his message, at the very first mention of the name of
Elspeth of the Craigburnfoot, the Earl's cheek became even more
deathlike than it had been at Edie's entrance.

"Ah," he said, "that name is indeed written on the darkest page of a

terrible history. But what can the woman want with me? Is she dead or
living?"

"She is living in the body," said Edie, "and at times her mind lives
too--but she is an awfu' woman."

"She always was so," said the Earl, answering almost unconsciously. "She
was different from other women--likest, perhaps, to her who is no
more--"
Edie knew that he meant his own mother, so lately dead.

"She wishes to see me," continued the Earl; "she shall be gratified,
though the meeting will be a pleasure to neither of us."

Lord Glenallan gave Edie a handful of guineas, which, contrary to his

usage, Edie had not the courage to refuse. The Earl's tone was too
absolute.

Then, as an intimation that the interview was at an end, Lord Glenallan

called his servant.

"See this old man safe," he said; "let no one ask him any questions. And
you, my friend, be gone, and forget the road that leads to my house!"

"That would indeed be difficult," said the undaunted Edie, "since your
lordship has given me such good cause to remember it."

Lord Glenallan stared, as if hardly comprehending the old man's boldness

in daring to bandy words with him. Then, without answering, he made him
another signal to depart by a simple movement of his hand, which Edie,
awed far beyond his wont, instantly obeyed.

II. THE MOTHER'S VENGEANCE

The day of Lord Glenallan's visit to the cottage where dwelt old Elspeth
of the Craigburnfoot seemed at first ill timed. That very day Steenie
Mucklebackit, the young, the gallant, the handsome eldest son of the
house had been carried to his grave. He had been drowned while at the
fishing, though his father had risked his life in vain to save him. The
family had now returned home, and were sitting alone in the first
benumbing shock of their grief.

It was some time before the Earl could make good his entrance into the
cottage. It was still longer before he could convince the old woman
Elspeth that he was really Lord Glenallan, and so obtain an opportunity
of speaking with her. But at last they were left alone in the cottage,
and the thick veil which had fallen upon Elspeth's spirit seemed for a
while to be drawn aside. She spoke like one of an education far superior
to her position, clearly and calmly, even when recounting the most
terrible events.

Her very first words recalled to the Earl the fair young wife, whom he
had married long ago, against his mother's will and without her
knowledge.

"Name not her name," he cried, in agony, "all that is dead to me--dead
long ago!"

"I MUST!" said the old woman; "it is of her I have to speak."

And in the fewest and simplest words she told him how, when his mother
the Countess had found means to separate husband and wife, while he
himself was fleeing half mad, none knew whither, the young wife had
thrown herself in a fit of frenzy over the cliffs into the sea. It was
to Elspeth's cottage that she and her babe had been brought.

"And here," said the terrible old woman, suddenly thrusting a golden
bodkin into his hand, "is the very dagger which your mother the Countess
gave me in order that with it I might slay your infant son."

The Earl looked at the gold bodkin or dagger, as if in fancy he saw the
blood of his child still red upon it.

"Wretch!" he cried; "and had you the heart?"

"I kenna whether I would or not," said Elspeth. "My mistress commanded
and I obeyed. So did I ever. But my obedience was not to be tried that
time. For when I returned, the babe had gone. Your younger brother had
been called up to the castle. The child had been left in the care of the
Countess's Spanish maid, and when I returned to my cottage, both she and
the babe were gone. The dead body of your young wife alone remained. And
now," concluded Elspeth, abruptly, "can you forgive me?"

Lord Glenallan was going out of the hut, overwhelmed by the disclosure
to which he had been listening. He saw his young wife hounded to death
by his fierce and revengeful mother. He thought of the living child so
wonderfully left to him as a legacy from the dead. Yet he turned at
Elspeth's last words.

"May God forgive thee, miserable woman," he said. "Turn for mercy to
Him. He will forgive you as sincerely as I do."

As Lord Glenallan went out into the sunlight, he met face to face with
the Antiquary himself, who was on his way to the cottage to offer what
consolation or help might be in his power. The Earl and he recognised
one another, but the Antiquary's greeting was hard and cold. As a
magistrate he had made, on his own responsibility and against all the
power of the Glenallan family, the legal inquiries into the death of the
Earl's young wife. Indeed, during a residence which she had made at
Knockwinnock Castle with the Wardour family twenty years ago, and while
she was still only known as Miss Eveline Neville, the Antiquary had
loved her and had asked her to be his wife. It was, indeed, chiefly on
her account that he had never married. Mr. Oldbuck had never ceased to
mourn her, and now, believing as he had good reason to do, that the Earl
was the cause of her untimely death, and of the stigma which rested upon
her name, it was little wonder that he should wish to have no dealings
with him.

But the Earl had a great need in his heart to speak to some one. In a
moment the whole world seemed to have changed for him. For the first
time he knew the truth about a dark deed of cruelty. For the first time,
also, he knew that he had a son. He desired above all else the wise
counsel of a true friend. In his heart he had admired the fearlessness
of the Antiquary in the bold inquiry he had made at the time of Eveline
Neville's death, and now, refusing to be rebuffed, he followed Mr.
Oldbuck as he was turning away, and demanded that he should not deny him
his counsel and assistance at a most terrible and critical moment.

It was not in the good Antiquary's nature to refuse such a request from
Earl or beggar, and their interview ended in the Earl's accepting the
hospitality of Monkbarns for the night, in order that they might have
plenty of time to discuss the whole subject of Elspeth's communication.

On his own part Mr. Oldbuck had some comfort to give Lord Glenallan. He
had kept the papers which concerned the inquiry carefully, and he was
able to assure his lordship that his brother had carried off the babe
with him, probably for the purpose of having it brought up and educated
upon the English estates he had inherited from his father, and on which
he had ever afterward lived.

"My brother," said Lord Glenallan, "is recently dead, which makes our
search the more difficult. Furthermore, I am not his heir. He has left
his property to a stranger, as indeed he had every right to do. But as
the heir is like himself a Protestant, he may be unwilling to aid the
inquiry--"

"I trust," interrupted Mr. Oldbuck, with some feeling, "that you will
find a Protestant can be as honest and honourable as a Catholic."

The Earl protested that he had no idea of supposing otherwise.

"Only," he continued, "there was an old steward on the estate who in all
probability is the only man now living who knows the truth. But it is
not expected that any man will willingly disinherit himself. For if I
have a living son, my father's estates are entailed on him, and the
steward may very likely stand by his master."

"I have a friend in Yorkshire," said Mr. Oldbuck, "to whom I can apply
for information as to the character of your brother's heir, and also as
to the disposition of his steward. That is all we can do at present. But
take courage, my lord. I believe that your son is alive."

In the morning Lord Glenallan returned to the castle in his carriage,

while Mr. Oldbuck, hearing from Hector that he was going down to
Fairport, in order to see that old Edie Ochiltree had fair play before
the magistrates, offered to bear him company.

Edie Ochiltree--in prison for thwacking the ribs of Dousterswivel, which

he had done (or at least poor Steenie Mucklebackit for him), and for
stealing the German's fifty pounds, which he had not done--willingly
revealed to Monkbarns what he had refused to breathe to Bailie
Littlejohn of the Fairport magistracy. After some delay Edie was
accordingly liberated on the Antiquary's bail, and immediately
accompanied his good friend to the cottage of old Elspeth Mucklebackit,
where, by the Earl's request, Oldbuck was to take down a statement from
her lips, such as might be produced in a court of law. But no single
syllable would the old beldame now utter against her ancient mistress.

"Ha," she said, at the first question put to her by the Antiquary; "I
thought it would come to this. It's only sitting silent when they
question me. There's nae torture in our days, and if there was, let them
rend me! It ill becomes a vassal's mouth to betray the bread which it
has eaten."

Then they told her that her mistress, the Countess Jocelin, was dead,
hoping this might bring her to confession. But the news had quite an
opposite effect.

"Dead!" cried Elspeth, aroused as ever by the sound of her mistress's

name, "then, if she be gone before, the servant must follow. All must
ride when she is in the saddle. Bring my scarf and hood! Ye wadna hae me
gang in the carriage with my lady, and my hair all abroad in this
fashion!"

She raised her withered arms, and her hands seemed busied like those of
a woman who puts on a cloak to go a journey.

"Call Miss Neville," she continued; "what do you mean by Lady Geraldin?
I said Eveline Neville. There's no Lady Geraldin. But tell her to change
her wet gown and not to look so pale. Bairn--what should she do wi' a
bairn? She has nane, I trow! Teresa--Teresa--my lady calls us! Bring a
candle! The grand staircase is as black before me as a Yule midnight!
Coming, my lady, we are coming!"

With these words, and as if following in the train of her mistress, old
Elspeth, once of the Craigburnfoot, sunk back on the settle, and from
thence sidelong to the floor.

III. THE HEIR OF GLENALLAN

Meanwhile doom was coming fast upon poor Sir Arthur Wardour. He seemed
to be utterly ruined. The treachery of Dousterswivel, the pressing and
extortionate demands of a firm called Goldiebirds, who held a claim over
his estate, the time-serving of his own lawyers, at last brought the
officers of the law down upon him. He found himself arrested for debt in
his own house. He was about to be sent to prison, when Edie Ochiltree,
who in his day had been deep in many plots, begged that he might be
allowed to drive over to Tannanburgh, and promised that he would
certainly bring back some good news from the post-office there.

It was all that Oldbuck, with his best tact and wisdom, could do to keep
Hector MacIntyre from assaulting the officers of the law during the
absence of Edie. Two long hours they waited. The carriage had already
been ordered round to the door to convey Sir Arthur to prison. Miss
Wardour was in agony, her father desperate with shame and grief, when
Edie arrived triumphantly grasping a packet. He delivered it forthwith
to the Antiquary. For Sir Arthur, knowing his own weakness, had put
himself unreservedly into the hands of his abler friend. The packet,
being opened, was found to contain a writ stopping the proceedings, a
letter of apology from the lawyers who had been most troublesome, and a
note from Captain Wardour, Sir Arthur's son, enclosing a thousand pounds
for his father's immediate needs. It also declared that ere long he
himself would come to the castle along with a distinguished officer,
Major Neville, who had been appointed to report to the War Office
concerning the state of the defences of the country.

"Thus," said the Antiquary, summing up the situation, "was the last
siege of Knockwinnock House laid by Saunders Sweepclean, the bailiff,
and raised by Edie Ochiltree, the King's Blue-Gown!"

There was, at the time when the story of the Antiquary and his doings
draws to a close, a daily expectation of a French invasion. Beacons had
been prepared on every hill and headland, and men were set to watch. One
of these beacons had been intrusted to old Caxon the hairdresser, and
one night he saw, directly in the line of the hill to the south which he
was to watch, a flame start suddenly up. It was undoubtedly the token
agreed upon to warn the country of the landing of the French.

He lighted his beacon accordingly. It threw up to the sky a long

wavering train of light, startling the sea-fowl from their nests, and
reddening the sea beneath the cliffs. Caxon's brother warders, equally
zealous, caught and repeated the signal. The district was soon awake and
alive with the tidings of invasion.
[Illustration: "ONE night he saw, directly in the line of the hill to
the south which he was to watch, a flame start suddenly up. It was
undoubtedly the token agreed upon to warn the country of the landing of
the French.

"He lighted his beacon accordingly."]

From far and near the Lowland burghers, the country lairds, the Highland
chiefs and clans responded to the summons. They had been drilling for
long, and now in the dead of the night they marched with speed upon
Fairport, eager to defend that point of probable attack.

Last of all the Earl of Glenallan came in with a splendidly mounted

squadron of horse, raised among his Lowland tenants, and five hundred
Highland clansmen with their pipes playing stormily in the van.
Presently also Captain Wardour arrived in a carriage drawn by four
horses, bringing with him Major Neville, the distinguished officer
appointed to the command of the district. The magistrates assembled at
the door of their town-house to receive him. The volunteers, the
yeomanry, the Glenallan clansmen--all were there awaiting the great man.

What was the astonishment of the people of Fairport, and especially of

the Antiquary, to see descend from the open door of the carriage,--who
but the quiet Mr. Lovel.

He had brought with him the news that the alarm of invasion was false.
The beacon which Caxon had seen was only the burning of the mining
machinery in Glen Withershins which had been ordered by Oldbuck and Sir
Arthur to make a final end of Dousterswivel's plots and deceits.

But there was yet further and more interesting private news. The proofs
that Lovel was indeed the son of the Earl of Glenallan were found to be
overwhelming. His heirship to the title had been fully made out. The
chaplain who had performed his father's wedding had returned from
abroad, exiled by the French Revolution. The witnesses also had been
found. Most decisive of all, among the papers of the Earl's late
brother, there was discovered a duly authenticated account of his
carrying off the child, and of how he had had him educated and pushed on
in the army.

So that very night the Antiquary enjoyed in some degree the crowning
pleasure of his whole life, in bringing together father and son for the
first time. That is, if the marriage which took place soon after between
his young friend Lovel (or Lord William Geraldin) and Miss Isabella
Wardour of Knockwinnock Castle did not turn out to be a yet greater
pleasure. Old Edie still travels from farm to farm, but mostly now
confines himself to the short round between Monkbarns and Knockwinnock.
It is reported, however, that he means soon to settle with old Caxon,
who, since the marriage of his daughter to Lieutenant Taffril, has been
given a cottage near the three wigs which he still keeps in order in the
parish,--the minister's, Sir Arthur's, and best of all, that of our good
and well-beloved Antiquary.

THE END OF THE LAST TALE FROM "THE ANTIQUARY."

* * * * *
 "Now," said Sweetheart, nodding particular
approval, "that is the way a story ought to end
up--everything going on from chapter to chapter,
with no roundabouts, and everything told about
everybody right to the very end!"

"Hum," said Hugh John, with a curl of his nose;

"well, that's done with! But it was good about the
Storm and the Duel! The rest was--"

"Hush," said Sweetheart, "remember, it was written

by Sir Walter."

"Sir," said I to Hugh John, heavily parental,

"_The Antiquary_ may not now be much to your
taste, but the day will come when you may probably
prefer it to all the rest put together."

At these words the young man assumed the expression

common to boys who are bound to receive the
wholesome advice of their elders, yet who do so
with silent but respectful doubt, if not with
actual disbelief.

"Well," he said, after a long pause, "anyway, the

Duel _was_ good. And I'd jolly well like to find a
treasure in Misticot's grave. Can we have another
snow fight?"

THE END OF THE FIRST SERIES OF RED CAP TALES FROM THE TREASURE-CHEST OF
THE WIZARD OF THE NORTH.

FOOTNOTES:

[1] These were Scottish children to whom the stories were retold, and
they understood the Scottish tongue. So the dialect parts were
originally told in that speech. Now, however, in pity for children who
have the misfortune to inherit only English, I have translated all the
hard words and phrases as best I could. But the old is infinitely
better, and my only hope and aim is, that the retelling of these stories
by the living voice may send every reader, every listener, to the Master
of Romance himself. If I succeed in this, my tale-telling shall not have
been in vain.

[2] _i.e._ scarecrow.

* * * * *

Transcriber's Notes

Obvious punctuation errors repaired.

One reference each of "lifeblood" and "life-blood" were retained. This

was also done with "sea-shore" and "seashore".

Page 151, "campanion" changed to "companion" (sole companion a)

Page 180, "summons" changed to "summon" (would summon all)

Page 324, "than" changed to "then" (and then began)

Page 374, "hims" changed to "his" (mounted on his)

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The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Golden Spears, by Edmund Leamy

This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or
re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.net

Title: The Golden Spears

And Other Fairy Tales

Author: Edmund Leamy

Illustrator: Corinne Turner

Release Date: July 28, 2007 [EBook #22168]

Language: English

*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE GOLDEN SPEARS ***

Produced by David Garcia, Michelle Croyle and the Online

Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net

[Illustration: "She beckoned the children to her"]

THE GOLDEN SPEARS

And Other Fairy Tales

BY

EDMUND LEAMY

ILLUSTRATIONS BY CORINNE TURNER

New York
Desmond FitzGerald, Inc.

Copyright, 1911
By DESMOND FITZGERALD, INC.
_All Rights Reserved_

CONTENTS

PAGE

PREFACE vii

INTRODUCTORY NOTE X

THE GOLDEN SPEARS 1

THE HOUSE IN THE LAKE 23

THE ENCHANTED CAVE 49

THE HUNTSMAN'S SON 76

THE FAIRY TREE OF DOOROS 101

THE LITTLE WHITE CAT 123

PRINCESS FINOLA AND THE DWARF 149

NOTES 170

ILLUSTRATIONS

"She beckoned the children to her" _Frontispiece_

 FACING PAGE

"'I have mourned you as dead, my darling,' said he" 39

"The queen wished to know if he would join them" 58

"Fergus knew it was the Pooka, the wild horse of the mountains" 81

"He was very sad, and tired" 106

"At the sight of him the prince remembered everything" 137

"Standing before him was the little princess" 169

PREFACE

It comes to me as a very welcome piece of news, and yet a piece of news

which I have been long expecting, that a special American edition of
Edmund Leamy's Irish fairy tales is about to be published. This, then,
will be the third issue of the little book. I venture to predict that it
will not be the last; and I fancy the American publisher who has had the
judgment to take the matter up will soon be rewarded for his enterprise.
For I believe the book to be a little classic in its way, and that it
will go on making for itself a place in the libraries of those who
understand children, and will hold that place permanently.

This is the verdict of competent literary judges. I am spared the

necessity of attempting a discussion of the grounds on which so strong
an opinion of Leamy's fairy tales is based by the fact that this is
already done in Mr. T. P. Gill's Introductory Note. Mr. Gill, though he
was, like myself, one of Leamy's intimate friends, is a conscientious
critic, and to his analysis not merely of the "Tales," but of that
attractive personality which Leamy infused into all he said or wrote
I can safely refer the reader. I think no one of taste and judgment who
reads these Tales will fail to agree with the view which is expressed in
that Note and which I here, with some confidence, venture to reiterate.

My chief hope with regard to this American edition is that when it has
made its mark with the general public, as it is sure to do, it will be
taken note of by those who are specially concerned with education.
Leamy, while a public man, a patriot steeped in the lore of Ireland's
past and ever weaving generous visions for her future, was before all
things else a child-lover. That was his own, his peculiar endowment.
He had an exquisite gift with children and seemed always able to speak
directly with the higher parts of their nature. It is this, I think,
which is evident in every page of these Tales, and which gives the book
its unique character. One to whose judgment on an educational matter
I attach the greatest value writes to me these words: "For refining
influence, for power to stimulate the sense of beauty, the tenderness,
the sentiment of nobleness of the child-soul, I can imagine no volume
more worthy of a place on the book-shelf of the people's schools."
Having myself often witnessed this influence at work, I can emphatically
indorse this opinion. I say I hope American educators may agree with it,
for if they do our educators here at home will follow so distinguished
a lead.
Of Edmund Leamy, in his personal aspect, I have already said something
in my preface to the Dublin edition. I need only add here that this
true-hearted Irishman had many friends on the American continent, and
that to them this little flower of his genius will be a vivid and
abiding souvenir of one of the most lovable of men.

If this book have the success in America which it deserves--and I hope

that success may be extended to Canada and the Australias--I believe a
charming and ennobling boon will have been conferred upon the child-life
of these great communities; and it will be a source of gratification to
those who were the author's friends and colleagues to think that that
gift came from one by whose side we had the honor to serve in Ireland's
struggles.

J. E. REDMOND.

Aughavannagh, _June, 1911_.

THE GOLDEN SPEARS

Once upon a time there lived in a little house under a hill a little old
woman and her two children, whose names were Connla and Nora. Right in
front of the door of the little house lay a pleasant meadow, and beyond
the meadow rose up to the skies a mountain whose top was sharp-pointed
like a spear. For more than halfway up it was clad with heather, and
when the heather was in bloom it looked like a purple robe falling from
the shoulders of the mountain down to its feet. Above the heather it was
bare and gray, but when the sun was sinking in the sea, its last rays
rested on the bare mountain top and made it gleam like a spear of gold,
and so the children always called it the "Golden Spear."

In summer days they gamboled in the meadow, plucking the sweet wild
grasses--and often and often they clambered up the mountain side, knee
deep in the heather, searching for frechans and wild honey, and sometimes
they found a bird's nest--but they only peeped into it, they never
touched the eggs or allowed their breath to fall upon them, for next to
their little mother they loved the mountain, and next to the mountain
they loved the wild birds who made the spring and summer weather musical
with their songs.

Sometimes the soft white mist would steal through the glen, and creeping
up the mountain would cover it with a veil so dense that the children
could not see it, and then they would say to each other: "Our mountain
is gone away from us." But when the mist would lift and float off into
the skies, the children would clap their hands, and say: "Oh, there's
our mountain back again."

In the long nights of winter they babbled of the spring and summertime
to come, when the birds would once more sing for them, and never a day
passed that they didn't fling crumbs outside their door, and on the
borders of the wood that stretched away towards the glen.

When the spring days came they awoke with the first light of the
morning, and they knew the very minute when the lark would begin to
sing, and when the thrush and the blackbird would pour out their liquid
notes, and when the robin would make the soft, green, tender leaves
tremulous at his song.

It chanced one day that when they were resting in the noontide heat,
under the perfumed shade of a hawthorn in bloom, they saw on the edge
of the meadow, spread out before them, a speckled thrush cowering in
the grass.

"Oh, Connla! Connla! Look at the thrush--and, look, look up in the sky,
there is a hawk!" cried Nora.

Connla looked up, and he saw the hawk with quivering wings, and he
knew that in a second it would pounce down on the frightened thrush.
He jumped to his feet, fixed a stone in his sling, and before the whir
of the stone shooting through the air was silent, the stricken hawk
tumbled headlong in the grass.

The thrush, shaking its wings, rose joyously in the air, and perching
upon an elm-tree in sight of the children, he sang a song so sweet that
they left the hawthorn shade and walked along together until they stood
under the branches of the elm; and they listened and listened to the
thrush's song, and at last Nora said:

"Oh, Connla! did you ever hear a song so sweet as this?"

"No," said Connla, "and I do believe sweeter music was never heard
before."

"Ah," said the thrush, "that's because you never heard the nine little
pipers playing. And now, Connla and Nora, you saved my life to-day."

"It was Nora saved it," said Connla, "for she pointed you out to me,
and also pointed out the hawk which was about to pounce on you."

"It was Connla saved you," said Nora, "for he slew the hawk with his
sling."

"I owe my life to both of you," said the thrush. "You like my song, and
you say you have never heard anything so sweet; but wait till you hear
the nine little pipers playing."

"And when shall we hear them?" said the children.

"Well," said the thrush, "sit outside your door to-morrow evening, and
wait and watch until the shadows have crept up the heather, and then,
when the mountain top is gleaming like a golden spear, look at the line
where the shadow on the heather meets the sunshine, and you shall see
what you shall see."

And having said this, the thrush sang another song sweeter than the
first, and then saying "good-by," he flew away into the woods.

The children went home, and all night long they were dreaming of the
thrush and the nine little pipers; and when the birds sang in the
morning, they got up and went out into the meadow to watch the mountain.

The sun was shining in a cloudless sky, and no shadows lay on the
mountain, and all day long they watched and waited, and at last, when
the birds were singing their farewell song to the evening star, the
children saw the shadows marching from the glen, trooping up the
mountain side and dimming the purple of the heather.

And when the mountain top gleamed like a golden spear, they fixed their
eyes on the line between the shadow and the sunshine.

"Now," said Connla, "the time has come."

"Oh, look! look!" said Nora, and as she spoke, just above the line of
shadow a door opened out, and through its portals came a little piper
dressed in green and gold. He stepped down, followed by another and
another, until they were nine in all, and then the door slung back
again. Down through the heather marched the pipers in single file, and
all the time they played a music so sweet that the birds, who had gone
to sleep in their nests, came out upon the branches to listen to them,
and then they crossed the meadow, and they went on and on until they
disappeared in the leafy woods.

While they were passing the children were spellbound, and couldn't
speak, but when the music had died away in the woods, they said:

"The thrush is right, that is the sweetest music that was ever heard
in all the world."

And when the children went to bed that night the fairy music came to
them in their dreams. But when the morning broke, and they looked out
upon their mountain and could see no trace of the door above the
heather, they asked each other whether they had really seen the little
pipers, or only dreamt of them.

That day they went out into the woods, and they sat beside a stream that
pattered along beneath the trees, and through the leaves tossing in the
breeze the sun flashed down upon the streamlet, and shadow and sunshine
danced upon it. As the children watched the water sparkling where the
sunlight fell, Nora said:

"Oh, Connla, did you ever see anything so bright and clear and glancing
as that?"

"No," said Connla, "I never did."

"That's because you never saw the crystal hall of the fairy of the
mountains," said a voice above the heads of the children.

And when they looked up, who should they see perched on a branch but the
thrush.

"And where is the crystal hall of the fairy?" said Connla.

"Oh, it is where it always was, and where it always will be," said the
thrush. "And you can see it if you like."

"We would like to see it," said the children.

"Well, then," said the thrush, "if you would, all you have to do is to
follow the nine little pipers when they come down through the heather,
and cross the meadow to-morrow evening."
And the thrush having said this, flew away.

Connla and Nora went home, and that night they fell asleep talking of
the thrush and the fairy and the crystal hall.

All the next day they counted the minutes, until they saw the shadows
thronging from the glen and scaling the mountain side. And, at last,
they saw the door springing open, and the nine little pipers marching
down.

They waited until the pipers had crossed the meadow and were about to
enter the wood. And then they followed them, the pipers marching on
before them and playing all the time. It was not long until they had
passed through the wood, and then, what should the children see rising
up before them but another mountain, smaller than their own, but, like
their own, clad more than half way up with purple heather, and whose
top was bare and sharp-pointed, and gleaming like a golden spear.

Up through the heather climbed the pipers, up through the heather the
children clambered after them, and the moment the pipers passed the
heather a door opened and they marched in, the children following, and
the door closed behind them.

Connla and Nora were so dazzled by the light that hit their eyes, when
they had crossed the threshold, that they had to shade them with their
hands; but, after a moment or two, they became able to bear the
splendor, and when they looked around they saw that they were in a noble
hall, whose crystal roof was supported by two rows of crystal pillars
rising from a crystal floor; and the walls were of crystal, and along
the walls were crystal couches, with coverings and cushions of sapphire
silk with silver tassels.

Over the crystal floor the little pipers marched; over the crystal floor
the children followed, and when a door at the end of the hall was opened
to let the pipers pass, a crowd of colors came rushing in, and floor,
and ceiling, and stately pillars, and glancing couches, and shining
walls, were stained with a thousand dazzling hues.

Out through the door the pipers marched; out through the door the
children followed, and when they crossed the threshold they were
treading on clouds of amber, of purple, and of gold.

"Oh, Connla," said Nora, "we have walked into the sunset!"

And around and about them everywhere were soft, fleecy clouds, and over
their heads was the glowing sky, and the stars were shining through it,
as a lady's eyes shine through a veil of gossamer. And the sky and stars
seemed so near that Connla thought he could almost touch them with his
hand.

When they had gone some distance, the pipers disappeared, and when
Connla and Nora came up to the spot where they had seen the last of
them, they found themselves at the head of a ladder, all the steps of
which were formed of purple and amber clouds that descended to what
appeared to be a vast and shining plain, streaked with purple and gold.
In the spaces between the streaks of gold and purple they saw soft,
milk-white stars. And the children thought that the great plain, so far
below them, also belonged to cloudland.
They could not see the little pipers, but up the steps was borne by
the cool, sweet air the fairy music; and lured on by it step by step
they traveled down the fleecy stairway. When they were little more
than halfway down there came mingled with the music a sound almost
as sweet--the sound of waters toying in the still air with pebbles
on a shelving beach, and with the sound came the odorous brine of the
ocean. And then the children knew that what they thought was a plain in
the realms of cloudland was the sleeping sea unstirred by wind or tide,
dreaming of the purple clouds and stars of the sunset sky above it.

When Connla and Nora reached the strand they saw the nine little pipers
marching out towards the sea, and they wondered where they were going
to. And they could hardly believe their eyes when they saw them stepping
out upon the level ocean as if they were walking upon the land; and away
the nine little pipers marched, treading the golden line cast upon the
waters by the setting sun. And as the music became fainter and fainter
as the pipers passed into the glowing distance, the children began to
wonder what was to become of themselves. Just at that very moment they
saw coming towards them from the sinking sun a little white horse, with
flowing mane and tail and golden hoofs. On the horse's back was a little
man dressed in shining green silk. When the horse galloped on to the
strand the little man doffed his hat, and said to the children:

"Would you like to follow the nine little pipers?" The children said,
"yes."

"Well, then," said the little man, "come up here behind me; you, Nora,
first, and Connla after."

Connla helped up Nora, and then climbed on to the little steed himself;
and as soon as they were properly seated the little man said "swish,"
and away went the steed, galloping over the sea without wetting hair or
hoof. But fast as he galloped the nine little pipers were always ahead
of him, although they seemed to be going only at a walking pace. When
at last he came up rather close to the hindmost of them the nine little
pipers disappeared, but the children heard the music playing beneath
the waters. The white steed pulled up suddenly, and wouldn't move a
step further.

"Now," said the little man to the children, "clasp me tight, Nora, and
do you, Connla, cling on to Nora, and both of you shut your eyes."

The children did as they were bidden, and the little man cried:

"Swish! swash!"

And the steed went down and down until at last his feet struck the
bottom.

"Now open your eyes," said the little man.

And when the children did so they saw beneath the horse's feet a golden
strand, and above their heads the sea like a transparent cloud between
them and the sky. And once more they heard the fairy music, and marching
on the strand before them were the nine little pipers.

"You must get off now," said the little man, "I can go no farther
with you."
The children scrambled down, and the little man cried "swish," and
himself and the steed shot up through the sea, and they saw him no more.
Then they set out after the nine little pipers, and it wasn't long until
they saw rising up from the golden strand and pushing their heads up
into the sea above, a mass of dark gray rocks. And as they were gazing
at them they saw the rocks opening, and the nine little pipers
disappearing through them.

The children hurried on, and when they came up close to the rocks they
saw sitting on a flat and polished stone a mermaid combing her golden
hair, and singing a strange sweet song that brought the tears to their
eyes, and by the mermaid's side was a little sleek brown otter.

When the mermaid saw them she flung her golden tresses back over her
snow-white shoulders, and she beckoned the children to her. Her large
eyes were full of sadness; but there was a look so tender upon her face
that the children moved towards her without any fear.

"Come to me, little one," she said to Nora, "come and kiss me," and in a
second her arms were around the child. The mermaid kissed her again and
again; as the tears rushed to her eyes, she said:

"Oh, Nora, mavourneen, your breath is as sweet as the wild rose that
blooms in the green fields of Erin, and happy are you, my children, who
have come so lately from the pleasant land. Oh, Connla! Connla! I get
the scent of the dew of the Irish grasses and of the purple heather from
your feet. And you both can soon return to Erin of the Streams, but I
shall not see it till three hundred years have passed away, for I am
Liban the Mermaid, daughter of a line of kings. But I may not keep you
here. The Fairy Queen is waiting for you in her snow-white palace and
her fragrant bowers. And now kiss me once more, Nora, and kiss me,
Connla. May luck and joy go with you, and all gentleness be upon you
both."[1]

Then the children said good-by to the mermaid, and the rocks opened for
them and they passed through, and soon they found themselves in a meadow
starred with flowers, and through the meadow sped a sunlit stream. They
followed the stream until it led them into a garden of roses, and beyond
the garden, standing on a gentle hill, was a palace white as snow.
Before the palace was a crowd of fairy maidens pelting each other with
rose-leaves. But when they saw the children they gave over their play,
and came trooping towards them.

"Our queen is waiting for you," they said; and then they led the
children to the palace door. The children entered, and after passing
through a long corridor they found themselves in a crystal hall so like
the one they had seen in the mountain of the golden spear that they
thought it was the same. But on all the crystal couches fairies, dressed
in silken robes of many colors, were sitting, and at the end of the
hall, on a crystal throne, was seated the fairy queen, looking lovelier
than the evening star. The queen descended from her throne to meet
the children, and taking them by the hands, she led them up the shining
steps. Then, sitting down, she made them sit beside her, Connla on her
right hand and Nora on her left.

Then she ordered the nine little pipers to come before her, and she said
to them:

"So far you have done your duty faithfully, and now play one more sweet
air and your task is done."

And the little pipers played, and from the couches at the first sound of
the music all the fairies rose, and forming partners, they danced over
the crystal floor as lightly as the young leaves dancing in the wind.

Listening to the fairy music, and watching the wavy motion of the
dancing fairies, the children fell asleep. When they awoke next morning
and rose from their silken beds they were no longer children. Nora was a
graceful and stately maiden, and Connla a handsome and gallant youth.
They looked at each other for a moment in surprise, and then Connla
said:

"Oh, Nora, how tall and beautiful you are!"

"Oh, not so tall and handsome as you are, Connla," said Nora, as she
flung her white arms round his neck and kissed her brother's lips.

Then they drew back to get a better look of each other, and who should
step between them but the fairy queen.

"Oh, Nora, Nora," said she, "I am not as high as your knee, and as for
you, Connla, you look as straight and as tall as one of the round towers
of Erin."

"And how did we grow so tall in one night?" said Connla.

"In one night!" said the fairy queen. "One night, indeed! Why, you have
been fast asleep, the two of you, for the last seven years!"

"And where was the little mother all that time?" said Connla and Nora
together.

"Oh, the little mother was all right. She knew where you were; but she
is expecting you to-day, and so you must go off to see her, although
I would like to keep you--if I had my way--all to myself here in the
fairyland under the sea. And you will see her to-day; but before you go
here is a necklace for you, Nora; it is formed out of the drops of the
ocean spray, sparkling in the sunshine. They were caught by my fairy
nymphs, for you, as they skimmed the sunlit billows under the shape of
sea-birds, and no queen or princess in the world can match their luster
with the diamonds won with toil from the caves of earth. As for you,
Connla, see here's a helmet of shining gold fit for a king of Erin--and
a king of Erin you will be yet; and here's a spear that will pierce any
shield, and here's a shield that no spear can pierce and no sword can
cleave as long as you fasten your warrior cloak with this brooch of
gold."

And as she spoke she flung round Connla's shoulders a flowing mantle of
yellow silk, and pinned it at his neck with a red gold brooch.

"And now, my children, you must go away from me. You, Nora, will be a
warrior's bride in Erin of the Streams. And you, Connla, will be king
yet over the loveliest province in all the land of Erin; but you will
have to fight for your crown, and days of battle are before you. They
will not come for a long time after you have left the fairyland under
the sea, and until they come lay aside your helmet, shield, and spear,
and warrior's cloak and golden brooch. But when the time comes when you
will be called to battle, enter not upon it without the golden brooch
I give you fastened in your cloak, for if you do harm will come to you.
Now, kiss me, children; your little mother is waiting for you at the
foot of the golden spear, but do not forget to say good-by to Liban the
Mermaid, exiled from the land she loves, and pining in sadness beneath
the sea."

Connla and Nora kissed the fairy queen, and Connla, wearing his golden
helmet and silken cloak, and carrying his shield and spear, led Nora
with him. They passed from the palace through the garden of roses,
through the flowery meadow, through the dark gray rocks, until they
reached the golden strand; and there, sitting and singing the strange,
sweet song, was Liban the Mermaid.

"And so you are going up to Erin," she said, "up through the covering
waters. Kiss me, children, once again; and when you are in Erin of the
Streams, sometimes think of the exile from Erin beneath the sea."

And the children kissed the mermaid, and with sad hearts, bidding her
good-by, they walked along the golden strand. When they had gone what
seemed to them a long way, they began to feel weary; and just then
they saw coming towards them a little man in a red jacket leading
a coal-black steed.

When they met the little man, he said: "Connla, put Nora up on this
steed; then jump up before her."

Connla did as he was told, and when both of them were mounted--

"Now, Connla," said the little man, "catch the bridle in your hands,
and you, Nora, clasp Connla round the waist, and close your eyes."

They did as they were bidden, and then the little man said, "Swash,
swish!" and the steed shot up from the strand like a lark from the
grass, and pierced the covering sea, and went bounding on over the
level waters; and when his hoofs struck the hard ground, Connla and
Nora opened their eyes, and they saw that they were galloping towards
a shady wood.

On went the steed, and soon he was galloping beneath the branches that
almost touched Connla's head. And on they went until they had passed
through the wood, and then they saw rising up before them the "Golden
Spear."

"Oh, Connla," said Nora, "we are at home at last."

"Yes," said Connla, "but where is the little house under the hill?"

And no little house was there; but in its stead was standing a
lime-white mansion.

"What can this mean?" said Nora.

But before Connla could reply, the steed had galloped up to the door
of the mansion, and, in the twinkling of an eye, Connla and Nora were
standing on the ground outside the door, and the steed had vanished.

Before they could recover from their surprise the little mother came
rushing out to them, and flung her arms around their necks, and kissed
them both again and again.
"Oh, children! children! You are welcome home to me; for though I knew
it was all for the best, my heart was lonely without you."

And Connla and Nora caught up the little mother in their arms, and they
carried her into the hall and set her down on the floor.

"Oh, Nora!" said the little mother, "you are a head over me; and as for
you, Connla, you look almost as tall as one of the round towers of Erin."

"That's what the fairy queen said, mother," said Nora.

"Blessings on the fairy queen," said the little mother. "Turn round,
Connla, till I look at you."

Connla turned round, and the little mother said:

"Oh, Connla, with your golden helmet and your spear, and your glancing
shield, and your silken cloak, you look like a king. But take them off,
my boy, beautiful as they are. Your little mother would like to see you,
her own brave boy, without any fairy finery."

And Connla laid aside his spear and shield, and took off his golden
helmet and his silken cloak. Then he caught the little mother and kissed
her, and lifted her up until she was as high as his head. And said he:

"Don't you know, little mother, I'd rather have you than all the world."

And that night, when they were sitting down by the fire together, you
may be sure that in the whole world no people were half as happy as
Nora, Connla, and the little mother.

THE HOUSE IN THE LAKE[2]

A long, long time ago there lived in a little hut, in the midst of one
of the inland lakes of Erin, an old fisherman and his son. The hut was
built on stakes driven into the bed of the lake, and was so high above
the waters that even when they were stirred into waves by the wind
coming down from the mountains they did not reach the threshold of the
door. Around, outside the hut, on a level with the floor, was a little
wicker-work platform, and under the platform, close to the steps leading
up to it from the water, the fisherman's curragh, made of willows,
covered with skins, was moored, and it was only by means of the curragh
that he and his son, Enda, could leave their lake dwelling.

On many a summer evening Enda lay stretched on the platform, watching

the sunset fading from the mountain-tops, and the twilight creeping over
the waters of the lake, and it chanced that once when he was so engaged
he heard a rustle in a clump of sedge that grew close to one side of
the hut. He turned to where the sound came from, and what should he see
but an otter swimming towards him, with a little trout in his mouth.
When the otter came up to where Enda was lying, he lifted his head and
half his body from the water, and flung the trout on the platform,
almost at Enda's feet, and then disappeared.
Enda took the little panting trout in his hand; but as he did so he
heard, quite close to him, in the lake, a sound like that of water
plashing upon water, and he saw the widening circles caused by a trout
which had just risen to a fly; and he said to the little trout he held
in his hand:

"I won't keep you, poor thing! Perhaps that was a little comrade come
to look for you, and so I'll send you back to him."

And saying this, he dropped the little trout into the lake.

Well, when the next evening came, again Enda was lying stretched outside
the hut, and once more he heard the rustle in the sedge, and once more
the otter came and flung the little trout almost into his hands.

Enda, more surprised than ever, did not know what to do. He saw that it
was the same little trout the otter had brought him the night before,
and he said:

"Well, I gave you a chance last night. I'll give you another, if only to
see what will come of it."

And he dropped the trout into the lake; but no sooner had it touched the
waters than it was changed into a beautiful, milk-white swan. And Enda
could hardly believe his eyes, as he saw it sailing across the lake,
until it was lost in the sedges growing by the shore.

All that night he lay awake, thinking of what he had seen, and as soon
as the morning stood on the hill-tops, and cast its shafts of golden
light across the lake, Enda rose and got into his curragh.

He rowed all round the shores, beating the sedges with his oar, in
pursuit of the swan; but all in vain; he could not catch a glimpse of
her white plumage anywhere. Day after day he rowed about the lake in
search of her, and every evening he lay outside the hut watching the
waters. At long last, one night, when the full moon, rising above the
mountains, flooded the whole lake with light, he saw the swan coming
swiftly towards him, shining brighter than the moonbeams. The swan came
on until it was almost within a boat's length of the hut; and what
should Enda hear but the swan speaking to him in his own language:

"Get into your curragh, Enda, and follow me," said she, and, saying
this, she turned round and sailed away.

Enda jumped into the curragh, and soon the water, dripping from his oar,
was flashing like diamonds in the moonlight. And he rowed after the
swan, who glided on before him, until she came to where the shadows of
the mountains lay deepest on the lake. Then the swan rested, and when
Enda came up to her:

"Enda," said she, "I have brought you where none may hear what I wish to
say to you. I am Mave, the daughter of the king of Erin. By the magic
arts of my cruel stepmother I was changed into a trout, and cast into
this lake a year and a day before the evening when you restored me to
the waters the second time. If you had not done so the first night the
otter brought me to you I should have been changed into a hooting owl;
if you had not done so the second night, I should have been changed into
a croaking raven. But, thanks to you, Enda, I am now a snow-white swan,
and for one hour on the first night of every full moon the power of
speech is and will be given to me as long as I remain a swan. And a swan
I must always remain, unless you are willing to break the spell of
enchantment that is over me; and you alone can break it."

"I'll do anything I can for you, O princess!" said Enda. "But how can
I break the spell?"

"You can do so," said the swan, "only by pouring upon my plumage the
perfumed water that fills the golden bowl that is in the inmost room of
the palace of the fairy queen, beneath the lake."

"And how can I get that?" said Enda.

"Well," said the swan, "you must dive beneath the lake, and walk along
its bed, until you come to where the lake dragon guards the entrance of
the fairy queen's dominions."

"I can dive like a fish," said Enda; "but how can I walk beneath the
waters?"

"You can do it easily enough," said the swan, "if you get the
water-dress of Brian, one of the three sons of Turenn, and his helmet
of transparent crystal, by the aid of which he was able to walk under
the green salt sea."[3]

"And where shall I find them?"

"They are in the water-palace of Angus of the Boyne," said the swan;
"but you should set out at once, for if the spell be not broken before
the moon is full again, it cannot be broken for a year and a day."

"I'll set out in the first ray of the morning," said Enda.

"May luck and joy go with you," said the swan. "And now the hours
of silence are coming upon me, and I have only time to warn you that
dangers you little dream of will lie before you in your quest for the
golden cup."

"I am willing to face all dangers for your sake, O princess," said Enda.

"Blessings be upon you, Enda," said the swan, and she sailed away from
the shadow out into the light across the lake to the sedgy banks. And
Enda saw her no more.

He rowed his curragh home, and he lay on his bed without taking off his
clothes. And as the first faint glimmer of the morning came slanting down
the mountains, he stepped into his curragh and pulled across the lake,
and took the road towards the water-palace of Angus of the Boyne.

When he reached the banks of the glancing river a little woman, dressed
in red, was standing there before him.

"You are welcome, Enda," said she. "And glad am I to see the day that
brings you here to help the winsome Princess Mave. And now wait a
second, and the water-dress and crystal helmet will be ready for you."

And, having said this, the little woman plucked a handful of wild
grasses, and she breathed upon them three times and then flung them on
the river, and a dozen fairy nymphs came springing up through the water,
bearing the water-dress and crystal helmet and a shining spear. And they
laid them down upon the bank at Enda's feet, and then disappeared.

"Now, Enda," said the fairy woman, "take these; by the aid of the dress
and the helmet you can walk beneath the waters. You will need the spear
to enable you to meet the dangers that lie before you. But with that
spear, if you only have courage, you can overcome everything and everyone
that may attempt to bar your way."

Having said this, she bid good-by to Enda, and stepping off the bank,
she floated out upon the river as lightly as a red poppy leaf. And when
she came to the middle of the stream she disappeared beneath the waters.

Enda took the helmet, dress, and spear, and it was not long until he
came to the sedgy banks where his little boat was waiting for him. As he
stepped into the curragh the moon was rising above the mountains. He
rowed on until he came to the hut, and having moored the boat to the
door, he put on the water-dress and the crystal helmet, and taking the
spear in his hand, he leaped over the side of the curragh, and sank down
and down until he touched the bottom. Then he walked along without
minding where he was going, and the only light he had was the shimmering
moonlight, which descended as faintly through the waters as if it came
through muffled glass. He had not gone very far when he heard a horrible
hissing, and straight before him he saw what he thought were two flaming
coals. After a few more steps he found himself face to face with the
dragon of the lake, the guardian of the palace of the fairy queen.
Before he had time to raise his spear, the dragon had wound its coils
around him, and he heard its horrible teeth crunching against the side
of his crystal helmet, and he felt the pressure of its coils around his
side, and the breath almost left his body; but the dragon, unable to
pierce the helmet, unwound his coils, and soon Enda's hands were free,
and before the dragon could attempt to seize him again, he drove his
spear through one of its fiery eyes, and, writhing with pain, the
hissing dragon darted through a cave behind him. Enda, gaining courage
from the dragon's flight, marched on until he came to a door of dull
brass set in the rocks. He tried to push it in before him, but he might
as well have tried to push away the rocks. While he was wondering what
he should do, he heard again the fierce hissing of the dragon, and saw
the red glare of his fiery eye dimly in the water.

Lifting his spear and hastily turning round to meet the furious monster,
Enda accidentally touched the door with the point of the spear, and the
door flew open. Enda passed through, and the door closed behind him with
a grating sound, and he marched along through a rocky pass which led to
a sandy plain.

As he stepped from the pass into the plain the sands began to move, as
if they were alive. In a second a thousand hideous serpents, almost the
color of the sand, rose hissing up, and with their forked tongues made a
horrible, poisonous hedge in front of him. For a second he stood
dismayed, but then, leveling his spear, he rushed against the hedge of
serpents, and they, shooting poison at him, sank beneath the sand. But
the poison did not harm him, because of his water-dress and crystal
helmet.

When he had passed over the sandy plain, he had to climb a great steep,
jagged rock. When he got to the top of the rock he saw spread out before
him a stony waste without a tuft or blade of grass. At some distance in
front of him he noticed a large dark object, which he took to be a rock,
but on looking at it more closely he saw that it was a huge, misshapen,
swollen mass, apparently alive. And it was growing bigger and bigger
every moment. Enda stood amazed at the sight, and before he knew where
he was the loathsome creature rose from the ground, and sprang upon him
before he could use his spear, and, catching him in its horrid grasp,
flung him back over the rocks on to the sandy plain. Enda was almost
stunned, but the hissing of the serpents rising from the sand around him
brought him to himself, and, jumping to his feet, once more he drove
them down beneath the surface. He then approached the jagged rock, on
the top of which he saw the filthy monster glaring at him with bloodshot
eyes. Enda poised his spear and hurled it against his enemy. It entered
between the monster's eyes, and from the wound the blood flowed down
like a black torrent and dyed the plain, and the shrunken carcass
slipped down the front of the rocks and disappeared beneath the sand.
Enda once more ascended the rock, and without meeting or seeing anything
he passed over the stony waste, and at last he came to a leafy wood.
He had not gone far in the wood until he heard the sound of fairy
music, and walking on he came upon a mossy glade, and there he found the
fairies dancing around their queen. They were so small, and were all so
brightly dressed, that they looked like a mass of waving flowers; but
when he was seen by them they vanished like a glorious dream, and no one
remained before him but the fairy queen. The queen blushed at finding
herself alone, but on stamping her little foot three times upon the
ground, the frightened fairies all crept back again.

"You are welcome, Enda," said the queen. "My little subjects have been
alarmed by your strange dress and crystal helmet. I pray you take them
off; you do not need them here."

Enda did as he was bidden, and he laid down his water-dress and helmet
on the grass, and the little fairies, seeing him in his proper shape,
got over their fright, and, unrestrained by the presence of the queen,
they ran tumbling over one another to try and get a good look at the
crystal helmet.

"I know what you have come for, Enda," said the queen. "The golden cup
you shall have to-morrow; but to-night you must share our feast, so
follow me to the palace."

Having said this, the queen beckoned her pages to her, and, attended by
them and followed by Enda, she went on through the wood. When they had
left it behind them Enda saw on a green hill before him the snow-white
palace of the fairy queen.

As the queen approached the steps that led up to the open door,
a band of tiny fairies, dressed in rose-colored silk, came out, carrying
baskets of flowers, which they flung down on the steps to make a
fragrant carpet for her. They were followed by a band of harpers dressed
in yellow silken robes, who ranged themselves on each side of the steps
and played their sweetest music as the queen ascended.

When the queen, followed by Enda, entered the palace, they passed
through a crystal hall that led to a banquet-room. The room was lighted
by a single star, large as a battle-shield. It was fixed against the
wall above a diamond throne.

The queen seated herself upon the throne, and the pages, advancing
towards her, and bending low, as they approached the steps, handed her
a golden wand.
The queen waved the wand three times, and a table laden with all kinds
of delicacies appeared upon the floor. Then she beckoned Enda to her,
and when he stood beside her the fairy table was no higher than his
knee.

"I am afraid I must make you smaller, Enda," said the queen, "or you
will never be able to seat yourself at my fairy table."

And having said this, she touched Enda with the golden wand, and at once
he became as small as her tallest page. Then she struck the steps of her
throne, and all the nobles of her court, headed by her bards, took their
places at the festive board.

The feast went on right merrily, and when the tiny jeweled drinking-cups
were placed upon the table, the queen ordered the harpers to play.

And the little harpers struck the chords, and as Enda listened to the
music it seemed to him as if he was being slowly lifted from his seat,
and when the music ended the fairies vanished, the shining star went
out, and Enda was in perfect darkness.

The air blew keenly in his face, and he knew not where he was. At
last he saw a faint gray light, and soon this light grew broader and
brighter, and as the shadows fled before it, he could hardly believe his
eyes when he found himself in his curragh on the lake, and the moonlight
streaming down from the mountain-tops.

For a moment he thought he must have been dreaming; but there in the
boat before him were the crystal helmet, and the water-dress, and the
gleaming spear, and the golden bowl of perfumed water that was to remove
the spell of enchantment from the white swan of the lake, and sailing
towards him from the sedgy bank came the snow-white swan; and when she
touched the boat, Enda put out his hands and lifted her in, and then
over her plumage he poured the perfumed water from the golden bowl, and
the Princess Mave in all her maiden beauty stood before him.

"Take your oar, Enda," she said, "and row to the southern bank."

Enda seized his oar, and the curragh sped across the waters swifter than
a swallow in its flight. When the boat touched the shore Enda jumped
out, and lifted the princess on to the bank.

"Send your boat adrift, Enda," she said; "but first take out your
shining spear; the water-dress and the crystal helmet will take care of
themselves."

Enda took out the spear, and then pushed the boat from the bank. It sped
on towards the hut in the middle of the lake; but before it had reached
halfway six nymphs sprang up from the water and seizing the helmet and
dress, sank with them beneath the tide, and the boat went on until it
pushed its prow against the steps of the little hut, where it remained.

Then Enda and the princess turned towards the south, and it was not long
until they came to a deep forest, that was folding up its shadows and
spreading out its mossy glades before the glancing footsteps of the
morning. They had not gone far through the forest when they heard the
music of hounds and the cries of huntsmen, and crashing towards them
through the low branches they saw a fierce wild boar. Enda, gently
pushing the princess behind him, leveled his spear, and when the boar
came close to him he drove it into his throat. The brute fell dead at
his feet, and the dogs rushing up began to tear it to pieces. The
princess fainted at the sight, and while Enda was endeavoring to restore
her, the king of Erin, followed by his huntsmen, appeared, and when the
king saw the princess he started in amazement, as he recognized the
features of his daughter Mave.

[Illustration: "'I have mourned you as dead, my darling,' said he"]

At that moment the princess came to herself, and her father, lifting her
tenderly in his arms, kissed her again and again.

"I have mourned you as dead, my darling," said he, "and now you are
restored to me more lovely than ever. I would gladly have given up my
throne for this. But say who is the champion who has brought you hither,
and who has slain the wild boar we have hunted so many years in vain?"

The princess blushed like a rose as she said:

"His name is Enda, father; it is he has brought me back to you."

Then the king embraced Enda and said:

"Forgive me, Enda, for asking any questions about you before you have
shared the hospitality of my court. My palace lies beyond the forest,
and we shall reach it soon."

Then the king ordered his huntsman to sound the bugle-horn, and all his
nobles galloped up in answer to it, and when they saw the Princess Mave
they were so dazzled by her beauty that they scarcely gave a thought to
the death of the wild boar.

"It is my daughter, Mave, come back to me," said the king.

And all the nobles lowered their lances, and bowed in homage to the
lady.

"And there stands the champion who has brought her home," said the king,
pointing to Enda.

The nobles looked at Enda, and bowed courteously, but in their hearts
they were jealous of the champion, for they saw he was already a
favorite of the king's.

Then the pages came up, leading milk-white steeds with golden bridles,
and the king, ordering Enda to mount one of them, lifted Mave on to his
own, and mounted behind her. The pages, carrying the boar's head on a
hollow shield, preceded by the huntsmen sounding their horns, set out
towards the palace, and the royal party followed them.

As the procession approached the palace crowds came rushing out to see
the trophies of the chase, and through the snow-white door the queen,
Mave's cruel stepmother, attended by her maids-of-honor and the royal
bards, came forth to greet the king. But when she saw seated before him
the Princess Mave, who she thought was at the bottom of the lake under a
spell of enchantment, she uttered a loud cry, and fell senseless to the
ground.
The king jumped from his horse, and rushing to the queen, lifted her up
and carried her in his arms to her apartments, for he had no suspicion
of the wickedness of which she had been guilty.

And the court leeches were summoned to attend her, but she died that
very night, and it was not until a green mound, worthy of a queen of
Erin, had been raised over her grave that the Princess Mave told her
father of the wickedness of her stepmother. And when she told him the
whole story of how Enda had broken the spell of enchantment, and of the
dangers which he had faced for her sake, the king summoned an assembly
of all his nobles, and seated on his throne, wearing his golden helmet,
the bards upon his right hand and the Druids upon his left, and the
nobles in ranks before him with gleaming helmets and flashing spears,
he told them the story of the princess, and of the service which Enda
had rendered to her.

"And now," said the king, "if the princess is willing to take her
deliverer for her husband, I am willing that she shall be his bride; and
if you, my subjects, bards and Druids and nobles and chiefs of Erin,
have anything to say against this union, speak. But first, Mave," said
the king, as he drew the blushing princess to him, "speak, darling, as
becomes the daughter of a king--speak in the presence of the nobles of
Erin, and say if it is your wish to become Enda's bride."

The princess flung her white arms around her father's neck, as she
murmured:

"Father, it was Enda brought me back to you, and before all the princes
and nobles of Erin I am willing to be his bride."

And she buried her head upon the king's breast, and as he stroked her
silken hair falling to her feet, the bards struck their golden harps,
but the sound of the joyous music could hardly drown the murmurs of the
jealous nobles.

When the music ceased the king beckoned Enda to him, and was about to
place his hand in Mave's when a Druid, whose white beard almost touched
the ground, and who had been a favorite of the dead stepmother, and hated
Mave for her sake, stepped forward and said:

"O king of Erin, never yet has the daughter of a king been freely given
in marriage to any save a battle champion; and that stripling there has
never struck his spear against a warrior's shield."

A murmur of approbation rose from the jealous princes, and Congal, the
bravest of them all, stepped out from the ranks, and said:

"The Druid speaks the truth, O king! That stripling has never faced a
battle champion yet, and, speaking for all the nobles of your land, I
challenge him to fight any one of us; and as he is young and unused to
arms, we are willing that the youngest and least experienced amongst us
should be set against him."

When Congal had spoken, the nobles, in approval of his words, struck
their shields with their swords, and the brazen sound ascended to the
skies.

The face of the princess, blushing a moment before like a rose, became
as white as a lily; but the color returned to her cheeks when she heard
Enda's voice ringing loud and clear.

"It is true, O king!" said he, "that I have never used my spear in
battle yet. The Prince Congal has challenged me to meet the youngest and
least experienced of the chiefs of Erin. I have risked my life already
for your daughter's sake. I would face death a thousand times for the
chance of winning her for my bride; but I would scorn to claim her hand
if I dared not meet the boldest battle champion of the nobles of Erin,
and here before you, O king, and bards, Druids, and nobles, and chiefs
of Erin, and here, in the presence of the Lady Mave, I challenge the
boldest of them all."

The king's eyes flashed with joy as he listened to the brave words of
Enda.

"It is well," said the king; "the contest shall take place to-morrow on
the lawn outside our palace gates; but before our assembly dissolves I
call on you, nobles and chiefs of Erin, to name your boldest champion."

Loud cries of "Congal! Congal!" answered the king's speech.

"Are you willing, Congal?" asked the king.

"Willing, O king!" answered Congal.

"It is well," said the king. "We shall all meet again to-night in our
banquet-hall."

And the king, with the Princess Mave on his arm, attended by his bards
and Druids, entered the palace, and the chiefs and nobles went their
several ways.

At the feast that night the princess sat beside the king, and Enda
beside the princess, and the bards and Druids, nobles and chiefs, took
their places in due order. And the bards sang songs of love and battle,
and never merrier hours were spent than those which passed away that
night in the banquet-hall of Erin's king.

When the feast was over Enda retired to his apartment to spend the night
dreaming of the Princess Mave, and Congal went to his quarters; but not
to sleep or dream, for the Druid who had provoked the contest came to
him bringing his golden wand, and all night long the Druid was weaving
spells to charm the shield and spear and helmet of Congal, to make them
invulnerable in the battle of the morrow.

But while Enda lay dreaming of the Princess Mave, the little fairy woman
who gave him the water-dress, and crystal helmet, and shining spear on
the banks of the Boyne, slid into his room, and she placed beside his
couch a silver helmet and a silver shield. And she rubbed the helmet,
and the shield, and the blue blade and haft of his spear with the juice
of the red rowan berries, and she let a drop fall upon his face and
hands, and then she slid out as silently as she came.

When the morning broke, Enda sprang from his couch, and he could hardly
believe his eyes when he saw the silver shield and helmet. At the sight
of them he longed for the hour of battle, and he watched with eager gaze
the sun climbing the sky; and, after hours of suspense, he heard the
trumpet's sound and the clangor of the hollow shields, struck by the
hard-pointed spears.
Putting on the helmet, and fastening the shield upon his left arm, and
taking the spear in his right hand, he stepped out bravely to the fight.
The edge of the lawn before the palace gates was ringed by the princes,
nobles, and chiefs of Erin. And the palace walls were thronged by all
the beauties of the Court and all the noble ladies of the land. And on
his throne, surrounded by his Druids, his brehons, and his bards, was
the king of Erin, and at his feet sat the lovely Lady Mave.

As Enda stepped out upon the lawn, he saw Congal advancing from the
ranks of the nobles, and the two champions approached each other until
they met right in front of the throne.

Then both turned towards the throne, and bowed to the king and the
Princess Mave; and then facing each other again, they retired a space,
and when their spears were poised, ready for battle, the king gave the
signal, which was answered by the clang of stricken shields, and Congal
and Enda launched their gleaming spears. They flashed like lightning
in the sunlit air, and in a second Congal's had broken against Enda's
shield; but Enda's, piercing Congal's helmet, hurled him senseless on
the plain.

The nobles and chiefs could hardly realize that in that single second
their boldest champion was overthrown; but when they saw him stretched
motionless on the grassy sward, from out their ranks six warriors
advanced to where the chieftain lay, and sadly they bore him away upon
their battle-shields, and Enda remained victor upon the field.

And then the king's voice rang out clear as the sound of a trumpet in
the still morning:

"Bards and brehons, princes and nobles, and chiefs of Erin, Enda has
proved himself a battle champion, and who amongst you now will dare
gainsay his right to claim my daughter for his bride?"

And no answer came.

But when he summoned Enda to his throne, and placed the lady's hand in
his, a cheer arose from the great assembly, that proved that jealousy
was extinguished in all hearts, and that all believed that Enda was
worthy of the winsome bride; and never since that day, although a
thousand years have passed, was there in all the world a brighter and
gayer wedding than the wedding of Enda and the Princess Mave.

THE ENCHANTED CAVE

A long, long time ago, Prince Cuglas,[4] master of the hounds to the
high King of Erin, set out from Tara to the chase. As he was leaving the
palace the light mists were drifting away from the hill-tops, and the
rays of the morning sun were falling aslant on the _grinan_ or sunny
bower of the Princess Ailinn. Glancing towards it the prince doffed his
plumed and jeweled hunting-cap, and the princess answered his salute
by a wave of her little hand, that was as white as a wild rose in the
hedges in June, and leaning from her bower, she watched the huntsman
until his tossing plumes were hidden by the green waving branches of
the woods.

The Princess Ailinn was over head and ears in love with Cuglas, and
Cuglas was over head and ears in love with the Princess Ailinn, and he
believed that never was summer morning half as bright, or as sweet, or
as fair as she. The glimpse which he had just caught of her filled his
heart with delight, and almost put all thought of hunting out of his
head, when suddenly the tuneful cries of the hounds, answered by a
hundred echoes from the groves, broke upon his ear.

The dogs had started a dappled deer that bounded away through the
forest. The prince, spurring his gallant steed, pushed on in eager
pursuit.

On through the forest sped the deer, through soft, green, secret ways
and flowery dells, then out from the forest, up heathery hills, and over
long stretches of moorland, and across brown rushing streams, sometimes
in view of the hounds, sometimes lost to sight, but always ahead of
them.

All day long the chase continued, and at last, when the sun was sinking,
the dogs were close upon the panting deer, and the prince believed he
was about to secure his game, when the deer suddenly disappeared through
the mouth of a cave which opened before him. The dogs followed at his
heels, and the prince endeavored to rein in his steed, but the impetuous
animal bore him on, and soon was clattering over the stony floor of the
cave in perfect darkness. Cuglas could hear ahead of him the cries of
the hounds growing fainter and fainter, as they increased the distance
between them and him. Then the cries ceased altogether, and the only
sound the prince heard was the noise of his horse's hoofs sounding in
the hollow cave. Once more he endeavored to check his career, but the
reins broke in his hands, and in that instant the prince felt the horse
had taken a plunge into a gulf, and was sinking down and down, as a
stone cast from the summit of a cliff sinks down to the sea. At last the
horse struck the ground again, and the prince was almost thrown out of
his saddle, but he succeeded in regaining his seat. Then on through
the darkness galloped the steed, and when he came into the light the
prince's eyes were for some time unable to bear it. But when he got used
to the brightness he saw he was galloping over a grassy plain, and in
the distance he perceived the hounds rushing towards a wood faintly
visible through a luminous summer haze. The prince galloped on, and as
he approached the wood he saw coming towards him a comely champion,
wearing a shining brown cloak, fastened by a bright bronze spear-like
brooch, and bearing a white hazel wand in one hand, and a single-edged
sword with a hilt made from the tooth of a sea-horse in the other;[5]
and the prince knew by the dress of the champion, and by his wand and
sword, that he was a royal herald. As the herald came close to him the
prince's steed stopped of his own accord.

"You are welcome, Cuglas," said the herald, "and I have been sent by the
Princess Crede to greet you and to lead you to her court, where you have
been so long expected."

"I know not how this may be," said Cuglas.

"How it has come about I shall tell you as we go along," said the
herald. "The Princess Crede is the Queen of the Floating Island. And it
chanced, once upon a day, when she was visiting her fairy kinsmen, who
dwell in one of the pleasant hills that lie near Tara, she saw you with
the high king and princes and nobles of Erin following the chase. And
seeing you her heart went out to you, and wishing to bring you to her
court, she sent one of her nymphs, in the form of a deer, to lure you
on through the cave, which is the entrance to this land."

"I am deeply honored by the preference shown me by the princess," said

Cuglas, "but I may not tarry in her court; for above in Erin there is
the Lady Ailinn, the loveliest of all the ladies who grace the royal
palace, and before the princes and chiefs of Erin she has promised to
be my bride."

"Of that I know not," said the herald; "but a true champion, like you,
cannot, I know, refuse to come with me to the court of the Princess
Crede."

As the herald had said these words the prince and he were on the verge
of the wood, and they entered upon a mossy pathway that broadened out as
they advanced until it was as wide as one of the great roads of Erin.
Before they had gone very far the prince heard the tinkling of silver
bells in the distance, and almost as soon as he heard them he saw
coming up towards him a troop of warriors on coal black steeds. All the
warriors wore helmets of shining silver, and cloaks of blue silk. And
on the horses' breasts were crescents of silver, on which were hung tiny
silver bells, shaking out music with the motion of the horses. As the
prince approached the champions they lowered their spears, and dividing
in two lines the prince and the herald passed between the ranks, and the
champions, forming again, followed on behind the prince.

At last they passed through the wood, and they found themselves on a
green plain, speckled with flowers, and they had not gone far when the
prince saw coming towards him a hundred champions on snow-white steeds,
and around the breast of the steeds were crescents of gold, from which
were hanging little golden bells.[6] The warriors all wore golden
helmets, and the shafts of their shining spears were of gold, and golden
sandals on their feet, and yellow silken mantles fell down over their
shoulders. And when the prince came near them they lowered their lances,
and then they turned their horses' heads around and marched before him.
And it was not long until above the pleasant jingle of the bells the
prince heard the measured strains of music, and he saw coming towards
him a band of harpers, dressed in green and gold, and when the harpers
had saluted the prince they marched in front of the cavalcade, playing
all the time, and it was not long until they came to a stream that ran
like a blue riband around the foot of a green hill, on the top of which
was a sparkling palace; the stream was crossed by a golden bridge, so
narrow that the horsemen had to go two-by-two. The herald asked the
prince to halt and to allow all the champions to go before him; and the
cavalcade ascended the hill, the sunlight brightly glancing on helmet
and on lance, and when it reached the palace the horsemen filed around
the walls.

When at length the prince and herald crossed the bridge and began
to climb the hill, the prince thought he felt the ground moving under
them, and on looking back he could see no sign of the golden bridge,
and the blue stream had already become as wide as a great river, and
was becoming wider every second.

"You are on the floating island now," said the herald, "and before you
is the palace of the Princess Crede."
At that moment the queen came out through the palace door, and the
prince was so dazzled by her beauty, that only for the golden bracelet
he wore upon his right arm, under the sleeve of his silken tunic, he
might almost have forgotten the Princess Ailinn. This bracelet was made
by the dwarfs who dwell in the heart of the Scandinavian Mountains, and
was sent with other costly presents by the King of Scandinavia to the
King of Erin, and he gave it to the princess, and it was the virtue of
this bracelet, that whoever was wearing it could not forget the person
who gave it to him, and it could never be loosened from the arm by any
art or magic spell; but if the wearer, even for a single moment, liked
anyone better than the person who gave it to him, that very moment the
bracelet fell off from the arm and could never again be fastened on. And
when the princess promised her hand in marriage to the Prince Cuglas,
she closed the bracelet on his arm.

The fairy queen knew nothing about the bracelet, and she hoped that
before the prince was long in the floating island he would forget all
about the princess.

"You are welcome, Cuglas," said the queen, as she held out her hand, and
Cuglas, having thanked her for her welcome, they entered the palace
together.

"You must be weary after your long journey," said the queen. "My page
will lead you to your apartments, where a bath of the cool blue waters
of the lake has been made ready for you, and when you have taken your
bath the pages will lead you to the banquet hall, where the feast is
spread."

At the feast the prince was seated beside the queen, and she talked to
him of all the pleasures that were in store for him in fairyland, where
pain, and sickness, and sorrow, and old age, are unknown, and where
every rosy hour that flies is brighter than the one that has fled before
it. And when the feast was ended the queen opened the dance with the
prince, and it was not until the moon was high above the floating island
that the prince retired to rest.

He was so tired after his journey and the dancing that he fell into
a sound sleep. When he awoke the next morning the sun was shining
brightly, and he heard outside the palace the jingle of bells and the
music of baying hounds, and his heart was stirred by memories of the
many pleasant days on which he had led the chase over the plains and
through the green woods of Tara.

He looked out through the window, and he saw all the fairy champions
mounted on their steeds ready for the chase, and at their head the fairy
queen. And at that moment the pages came to say the queen wished to know
if he would join them, and the prince went out and found his steed ready
saddled and bridled, and they spent the day hunting in the forest that
stretched away for miles behind the palace, and the night in feasting
and dancing.

When the prince awoke the following morning he was summoned by the pages
to the presence of the queen. The prince found the queen on the lawn
outside the palace surrounded by her court.

"We shall go on the lake to-day, Cuglas," said the queen, and taking his
arm she led him along the water's edge, all the courtiers following.
[Illustration: "The queen wished to know if he would join them"]

When she was close to the water she waved her wand, and in a second a
thousand boats, shining like glass, shot up from beneath the lake and
set their bows against the bank. The queen and Cuglas stepped into one,
and when they were seated two fairy harpers took their places in the
prow. All the other boats were soon thronged by fairies, and then the
queen waved her wand again, and an awning of purple silk rose over the
boat, and silken awnings of various colors over the others, and the
royal boat moved off from the bank followed by all the rest, and in
every boat sat a harper with a golden harp, and when the queen waved her
wand for the third time, the harpers struck the trembling chords, and to
the sound of the delightful music the boats glided over the sunlit lake.
And on they went until they approached the mouth of a gentle river
sliding down between banks clad with trees. Up the river, close to the
bank and under the drooping trees, they sailed, and when they came to
a bend in the river, from which the lake could be no longer seen, they
pushed their prows in against the bank, and the queen and Cuglas, and
all the party, left the boats and went on under the trees until they
came to a mossy glade.

Then the queen waved her wand, and silken couches were spread under the
trees, and she and Cuglas sat on one apart from the others, and the
courtiers took their places in proper order.

And the queen waved her wand again, and wind shook the trees above them,
and the most luscious fruit that was ever tasted fell down into their
hands; and when the feast was over there was dancing in the glades to
the music of the harps, and when they were tired dancing they set out
for the boats, and the moon was rising above the trees as they sailed
away over the lake, and it was not long until they reached the bank
below the fairy palace.

Well, between hunting in the forest, and sailing over the lake, and
dancing in the greenwood glade and in the banquet hall, the days passed,
but all the time the prince was thinking of the Princess Ailinn, and one
moonlit night, when he was lying awake on his couch thinking of her, a
shadow was suddenly cast on the floor.

The prince looked towards the window, and what should he see sitting
on the sill outside but a little woman tapping the pane with a golden
bodkin.

The prince jumped from his couch and opened the window, and the little
woman floated on the moonbeams into the room and sat down on the floor.

"You are thinking of the Princess Ailinn," said the little woman.

"I never think of anyone else," said the prince.

"I know that," said the little woman, "and it's because of your love for
each other, and because her mother was a friend to me in the days gone
by, that I have come here to try and help you; but there is not much
time for talking, the night advances. At the bank below a boat awaits
you. Step into it and it will lead you to the mainland, and when you
reach it you will find before you a path that will take you to the green
fields of Erin and the plains of Tara. I know you will have to face
danger. I know not what kind of danger; but whatever it may be do not
draw your sword before you tread upon the mainland, for if you do you
shall never reach it, and the boat will come back again to the floating
island; and now go and may luck go with you;" and saying this the little
woman climbed up the moonbeams and disappeared.

The prince left the palace and descended to the lake, and there before
him he saw a glistening boat; he stepped into it, and the boat went on
and on beneath the moon, and at last he saw the mainland, and he could
trace a winding pathway going away from the shore. The sight filled his
heart with joy, but suddenly the milk-white moonshine died away, and
looking up to the sky he saw the moon turning fiery red, and the waters
of the lake, shining like silver a moment before, took a blood-red hue,
and a wind arose that stirred the waters, and they leaped up against the
little boat, tossing it from side to side. While Cuglas was wondering
at the change, he heard a strange, unearthly noise ahead of him, and
a bristling monster, lifting its claws above the water, in a moment
was beside the boat and stuck one of his claws in the left arm of the
prince, and pierced the flesh to the bone. Maddened by the pain the
prince drew his sword and chopped off the monster's claw. The monster
disappeared beneath the lake, and, as it did so, the color of the water
changed, and the silver moonlight shone down from the sky again, but the
boat no longer went on towards the mainland, but sped back towards the
floating island, while forth from the island came a fleet of fairy boats
to meet it, led by the shallop of the fairy queen. The queen greeted the
prince as if she knew not of his attempted flight, and to the music of
the harps the fleet returned to the palace.

The next day passed and the night came, and again the prince was lying
on the couch, thinking of the Princess Ailinn, and again he saw the
shadow on the floor and heard the tapping against the window.

And when he opened it the little woman slid into the room.

"You failed last night," she said, "but I come to give you another
chance. To-morrow the queen must set out on a visit to her fairy
kinsmen, who dwell in the green hill near the plain of Tara; she cannot
take you with her, for if your feet once touched the green grass that
grows in the fruitful fields of Erin, she could never bring you back
again. And so, when you find she has left the palace, go at once into
the banquet hall and look behind the throne, and you will see a small
door let down into the ground. Pull this up and descend the steps which
you will see. Where they lead to I cannot tell. What dangers may be
before you I do not know; but this I know, if you accept anything, no
matter what it is, from anyone you may meet on your way, you shall not
set foot on the soil of Erin."

And having said this the little woman, rising from the floor, floated
out through the window.

The prince returned to his couch, and the next morning, as soon as he
heard the queen had left the palace, he hastened to the banquet hall.
He discovered the door and descended the steps, and he found himself
in a gloomy and lonesome valley. Jagged mountains, black as night, rose
on either side, and huge rocks seemed ready to topple down upon him at
every step. Through broken clouds a watery moon shed a faint, fitful
light, that came and went as the clouds, driven by a moaning wind,
passed over the valley.

Cuglas, nothing daunted, pushed on boldly until a bank of cloud shut out
completely the struggling moon, and closing over the valley covered it
like a pall, leaving him in perfect darkness. At the same moment the
moaning wind died away, and with it died away all sound. The darkness
and the deathlike silence sent an icy chill to the heart of Cuglas. He
held his hand close to his eyes, but he saw it not. He shouted that he
might hear the sound of his own voice, but he heard it not. He stamped
his foot on the rocky ground, but no sound was returned to him. He
rattled his sword in its brazen scabbard, but it gave no answer back
to him. His heart grew colder and colder, when suddenly the cloud above
him was rent in a dozen places, and lightning flashed through the
valley, and the thunder rolled over the echoing mountains. In the lurid
glare of the lightning Cuglas saw a hundred ghostly forms sweeping
towards him, uttering as they came nearer and nearer shrieks so terrible
that the silence of death could more easily be borne. Cuglas turned to
escape, but they hemmed him round, and pressed their clammy hands upon
his face.

With a yell of horror he drew his sword and slashed about him, and that
very moment the forms vanished, the thunder ceased, the dark cloud
passed, and the sun shone out as bright as on a summer day, and then
Cuglas knew the forms he had seen were those of the wild people of the
glen.[7]

With renewed courage he pursued his way through the valley, and after
three or four windings it took him out upon a sandy desert. He had no
sooner set foot upon the desert than he heard behind him a crashing
sound louder than thunder. He looked around, and he saw that the walls
of mountain through which he had just passed had fallen into the valley,
and filled it up so that he could no longer tell where it had been.

The sun was beating fiercely on the desert, and the sands were almost as
hot as burning cinders; and as Cuglas advanced over them his body became
dried up, and his tongue clove to the roof of his mouth, and when his
thirst was at its height a fountain of sparkling water sprang up in the
burning plain a few paces in front of him; but when he came up quite
close to it and stretched out his parched hands to cool them in the
limpid waters, the fountain vanished as suddenly as it appeared. With
great pain, and almost choking with heat and thirst, he struggled on,
and again the fountain sprang up in front of him and moved before him,
almost within his reach. At last he came to the end of the desert, and
he saw a green hill up which a pathway climbed; but as he came to the
foot of the hill, there, sitting right in his way, was a beautiful fairy
holding out towards him a crystal cup, over the rim of which flowed
water as clear as crystal. Unable to resist the temptation, the prince
seized the cold, bright goblet, and drank the water. When he did so his
thirst vanished, but the fairy, and the green hill, and the burning
desert disappeared, and he was standing in the forest behind the palace
of the fairy queen.

That evening the queen returned, and at the feast she talked as gaily
to the prince as if she knew not of his attempt to leave the Floating
Island, and the prince spoke as gaily as he could to her, although in
his heart there was sadness when he remembered that if he had only
dashed away the crystal cup, he would be at that moment in the royal
banquet hall of Tara, sitting beside the Princess Ailinn.

And he thought the feast would never end; but it was over at last, and
the prince returned to his apartments. And that night, as he lay on his
couch, he kept his eyes fixed upon the window; but hours passed, and
there was no sign of anyone. At long last, and when he had given up all
hope of seeing her, he heard a tapping at the window, and he got up and
opened it, and the little woman came in.

"You failed again to-day," said she--"failed just at the very moment
when you were about to step on the green hills of Erin. I can give you
only one chance more. It will be your last. The queen will go hunting
in the morning. Join the hunt, and when you are separated from the rest
of the party in the wood throw your reins upon your horse's neck and he
will lead you to the edge of the lake. Then cast this golden bodkin into
the lake in the direction of the mainland, and a golden bridge will be
thrown across, over which you can pass safely to the fields of Erin;
but take care and do not draw your sword, for if you do your steed will
bear you back again to the Floating Island, and here you must remain
forever." Then handing the bodkin to the prince, and saying good-by,
the little woman disappeared.

The next morning the queen and the prince and all the court went out
to hunt, and a fleet white deer started out before them, and the royal
party pressed after him in pursuit. The prince's steed outstripped the
others, and when he was alone the prince flung the reins upon his
horse's neck, and before long he came to the edge of the lake.

Then the prince cast the bodkin on to the water, and a golden bridge was
thrown across to the mainland, and the horse galloped on to it, and when
the prince was more than halfway he saw riding towards him a champion
wearing a silver helmet, and carrying on his left arm a silver shield,
and holding in his right hand a gleaming sword. As he came nearer he
struck his shield with his sword and challenged the prince to battle.
The prince's sword almost leaped out of its scabbard at the martial
sound, and, like a true knight of Tara, he dashed against his foe, and
swinging his sword above his head, with one blow he clove the silver
helmet, and the strange warrior reeled from his horse and fell upon the
golden bridge. The prince, content with this achievement, spurred his
horse to pass the fallen champion, but the horse refused to stir, and
the bridge broke in two almost at his feet, and the part of it between
him and the mainland disappeared beneath the lake, carrying with it the
horse and the body of the champion, and before the prince could recover
from his surprise, his steed wheeled round and was galloping back, and
when he reached the land he rushed through the forest, and the prince
was not able to pull him up until he came to the palace door.

All that night the prince lay awake on his couch with his eyes fixed
upon the window, but no shadow fell upon the floor, and there was no
tapping at the pane, and with a heavy heart he joined the hunting party
in the morning. And day followed day, and his heart was sadder and
sadder, and found no pleasure in the joys and delights of fairyland. And
when all in the palace were at rest he used to roam through the forest,
always thinking of the Princess Ailinn, and hoping against hope that the
little woman would come again to him, but at last he began to despair of
ever seeing her. It chanced one night he rambled so far that he found
himself on the verge of the lake, at the very spot from which the golden
bridge had been thrown across the waters, and as he gazed wistfully upon
them a boat shot up and came swiftly to the bank, and who should he see
sitting in the stern but the little woman.

"Ah, Cuglas, Cuglas," she said, "I gave you three chances, and you
failed in all of them."

"I should have borne the pain inflicted by the monster's claw," said
Cuglas. "I should have borne the thirst on the sandy desert, and dashed
the crystal cup untasted from the fairy's hand; but I could never have
faced the nobles and chiefs of Erin if I had refused to meet the
challenge of the battle champion on the golden bridge."

"And you would have been no true knight of Erin, and you would not have
been worthy of the wee girl who loves you, the bonny Princess Ailinn, if
you had refused to meet it," said the little woman; "but for all that
you can never return to the fair hills of Erin. But cheer up, Cuglas,
there are mossy ways and forest paths and nestling bowers in fairyland.
Lonely they are, I know, in your eyes now," said the little woman; "but
maybe," she added, with a laugh as musical as the ripple on a streamlet
when summer is in the air, "maybe you won't always think them so
lonely."

"You think I'll forget Ailinn for the fairy queen," said Cuglas, with a
sigh.

"I don't think anything of the kind," said she.

"Then what do you mean?" said the prince.

"Oh, I mean what I mean," said the little woman. "But I can't stop here
all night talking to you: and, indeed, it is in your bed you ought to
be yourself. So now good-night; and I have no more to say, except that
perhaps, if you happen to be here this night week at this very hour,
when the moon will be on the waters, you will see---- But no matter what
you will see," said she; "I must be off."

And before the prince could say another word the boat sped away from the
bank, and he was alone. He went back to the palace, and he fell asleep
that night only to dream of the Princess Ailinn.

As for the princess, she was pining away in the palace of Tara, the
color had fled from her cheeks, and her eyes, which had been once so
bright they would have lighted darkness like a star, lost nearly all
their luster, and the king's leeches could do nothing for her, and at
last they gave up all hope, and the king and queen of Erin and the
ladies of the court watched her couch by night and by day sadly waiting
for her last hour.

At length one day, when the sun was shining brightly over Tara's plain,
and its light, softened by the intervening curtains, was falling in the
sick chamber, the royal watchers noticed a sweet change coming over the
face of the princess; the bloom of love and youth were flushing on her
cheeks, and from her eyes shone out the old, soft, tender light, and
they began to hope she was about to be restored to them, when suddenly
the room was in darkness as if the night had swept across the sky, and
blotted out the sun. Then they heard the sound of fairy music, and over
the couch where the princess lay they beheld a gleam of golden light,
but only for a moment; and again there was perfect darkness, and the
fairy music ceased. Then, as suddenly as it came the darkness vanished,
the softened sunlight once more filled the chamber, and rested upon the
couch; but the couch was empty, and the royal watchers, looking at each
other, said in whispers: "The fairies have carried away the Princess
Ailinn to fairyland."

Well, that very day the prince roamed by himself through the forest,
counting the hours until the day would fade in the sky and the moon come
climbing up, and at last, when it was shining full above the waters, he
went down to the verge of the lake, and he looked out over the gleaming
surface watching for the vision promised by the little woman. But he
could see nothing, and was about to turn away when he heard the faint
sound of fairy music. He listened and listened, and the sound came
nearer and clearer, and away in the distance, like drops of glistening
water breaking the level of the lake, he saw a fleet of fairy boats, and
he thought it was the fairy queen sailing in the moonlight. And it was
the fairy queen, and soon he was able to recognize the royal shallop
leading the others, and as it came close to the bank he saw the little
woman sitting in the prow between the little harpers, and at the stern
was the fairy queen, and by her side the lady of his heart, the Princess
Ailinn. In a second the boat was against the bank, and the princess in
his arms. And he kissed her again and again.

"And have you never a kiss for me?" said the little woman, tapping his
hand with the little gold bodkin.

"A kiss and a dozen," said Cuglas, as he caught the little fairy up in
his arms.

"Oh, fie, Cuglas," said the queen.

"Oh, the princess isn't one bit jealous," said the little woman. "Are
you, Ailinn?"

"Indeed I am not," said Ailinn.

"And you should not be," said the fairy queen, "for never lady yet had
truer knight than Cuglas. I loved him, and I love him dearly. I lured
him here hoping that in the delights of fairyland he might forget you.
It was all in vain. I know now that there is one thing no fairy power
above or below the stars, or beneath the waters, can ever subdue, and
that is love. And here together forever shall you and Cuglas dwell,
where old age shall never come upon you, and where pain or sorrow or
sickness is unknown."

And Cuglas never returned to the fair hills of Erin, and ages passed
away since the morning he followed the hounds into the fatal cave, but
his story was remembered by the firesides, and sometimes, even yet,
the herdboy watching his cattle in the fields hears the tuneful cry of
hounds, and follows it till it leads him to a darksome cave, and as
fearfully he listens to the sound becoming fainter and fainter he hears
the clatter of hoofs over the stony floor, and to this day the cave
bears the name of the prince who entered it never to return.[A]

[Footnote A: _Uaimh Bealach Conglais_, the cave of the road of

Cuglas--now Baltinglass--in the County Wicklow.]

THE HUNTSMAN'S SON

A long, long time ago there lived in a little hut on the borders of a
great forest a huntsman and his wife and son. From his earliest years
the boy, whose name was Fergus, used to hunt with his father in the
forest, and he grew up strong and active, sure and swift-footed as a
deer, and as free and fearless as the wind. He was tall and handsome; as
supple as a mountain ash, his lips were as red as its berries; his eyes
were as blue as the skies in spring; and his hair fell down over his
shoulders like a shower of gold. His heart was as light as a bird's,
and no bird was fonder of green woods and waving branches. He had lived
since his birth in the hut in the forest, and had never wished to leave
it, until one winter night a wandering minstrel sought shelter there,
and paid for his night's lodging with songs of love and battle. Ever
since that night Fergus pined for another life. He no longer found joy
in the music of the hounds or in the cries of the huntsmen in forest
glades. He yearned for the chance of battle, and the clang of shields,
and the fierce shouts of fighting warriors, and he spent all his spare
hours practicing on the harp and learning the use of arms, for in those
days the bravest warriors were also bards. In this way the spring and
summer and autumn passed; and when the winter came again it chanced that
on a stormy night, when thunder was rattling through the forest, smiting
the huge oaks and hurling them crashing to the earth, Fergus lay awake
thinking of his present lot, and wondering what the future might have in
store for him. The lightning was playing around the hut, and every now
and then a flash brightened up the interior.

After a peal, louder than any which had preceded it, Fergus heard three
loud knocks at the door. He called out to his parents that someone was
knocking.

"If that is so," said his father, "open at once; this is no night to
keep a poor wanderer outside our door."

Fergus did as he was bidden, and as he opened the door a flash of

lightning showed him, standing at the threshold, a little wizened old
man with a small harp under his arm.

"Come in, and welcome," said Fergus, and the little man stepped into
the room.

"It is a wild night, neighbors," said he.

"It is, indeed, a wild night," said the huntsman and his wife, who had
got up and dressed themselves; "and sorry we are we have no better
shelter or better fare to offer you, but we give you the best we have."

"A king cannot do more than his best," said the little man.

The huntsman's wife lit the fire, and soon the pine logs flashed up into
a blaze, and made the hut bright and warm. She then brought forth a
peggin of milk and a cake of barley-bread.

"You must be hungry, sir," she said.

"Hungry I am," said he; "but I wouldn't ask for better fare than this if
I were in the king's palace."

"Thank you kindly, sir," said she, "and I hope you will eat enough, and
that it will do you good."

"And while you are eating your supper," said the huntsman, "I'll make
you a bed of fresh rushes."

"Don't put yourself to that trouble," said the little man. "When I have
done my supper I'll lie down here by the fire, if it is pleasing to you,
and I'll sleep like a top until morning. And now go back to your beds
and leave me to myself, and maybe some time when you won't be expecting
it I'll do a good turn for your kindness to the poor wayfarer."

"Oh, it's no kindness at all," said the huntsman's wife. "It would be
a queer thing if an Irish cabin would not give shelter and welcome in
a wild night like this. So good night, now, and we hope you will sleep
well."

"Good night," said the little man, "and may you and yours never sup
sorrow until your dying day."

The huntsman and his wife and Fergus then went back to their beds, and
the little man, having finished his supper, curled himself up by the
fire, and was soon fast asleep.

About an hour after a loud clap of thunder awakened Fergus, and before
it had died away he heard three knocks at the door. He aroused his parents
and told them.

"Get up at once," said his mother, "this is no night to keep a stranger

outside our door."

Fergus rose and opened the door, and a flash of lightning showed him a
little old woman, with a shuttle in her hand, standing outside.

"Come in, and welcome," said he, and the little old woman stepped into
the room.

"Blessings be on them who give welcome to a wanderer on a wild night

like this," said the old woman.

"And who wouldn't give welcome on a night like this?" said the
huntsman's wife, coming forward with a peggin of milk and a barley cake
in her hand, "and sorry we are we have not better fare to offer you."

"Enough is as good as a feast," said the little woman, "and now go back
to your beds and leave me to myself."

"Not till I shake down a bed of rushes for you," said the huntsman's
wife.

"Don't mind the rushes," said the little woman; "go back to your beds.
I'll sleep here by the fire."

[Illustration: "Fergus knew it was the Pooka, the wild horse of the
mountains"]

The huntsman's wife went to bed, and the little old woman, having eaten
her supper, lay down by the fire, and was soon fast asleep.

About an hour later another clap of thunder startled Fergus. Again he

heard three knocks at the door. He roused his parents, but he did not
wait for orders from them. He opened the door, and a flash of lightning
showed him outside the threshold a low-sized, shaggy, wild-looking
horse. And Fergus knew it was the Pooka, the wild horse of the
mountains. Bold as Fergus was, his heart beat quickly as he saw fire
issuing from the Pooka's nostrils. But, banishing fear, he cried out:
"Come in, and welcome."

"Welcome you are," said the huntsman, "and sorry we are that we have not
better shelter or fare to offer you."

"I couldn't wish a better welcome," said the Pooka, as he came over near
the fire and sat down on his haunches.

"Maybe you would like a little bit of this, Master Pooka," said the
huntsman's wife, as she offered him a barley cake.

"I never tasted anything sweeter in my life," said the Pooka, crunching
it between his teeth, "and now if you can give me a sup of milk, I'll
want for nothing."

The huntsman's wife brought him a peggin of milk. When he had drunk it,
"Now," says the Pooka, "go back to your beds, and I'll curl myself up by
the fire and sleep like a top till morning."

And soon everybody in the hut was fast asleep.

When the morning came the storm had gone, and the sun was shining
through the windows of the hut. At the song of the lark Fergus got up,
and no one in the world was ever more surprised than he when he saw no
sign of the little old man, or the little old woman, or the wild horse
of the mountains. His parents were also surprised, and they all thought
that they must have been dreaming until they saw the empty peggins
around the fire and some pieces of broken bread; and they did not know
what to think of it all.

From that day forward the desire grew stronger in the heart of Fergus
for a change of life; and one day he told his parents that he was
resolved to seek his fortune. He said he wished to be a soldier, and that
he would set out for the king's palace, and try to join the ranks of the
Feni.

About a week afterwards he took leave of his parents, and having

received their blessing he struck out for the road that led to the
palace of the High King of Erin. He arrived there just at the time when
the great captain of the Fenian host was recruiting his battalions,
which had been thinned in recent battle.

The manly figure of Fergus, his gallant bearing, and handsome face, all
told in his favor. But before he could be received into the Fenian ranks
he had to prove that he could play the harp like a bard, that he could
contend with staff and shield against nine Fenian warriors, that he
could run with plaited hair through the tangled forest without loosening
a single hair, and that in his course he could jump over trees as high
as his head, and stoop under trees as low as his knee, and that he could
run so lightly that the rotten twigs should not break under his feet.
Fergus proved equal to all the tests, thanks to the wandering minstrel
who taught him the use of the harp, to his own brave heart, and to his
forest training. He was enrolled in the second battalion of the Feni,
and before long he was its bravest and ablest champion.

At that very time it happened that the niece of the High King of
Erin was staying with the king and queen in their palace at Tara. The
princess was the loveliest lady in all the land. She was as proud as
she was beautiful. The princes and chieftains of Erin in vain sought her
hand in marriage. From Alba and Spain, and the far-off isles of Greece,
kings came to woo her. From the northern lands came vikings in stately
galleys with brazen prows, whose oarsmen tore the white foam from the
emerald seas as they swept towards the Irish coasts. But the lady had
vowed she would wed with no one except a battle champion who could excel
in music the chief bard of the High King of Erin; who could outstrip on
his steed in the great race of Tara the white steed of the plains; and
who could give her as a wedding robe a garment of all the colors of the
rainbow, so finely spun that when folded up it would fit in the palm of
her small white hand. To fulfill these three conditions was impossible
for all her suitors, and it seemed as if the loveliest lady of the land
would go unmarried to her grave.

It chanced that once, on a day when the Fenian battalions were engaged
in a hurling-match, Fergus beheld the lady watching the match from her
sunny bower. He no sooner saw her than he fell over head and ears in
love with her, and he thought of her by night, and he thought of her by
day, and believing that his love was hopeless, he often wished he had
never left his forest-home.

The great fair of Tara[8] was coming on, and all the Feni were busy from
morning till night practicing feats of arms and games, in order to take
part in the contests to be held during the fair. And Fergus, knowing
that the princess would be present, determined to do his best to win the
prizes which were to be contended for before the ladies' eyes.

The fair began on the 1st of August, but for a whole week before the
five great roads of Erin were thronged with people of all sorts. Princes
and warriors on their steeds, battle champions in their chariots,
harpers in hundreds, smiths with gleaming spears and shields and
harness for battle steeds and chariots; troops of men and boys leading
racehorses; jewelers with gold drinking-horns, and brooches, and pins,
and earrings, and costly gems of all kinds, and chessboards of silver
and gold, and golden and silver chessmen in bags of woven brass; dyers
with their many-colored fabrics; bands of jugglers; drovers goading on
herds of cattle; shepherds driving their sheep; huntsmen with spoils
of the chase; dwellers in the lakes or by the fish-abounding rivers
with salmon and speckled trout; and countless numbers of peasants on
horseback and on foot, all wending their way to the great meeting-place
by the mound, which a thousand years before had been raised over the
grave of the great queen. For there the fair was to be held.

On the opening day the High King, attended by the four kings of Erin,
set out from the palace, and with them went the queen and the ladies of
the court in sparkling chariots. The princess rode in the chariot with
the High Queen, under an awning made of the wings of birds, to protect
them from the rays of the sun. Following the queen were the court ladies
in other chariots, under awnings of purple or of yellow silk. Then came
the brehons, the great judges of the land, and the chief bards of the
high court of Tara, and the Druids, crowned with oak leaves, and
carrying wands of divination in their hands.

When the royal party reached the ground it took its place in inclosures
right up against the monumental mound. The High King sat with the four
kings of Erin, all wearing their golden helmets, for they wore their
diadems in battle only. In an inclosure next the king's sat the queen
and the princess and all the ladies of the court. At either side of the
royal pavilions were others for the dames and ladies and nobles and
chiefs of different degrees, forming part of a circle on the plain, and
the stands and benches for the people were so arranged as to complete
the circle, and in the round green space within it, so that all might
hear and see, the contests were to take place.

At a signal from the king, who was greeted with a thunderous cheer, the
heralds rode round the circle, and having struck their sounding shields
three times with their swords, they made a solemn proclamation of peace.
Then was sung by all the assembled bards, to the accompaniment of their
harps, the chant in honor of the mighty dead. When this was ended, again
the heralds struck their shields, and the contests began. The first
contest was the contest of spear-throwing between the champions of the
seven battalions of the Feni. When the seven champions took their places
in front of the royal inclosure, everyone, even the proud princess, was
struck by the manly beauty and noble bearing of Fergus.

The champions poised their spears, and at a stroke from the heralds upon
their shields the seven spears sped flashing through the air. They all
struck the ground, shafts up, and it was seen that two were standing
side by side in advance of the rest, one belonged to Fergus, the other
to the great chief, Oscar. The contest for the prize then lay between
Oscar and Fergus, and when they stood in front of the king, holding
their spears aloft, every heart was throbbing with excitement. Once more
the heralds struck their shields, and, swifter than the lightning's
flash, forth went the spears, and when Fergus's spear was seen shivering
in the ground a full length ahead of the great chief Oscar's, the air was
shaken by a wild cheer that was heard far beyond the plains of Tara. And
as Fergus approached the high king to receive the prize the cheers were
renewed. But Fergus thought more of the winsome glance of the princess
than he did of the prize or the sounding cheers. And Princess Maureen
was almost sorry for her vow, for her heart was touched by the beauty
of the Fenian champion.

Other contests followed, and the day passed, and the night fell, and
while the Fenian warriors were reveling in their camps the heart of
Fergus, victor as he was, was sad and low. He escaped from his
companions, and stole away to his native forest, for--

"When the heart is sick and sorest,

There is balsam in the forest--
There is balsam in the forest
For its pain."

And as he lay under the spreading branches, watching the stars glancing
through the leaves, and listening to the slumb'rous murmur of the
waters, a strange peace came over him.

But in the camp which he had left, and in the vast multitude on the plains
of Tara, there was stir and revelry, and babbling speculation as to the
contest of to-morrow--the contest which was to decide whether the chief
bard of Erin was to hold his own against all comers, or yield the palm.
For rumor said that a great Skald had come from the northern lands to
compete with the Irish bard.

At last, over the Fenian camp, and over the great plain and the
multitude that thronged it, sleep fell, clothing them with a silence as
deep as that which dwelt in the forest, where, dreaming of the princess,
Fergus lay. He awoke at the first notes of the birds, but though he felt
he ought to go back to his companions and be witness of the contest
which might determine whether the princess was to be another's bride,
his great love and his utter despair of winning her so oppressed him
that he lay as motionless as a broken reed. He scarcely heard the music
of the birds, and paid no heed to the murmur of the brook rushing by his
feet. The crackling of branches near him barely disturbed him, but when
a shadow fell across his eyes he looked up gloomily, and saw, or thought
he saw, someone standing before him. He started up, and who should he see
but the little wizened old man who found shelter in his father's hut on
the stormy night.

"This is a nice place for a battle champion to be. This is a nice place
for _you_ to be on the day which is to decide who will be the successful
suitor of the princess."

"What is it to me," said Fergus, "who is to win her since I cannot?"

"I told you," said the little man, "the night you opened the door for
me, that the time might come when I might be able to do a good turn for
you and yours. The time has come. Take this harp, and my luck go with
you, and in the contest of the bards to-day you'll reap the reward of
the kindness you did when you opened your door to the poor old wayfarer
in the midnight storm."

The little man handed his harp to Fergus and disappeared as swiftly as
the wind that passes through the leaves.

Fergus, concealing the harp under his silken cloak, reached the camp
before his comrades had aroused themselves from sleep.

At length the hour arrived when the great contest was to take place.

The king gave the signal, and as the chief bard of Erin was seen
ascending the mound in front of the royal inclosures he was greeted with
a roar of cheers, but at the first note of his harp silence like that of
night fell on the mighty gathering.

As he moved his fingers softly over the strings every heart was hushed,
filled with a sense of balmy rest. The lark soaring and singing above
his head paused mute and motionless in the still air, and no sound was
heard over the spacious plain save the dreamy music. Then the bard
struck another key, and a gentle sorrow possessed the hearts of his
hearers, and unbidden tears gathered to their eyes. Then, with bolder
hand, he swept his fingers across his lyre, and all hearts were moved
to joy and pleasant laughter, and eyes that had been dimmed by tears
sparkled as brightly as running waters dancing in the sun. When the last
notes had died away a cheer arose, loud as the voice of the storm in the
glen when the live thunder is reveling on the mountain tops. As soon as
the bard had descended the mound the Skald from the northern lands took
his place, greeted by cries of welcome from a hundred thousand throats.
He touched his harp, and in the perfect silence was heard the strain of
the mermaid's song, and through it the pleasant ripple of summer waters
on the pebbly beach. Then the theme was changed, and on the air was
borne the measured sweep of countless oars and the swish of waters
around the prows of contending galleys, and the breezy voices of the
sailors and the sea-bird's cry. Then his theme was changed to the mirth
and laughter of the banquet-hall, the clang of meeting drinking-horns,
and songs of battle. When the last strain ended, from the mighty host a
great shout went up, loud as the roar of winter billows breaking in the
hollows of the shore; and men knew not whom to declare the victor, the
chief bard of Erin or the Skald of the northern lands.

In the height of the debate the cry arose that another competitor had
ascended the mound, and there standing in view of all was Fergus, the
huntsman's son. All eyes were fastened upon him, but no one looked so
eagerly as the princess.

He touched his harp with gentle fingers, and a sound low and soft as
a faint summer breeze passing through forest trees stole out, and then
was heard the rustle of birds through the branches, and the dreamy
murmur of waters lost in deepest woods, and all the fairy echoes
whispering when the leaves are motionless in the noonday heat; then
followed notes cool and soft as the drip of summer showers on the
parched grass, and then the song of the blackbird, sounding as clearly
as it sounds in long silent spaces of the evening, and then in one sweet
jocund burst the multitudinous voices that hail the breaking of the
morn. And the lark, singing and soaring above the minstrel, sank mute
and motionless upon his shoulder, and from all the leafy woods the birds
came thronging out and formed a fluttering canopy above his head.

When the bard ceased playing no shout arose from the mighty multitude,
for the strains of his harp, long after its chords were stilled, held
their hearts spellbound.

And when he had passed away from the mound of contest all knew there was
no need to declare the victor.[9] And all were glad the comely Fenian
champion had maintained the supremacy of the bards of Erin. But there
was one heart sad, the heart of the princess; and now she wished more
than ever that she had never made her hateful vow.

Other contests went on, but Fergus took no interest in them; and once
more he stole away to the forest glade. His heart was sorrowful, for he
thought of the great race of the morning, and he knew that he could not
hope to compete with the rider of the white steed of the plains. And as
he lay beneath the spreading branches during the whole night long his
thoughts were not of the victory he had won, but of the princess, who
was as far away from him as ever. He passed the night without sleep, and
when the morning came he rose and walked aimlessly through the woods.

A deer starting from a thicket reminded him of the happy days of his
boyhood, and once more the wish came back to him that he had never left
his forest home. As his eyes followed the deer wistfully, suddenly he
started in amazement. The deer vanished from view, and in his stead was
the wild horse of the mountains.

"I told you I'd do you a good turn," said the Pooka, "for the kindness
you and yours did me on that wild winter's night. The day is passing.
You have no time to lose. The white steed of the plains is coming to the
starting-post. Jump on my back, and remember, 'Faint heart never won
fair lady.'"

In half a second Fergus was bestride the Pooka, whose coat of shaggy
hair became at once as glossy as silk, and just at the very moment
when the king was about to declare there was no steed to compete with
the white steed of the plains, the Pooka, with Fergus upon his back,
galloped up in front of the royal inclosure. When the people saw the
champion a thunderous shout rose up that startled the birds in the
skies, and sent them flying to the groves.
And in the ladies' inclosure was a rustle of many-colored scarves waving
in the air. At the striking of the shields the contending steeds rushed
from the post with the swiftness of a swallow's flight. But before the
white steed of the plains had gone halfway round, Fergus and the wild
horse of the mountains had passed the winning post, greeted by such
cheers as had never before been heard on the plains of Tara.

Fergus heard the cheers, but scarcely heeded them, for his heart went
out through his eyes that were fastened on the princess, and a wild hope
stirred him that his glance was not ungrateful to the loveliest lady of
the land.

And the princess was sad and sorry for her vow, for she believed that it
was beyond the power of Fergus to bring her a robe of all the colors of
the rainbow, so subtly woven as to fit in the palm of her soft, white
hand.

That night also Fergus went to the forest, not too sad, because there
was a vague hope in his heart that had never been there before. He lay
down under the branches, with his feet towards the rustling waters, and
the smiles of the princess gilded his slumbers, as the rays of the
rising sun gild the glades of the forest; and when the morning came he
was scarcely surprised when before him appeared the little old woman
with the shuttle he had welcomed on the winter's night.

"You think you have won her already," said the little woman. "And so you
have, too; her heart is all your own, and I'm half inclined to think
that my trouble will be thrown away, for if you had never a wedding robe
to give her, she'd rather have you this minute than all the kings of
Erin, or than all the other princes and kings and chieftains in the
whole world. But you and your father and mother were kind to me on a
wild winter's night, and I'd never see your mother's son without a
wedding robe fit for the greatest princess that ever set nations to
battle for her beauty. So go and pluck me a handful of wild forest
flowers, and I'll weave out of them a wedding robe with all the colors
of the rainbow, and one that will be as sweet and as fragrant as the
ripe, red lips of the princess herself."

Fergus, with joyous heart, culled the flowers, and brought them to the
little old woman.

In the twinkling of an eye she wove with her little shuttle a wedding
robe, with all the colors of the rainbow, as light as the fairy dew, as
soft as the hand of the princess, as fragrant as her little red mouth,
and so small that it would pass through the eye of a needle.

"Go now, Fergus," said she, "and may luck go with you; but, in the days
of your greatness and of the glory which will come to you when you are
wedded to the princess, be as kind, and have as open a heart and as open
a door for the poor as you had when you were only a poor huntsman's son."

Fergus took the robe and went towards Tara. It was the last day of the
fair, and all the contests were over, and the bards were about to chant
the farewell strains to the memory of the great queen. But before the
chief bard could ascend the mound, Fergus, attended by a troop of Fenian
warriors on their steeds, galloped into the inclosure, and rode up in
front of the queen's pavilion. Holding up the glancing and many-colored
robe, he said:
"O Queen and King of Erin! I claim the princess for my bride. You,
O king, have decided that I have won the prize in the contest of the
bards; that I have won the prize in the race against the white steed of
the plains; it is for the princess to say if the robe which I give her
will fit in the hollow of her small white hand."

"Yes," said the king. "You are victor in the contests; let the princess
declare if you have fulfilled the last condition."

The princess took the robe from Fergus, closed her fingers over it, so
that no vestige of it was seen.

"Yes, O king!" said she, "he has fulfilled the last condition; but
before ever he had fulfilled a single one of them, my heart went out to
the comely champion of the Feni. I was willing then, I am ready now, to
become the bride of the huntsman's son."

THE FAIRY TREE OF DOOROS[10]

Once upon a time the fairies of the west, going home from a
hurling-match with the fairies of the lakes, rested in Dooros Wood for
three days and three nights. They spent the days feasting and the nights
dancing in the light of the moon, and they danced so hard that they wore
the shoes off their feet, and for a whole week after the leprechauns,
the fairies' shoemakers, were working night and day making new ones, and
the rip, rap, tap, tap of their little hammers were heard in all the
hedgerows.

The food on which the fairies feasted was little red berries, which were
so like those that grow on the rowan tree that if you only looked at
them you might mistake one for the other; but the fairy berries grow
only in fairyland, and are sweeter than any fruit that grows here in
this world, and if an old man, bent and gray, ate one of them, he became
young and active and strong again; and if an old woman, withered and
wrinkled, ate one of them, she became young and bright and fair; and if
a little maiden who was not handsome ate of them, she became lovelier
than the flower of beauty.

The fairies guarded the berries as carefully as a miser guards his gold,
and whenever they were about to leave fairyland they had to promise in
the presence of the king and queen that they would not give a single
berry to mortal man, nor allow one to fall upon the earth; for if a
single berry fell upon the earth a slender tree of many branches,
bearing clusters of berries, would at once spring up, and mortal men
might eat of them.

But it chanced that this time they were in Dooros Wood they kept up the
feasting and dancing so long, and were so full of joy because of their
victory over the lake fairies, that one little, weeny fairy, not much
bigger than my finger, lost his head, and dropped a berry in the wood.

When the feast was ended the fairies went back to fairyland, and were at
home for more than a week before they knew of the little fellow's fault,
and this is how they came to know of it.
A great wedding was about to come off, and the queen of the fairies sent
six of her pages to Dooros Wood to catch fifty butterflies with golden
spots on their purple wings, and fifty white without speck or spot, and
fifty golden, yellow as the cowslip, to make a dress for herself, and a
hundred white, without speck or spot, to make dresses for the bride and
bridesmaids.

When the pages came near the wood they heard the most wonderful music,
and the sky above them became quite dark, as if a cloud had shut out
the sun. They looked up, and saw that the cloud was formed of bees, who
in a great swarm were flying towards the wood and humming as they flew.
Seeing this they were sore afraid until they saw the bees settling on a
single tree, and on looking closely at the tree they saw it was covered
with fairy berries.

The bees took no notice of the fairies, and so they were no longer
afraid, and they hunted the butterflies until they had captured the full
number of various colors. Then they returned to fairyland, and they told
the queen about the bees and the berries, and the queen told the king.

The king was very angry, and he sent his heralds to the four corners of
fairyland to summon all his subjects to his presence that he might find
out without delay who was the culprit.

They all came except the little weeny fellow who dropped the berry, and
of course everyone said that it was fear that kept him away, and that he
must be guilty.

The heralds were at once sent in search of him, and after a while they
found him hiding in a cluster of ferns, and brought him before the king.

The poor little fellow was so frightened that at first he could scarcely
speak a word, but after a time he told how he never missed the berry
until he had returned to fairyland, and that he was afraid to say
anything to anyone about it.

The king, who would hear of no excuse, sentenced the little culprit to
be banished into the land of giants beyond the mountains, to stay there
for ever and a day unless he could find a giant willing to go to Dooros
Wood and guard the fairy tree. When the king had pronounced sentence
everyone was very sorry, because the little fellow was a favorite with
them all. No fairy harper upon his harp, or piper upon his pipe, or
fiddler upon his fiddle, could play half so sweetly as he could play
upon an ivy leaf; and when they remembered all the pleasant moonlit
nights on which they had danced to his music, and thought that they
should never hear or dance to it any more, their little hearts were
filled with sorrow. The queen was as sad as any of her subjects, but
the king's word should be obeyed.

When the time came for the little fellow to set out into exile the queen
sent her head page to him with a handful of berries. These the queen
said he was to offer to the giants, and say at the same time that the
giant who was willing to guard the tree could feast on berries just as
sweet from morn till night.

As the little fellow went on his way nearly all the fairies followed him
to the borders of the land, and when they saw him go up the mountain
towards the land of the giants, they all took off their little red caps
and waved them until he was out of sight.

On he went walking all day and night, and when the sun rose on the
morrow he was on the top of the mountain, and he could see the land of
the giants in the valley stretched far below him. Before beginning his
descent he turned round for a last glimpse of fairyland; but he could
see nothing, for a thick, dark cloud shut it out from view. He was
very sad, and tired, and footsore, and as he struggled down the rough
mountain side, he could not help thinking of the soft, green woods and
mossy pathways of the pleasant land he had left behind him.

[Illustration: "He was very sad, and tired"]

When he awoke the ground was trembling, and a noise that sounded like
thunder fell on his ears. He looked up and saw coming towards him a
terrible giant, with one eye that burned like a live coal in the middle
of his forehead; his mouth stretched from ear to ear, his teeth were
long and crooked, the skin of his face was as black as night, and his
arms and chest were all covered with black, shaggy hair; round his body
was an iron band, and hanging from this by a chain was a great club with
iron spikes. With one blow of this club he could break a rock into
splinters, and fire could not burn him, and water could not drown him,
and weapons could not wound him, and there was no way to kill him but
by giving him three blows of his own club. And he was so bad-tempered
that the other giants called him Sharvan the Surly. When the giant spied
the red cap of the little fairy he gave the shout that sounded like
thunder. The poor fairy was shaking from head to foot.

"What brought you here?" said the giant.

"Please, Mr. Giant," said the fairy, "the king of the fairies banished
me here, and here I must stay for ever and a day, unless you come and
guard the fairy tree in Dooros Wood."

"Unless what?" roared the giant, and he gave the fairy a touch of his
foot that sent the little fellow rolling down head over heels.

The poor fairy lay as if he were dead, and then the giant, feeling sorry
for what he had done, took him up gently between his finger and thumb.

"Don't be frightened, little man," said he, "and now, tell me all about
the tree."

"It is the tree of the fairy berry that grows in the Wood of Dooros,"
said the fairy, "and I have some of the berries with me."

"Oh, you have, have you?" said the giant. "Let me see them."

The fairy took three berries from the pocket of his little green coat,
and gave them to the giant.

The giant looked at them for a second. He then swallowed the three
together, and when he had done so, he felt so happy that he began to
shout and dance for joy.

"More, you little thief!" said he. "More, you little----what's your
name?" said the giant.

"Pinkeen, please, Mr. Giant," said the fairy, as he gave up all the
berries.

The giant shouted louder than before, and his shouts were heard by all
the other giants, who came running towards him.

When Sharvan saw them coming, he caught up Pinkeen, and put him in his
pocket, that they shouldn't see him.

"What were you shouting for?" said the giants.

"Because," said Sharvan, "that rock there fell down on my big toe."

"You did not shout like a man that was hurt," said they.

"What is it to you what way I shouted?" said he.

"You might give a civil answer to a civil question," said they; "but
sure you were always Sharvan the Surly;" and they went away.

When the giants were out of sight, Sharvan took Pinkeen out of his
wallet.

"Some more berries, you little thief--I mean little Pinkeen," said he.

"I have not any more," said Pinkeen; "but if you will guard the tree in
Dooros Wood you can feast on them from morn till night."

"I'll guard every tree in the wood, if I may do that," said the giant.

"You'll have to guard only one," said Pinkeen.

"How am I to get to it?" said Sharvan.

"You must first come with me towards fairyland," said the fairy.

"Very well," said Sharvan; "let us go." And he took up the fairy and put
him into his wallet, and before very long they were on the top of the
mountain. Then the giant looked around towards the giants' land; but
a black cloud shut it out from view, while the sun was shining on the
valley that lay before him, and he could see away in the distance the
green woods and shining waters of fairyland.

It was not long until he reached its borders, but when he tried to cross
them his feet stuck to the ground and he could not move a step. Sharvan
gave three loud shouts that were heard all over fairyland, and made the
trees in the woods tremble, as if the wind of a storm was sweeping over
them.

"Oh, please, Mr. Giant, let me out," said Pinkeen. Sharvan took out the
little fellow, who, as soon as he saw he was on the borders of fairyland
ran as fast as his legs could carry him, and before he had gone very far
he met all the little fairies who, hearing the shouts of the giant, came
trooping out from the ferns to see what was the matter. Pinkeen told
them it was the giant who was to guard the tree, shouting because he
was stuck fast on the borders, and they need have no fear of him. The
fairies were so delighted to have Pinkeen back again, that they took
him up on their shoulders and carried him to the king's palace, and all
the harpers and pipers and fiddlers marched before him playing the most
jocund music that was ever heard. The king and queen were on the lawn
in front of the palace when the gay procession came up and halted before
them. The queen's eyes glistened with pleasure when she saw the little
favorite, and the king was also glad at heart, but he looked very grave
as he said:

"Why have you returned, sirrah?"

Then Pinkeen told his majesty that he had brought with him a giant who
was willing to guard the fairy tree.

"And who is he and where is he?" asked the king.

"The other giants called him Sharvan the Surly," said Pinkeen, "and he
is stuck fast outside the borders of fairyland."

"It is well," said the king, "you are pardoned."

When the fairies heard this they tossed their little red caps in the
air, and cheered so loudly that a bee who was clinging to a rose-bud
fell senseless to the ground.

Then the king ordered one of his pages to take a handful of berries,
and to go to Sharvan and show him the way to Dooros Wood. The page,
taking the berries with him, went off to Sharvan, whose roaring nearly
frightened the poor little fellow to death. But as soon as the giant
tasted the berries he got into good humor, and he asked the page if he
could remove the spell of enchantment from him.

"I can," said the page, "and I will if you promise me that you will not
try to cross the borders of fairyland."

"I promise that, with all my heart," said the giant. "But hurry on, my
little man, for there are pins and needles in my legs."

The page plucked a cowslip, and picking out the five little crimson
spots in the cup of it, he flung one to the north, and one to the south,
and one to the east, and one to the west, and one up into the sky, and
the spell was broken, and the giant's limbs were free. Then Sharvan
and the fairy page set off for Dooros Wood, and it was not long until
they came within view of the fairy tree. When Sharvan saw the berries
glistening in the sun, he gave a shout so loud and strong that the wind
of it blew the little fairy back to fairyland. But he had to return to
the wood to tell the giant that he was to stay all day at the foot of
the tree ready to do battle with anyone who might come to steal the
berries, and that during the night he was to sleep amongst the branches.

"All right," said the giant, who could scarcely speak, as his mouth was
full of berries.

Well, the fame of the fairy-tree spread far and wide, and every day some
adventurer came to try if he could carry away some of the berries; but
the giant, true to his word, was always on the watch, and not a single
day passed on which he did not fight and slay a daring champion, and the
giant never received a wound, for fire could not burn him, nor water
drown him, nor weapon wound him.

Now, at this time, when Sharvan was keeping watch and ward over the
tree, a cruel king was reigning over the lands that looked towards
the rising sun. He had slain the rightful king by foul means, and his
subjects, loving their murdered sovereign, hated the usurper; but much
as they hated him they feared him more, for he was brave and masterful,
and he was armed with a helmet and shield which no weapon made by mortal
hands could pierce, and he carried always with him two javelins that
never missed their mark, and were so fatal that they were called "the
shafts of death." The murdered king had two children--a boy, whose name
was Niall, and a girl, who was called Rosaleen--that is, little Rose;
but no rose that ever bloomed was half as sweet or fresh or fair as she.
Cruel as the tyrant king was, he was too afraid of the people to kill
the children. He sent the boy adrift on the sea in an open boat, hoping
the waves would swallow it; and he got an old witch to cast the spell of
deformity over Rosaleen, and under the spell her beauty faded, until at
last she became so ugly and wasted that scarcely anyone would speak to
her. And, shunned by everyone, she spent her days in the out-houses with
the cattle, and every night she cried herself to sleep.

One day, when she was very lonely, a little robin came to pick the
crumbs that had fallen about her feet. He appeared so tame that she
offered him the bread from her hand, and when he took it she cried with
joy at finding that there was one living thing that did not shun her.
After this the robin came every day, and he sang so sweetly for her that
she almost forgot her loneliness and misery. But once while the robin
was with her the tyrant king's daughter, who was very beautiful, passed
with her maids of honor, and, seeing Rosaleen, the princess said:

"Oh, there is that horrid ugly thing."

The maids laughed and giggled, and said they had never seen such a
fright.

Poor Rosaleen felt as if her heart would break, and when the princess
and her maids were out of sight she almost cried her eyes out. When the
robin saw her crying he perched on her shoulder and rubbed his little
head against her neck and chirruped softly in her ear, and Rosaleen
was comforted, for she felt she had at least one friend in the world,
although it was only a little robin. But the robin could do more for
her than she could dream of. He heard the remark made by the princess,
and he saw Rosaleen's tears, and he knew now why she was shunned by
everybody, and why she was so unhappy. And that very evening he flew off
to Dooros Wood, and called on a cousin of his and told him all about
Rosaleen.

"And you want some of the fairy berries, I suppose," said his cousin,
Robin of the Wood.

"I do," said Rosaleen's little friend.

"Ah," said Robin of the Wood, "times have changed since you were here
last. The tree is guarded now all the day long by a surly giant. He
sleeps in the branches during the night, and he breathes upon them and
around them every morning, and his breath is poison to bird and bee.
There is only one chance open, and if you try that it may cost you
your life."

"Then tell me what it is, for I would give a hundred lives for
Rosaleen," said her own little robin.

"Well," said Robin of the Wood, "every day a champion comes to battle
with the giant, and the giant, before he begins the fight, puts a branch
of berries in the iron belt that's around his waist, so that when he
feels tired or thirsty he can refresh himself, and there is just a bare
chance, while he is fighting, of picking one of the berries from the
branch; but if his breath fall on you it is certain death."

"I will take the chance," said Rosaleen's robin.

"Very well," said the other. And the two birds flew through the wood
until they came within sight of the fairy tree. The giant was lying
stretched at the foot of it, eating the berries; but it was not long
until a warrior came, who challenged him to battle. The giant jumped up,
and plucking a branch from the tree stuck it in his belt, and swinging
his iron club above his head strode towards the warrior, and the fight
began. The robin perched on a tree behind the giant, and watched and
waited for his chance; but it was a long time coming, for the berries
were in front of the giant's belt. At last the giant, with one great
blow, struck the warrior down, but as he did so he stumbled and fell
upon him, and before he had time to recover himself the little robin
darted towards him like a flash and picked off one of the berries, and
then, as fast as wings could carry him, he flew towards home, and on his
way he passed over a troop of warriors on snow-white steeds. All the
horsemen except one wore silver helmets and shining mantles of green
silk, fastened by brooches of red gold, but the chief, who rode at the
head of the troop, wore a golden helmet, and his mantle was of yellow
silk, and he looked by far the noblest of them all. When the robin had
left the horsemen far behind him he spied Rosaleen sitting outside the
palace gates bemoaning her fate. The robin perched upon her shoulder,
and almost before she knew he was there he put the berry between her
lips, and the taste was so delicious that Rosaleen ate it at once, and
that very moment the witch's withering spell passed away from her, and
she became as lovely as the flower of beauty. Just then the warriors on
the snow-white steeds came up, and the chief with the mantle of yellow
silk and the golden helmet leaped from his horse, and bending his knee
before her, said:

"Fairest of all fair maidens, you are surely the daughter of the king of
these realms, even though you are without the palace gates, unattended,
and wear not royal robes. I am the Prince of the Sunny Valleys."

"Daughter of a king I am," said Rosaleen, "but not of the king who rules
these realms."

And saying this she fled, leaving the prince wondering who she could be.
The prince then ordered his trumpeters to give notice of his presence
outside the palace, and in a few moments the king and all his nobles
came out to greet the prince and his warriors, and give them welcome.
That night a great feast was spread in the banquet hall, and the Prince
of the Sunny Valleys sat by the king, and beside the prince sat the
king's beautiful daughter, and then in due order sat the nobles of the
court and the warriors who had come with the prince, and on the wall
behind each noble and warrior his shield and helmet were suspended,
flashing radiance through the room. During the feast the prince spoke
most graciously to the lovely lady at his side, but all the time he was
thinking of the unknown beauty he had met outside the palace gates, and
his heart longed for another glimpse of her. When the feast was ended,
and the jeweled drinking-cups had gone merrily around the table, the
bards sang, to the accompaniment of harps, the "Courtship of the Lady
Eimer," and as they pictured her radiant beauty outshining that of all
her maidens, the prince thought that fair as Lady Eimer was there was
one still fairer.

When the feast was ended the king asked the prince what brought him into
his realms.

"I come," said the prince, "to look for a bride, for it was foretold
to me in my own country that here only I should find the lady who is
destined to share my throne, and fame reported that in your kingdom are
to be found the loveliest maidens in all the world, and I can well
believe that," added the prince, "after what I have seen to-day."

When the king's daughter heard this she hung down her head and blushed
like a rose, for, of course, she thought the prince was alluding only to
herself, as she did not know that he had seen Rosaleen, and she had not
heard of the restoration of her beauty.

Before another word could be spoken a great noise and the clang of arms
were heard outside the palace. The king and his guests started from
their seats and drew their swords, and the bards raised the song of
battle; but their voices were stilled and their harps silenced when they
saw at the threshold of the banquet hall a battle champion, in whose
face they recognized the features of their murdered king.

"'Tis Niall come back to claim his father's throne," said the chief
bard. "Long live Niall!"

"Long live Niall!" answered all the others.

The king, white with rage and amazement, turned to the chiefs and nobles
of his court, and cried out:

"Is there none loyal enough to drive that intruder from the banquet
hall?"

But no one stirred, and no answer was given. Then the king rushed
forward alone, but before he could reach the spot where Niall was
standing he was seized by a dozen chiefs and at once disarmed.

During this scene the king's daughter had fled frightened; but Rosaleen,
attracted by the noise, and hearing her brother's name and the cheers
which greeted it, had entered the banquet hall unperceived by anyone.
But when her presence was discovered every eye was dazzled with her
beauty. Niall looked at her for a second, wondering if the radiant
maiden before him could be the little sister he had been separated from
for so many years. In another second she was clasped in his arms.

Then the feast was spread again, and Niall told the story of his
adventures; and when the Prince of the Sunny Valley asked for the hand
of Rosaleen, Niall told his lovely sister to speak for herself. With
downcast eyes and smiling lips she said, "yes," and that very day was
the gayest and brightest wedding that ever took place, and Rosaleen
became the prince's bride.

In her happiness she did not forget the little robin, who was her friend
in sorrow. She took him home with her to Sunny Valleys, and every day
she fed him with her own hands, and every day he sang for her the
sweetest songs that were ever heard in lady's bower.
THE LITTLE WHITE CAT

A long, long time ago, in a valley far away, the giant Trencoss lived in
a great castle, surrounded by trees that were always green. The castle
had a hundred doors, and every door was guarded by a huge, shaggy hound,
with tongue of fire and claws of iron, who tore to pieces anyone who
went to the castle without the giant's leave. Trencoss had made war on
the King of the Torrents, and, having killed the king, and slain his
people, and burned his palace, he carried off his only daughter, the
Princess Eileen, to the castle in the valley. Here he provided her with
beautiful rooms, and appointed a hundred dwarfs, dressed in blue and
yellow satin, to wait upon her, and harpers to play sweet music for her,
and he gave her diamonds without number, brighter than the sun; but he
would not allow her to go outside the castle, and told her if she went
one step beyond its doors, the hounds, with tongues of fire and claws of
iron, would tear her to pieces. A week after her arrival, war broke out
between the giant and the King of the Islands, and before he set out for
battle, the giant sent for the princess, and informed her that on his
return he would make her his wife. When the princess heard this she
began to cry, for she would rather die than marry the giant who had
slain her father.

"Crying will only spoil your bright eyes, my little princess," said
Trencoss, "and you will have to marry me whether you like it or no."

He then bade her go back to her room, and he ordered the dwarfs to give
her everything she asked for while he was away, and the harpers to play
the sweetest music for her. When the princess gained her room she cried
as if her heart would break. The long day passed slowly, and the night
came, but brought no sleep to Eileen, and in the gray light of the
morning she rose and opened the window, and looked about in every
direction to see if there were any chance of escape. But the window was
ever so high above the ground, and below were the hungry and ever
watchful hounds. With a heavy heart she was about to close the window
when she thought she saw the branches of the tree that was nearest to
it moving. She looked again, and she saw a little white cat creeping
along one of the branches.

"Mew!" cried the cat.

"Poor little pussy," said the princess. "Come to me, pussy."

"Stand back from the window," said the cat, "and I will."

The princess stepped back, and the little white cat jumped into the
room. The princess took the little cat on her lap and stroked him with
her hand, and the cat raised up its back and began to purr.

"Where do you come from, and what is your name?" asked the princess.

"No matter where I come from or what's my name," said the cat. "I am a
friend of yours, and I come to help you."

"I never wanted help worse," said the princess.

"I know that," said the cat; "and now listen to me. When the giant comes
back from battle and asks you to marry him, say to him you will marry
him."

"But I will never marry him," said the princess.

"Do what I tell you," said the cat. "When he asks you to marry him, say
to him you will if his dwarfs will wind for you three balls from the
fairy dew that lies on the bushes on a misty morning as big as these,"
said the cat, putting his right forefoot into his ear and taking out
three balls--one yellow, one red, and one blue.

"They are very small," said the princess. "They are not much bigger than
peas, and the dwarfs will not be long at their work."

"Won't they," said the cat. "It will take them a month and a day to make
one, so that it will take three months and three days before the balls
are wound; but the giant, like you, will think they can be made in a few
days, and so he will readily promise to do what you ask. He will soon
find out his mistake, but he will keep his word, and will not press you
to marry him until the balls are wound."

"When will the giant come back?" asked Eileen.

"He will return to-morrow afternoon," said the cat.

"Will you stay with me until then?" said the princess. "I am very
lonely."

"I cannot stay," said the cat. "I have to go away to my palace on the
island on which no man ever placed his foot, and where no man but one
shall ever come."

"And where is that island?" asked the princess, "and who is the man?"

"The island is in the far-off seas where vessel never sailed; the man
you will see before many days are over; and if all goes well, he will
one day slay the giant Trencoss, and free you from his power."

"Ah!" sighed the princess, "that can never be, for no weapon can wound
the hundred hounds that guard the castle, and no sword can kill the
giant Trencoss."

"There is a sword that will kill him," said the cat; "but I must go
now. Remember what you are to say to the giant when he comes home, and
every morning watch the tree on which you saw me, and if you see in the
branches anyone you like better than yourself," said the cat, winking
at the princess, "throw him these three balls and leave the rest to me;
but take care not to speak a single word to him, for if you do all will
be lost."

"Shall I ever see you again?" asked the princess.

"Time will tell," answered the cat, and, without saying so much as
good-by, he jumped through the window on to the tree, and in a second
was out of sight.

The morrow afternoon came, and the giant Trencoss returned from battle.
Eileen knew of his coming by the furious barking of the hounds, and her
heart sank, for she knew that in a few moments she would be summoned to
his presence. Indeed, he had hardly entered the castle when he sent for
her, and told her to get ready for the wedding. The princess tried to
look cheerful, as she answered:

"I will be ready as soon as you wish; but you must first promise me
something."

"Ask anything you like, little princess," said Trencoss.

"Well, then," said Eileen, "before I marry you, you must make your
dwarfs wind three balls as big as these from the fairy dew that lies on
the bushes on a misty morning in summer."

"Is that all?" said Trencoss, laughing. "I shall give the dwarfs orders
at once, and by this time to-morrow the balls will be wound, and our
wedding can take place in the evening."

"And will you leave me to myself until then?"

"I will," said Trencoss.

"On your honor as a giant?" said Eileen.

"On my honor as a giant," replied Trencoss.

The princess returned to her rooms, and the giant summoned all his
dwarfs, and he ordered them to go forth in the dawning of the morn
and to gather all the fairy dew lying on the bushes, and to wind three
balls--one yellow, one red, and one blue. The next morning, and the
next, and the next, the dwarfs went out into the fields and searched
all the hedgerows, but they could gather only as much fairy dew as would
make a thread as long as a wee girl's eyelash; and so they had to go out
morning after morning, and the giant fumed and threatened, but all to
no purpose. He was very angry with the princess, and he was vexed with
himself that she was so much cleverer than he was, and, moreover, he saw
now that the wedding could not take place as soon as he expected.

When the little white cat went away from the castle he ran as fast as
he could up hill and down dale, and never stopped until he came to the
Prince of the Silver River. The prince was alone, and very sad and
sorrowful he was, for he was thinking of the Princess Eileen, and
wondering where she could be.

"Mew," said the cat, as he sprang softly into the room; but the prince
did not heed him. "Mew," again said the cat; but again the prince did
not heed him. "Mew," said the cat the third time, and he jumped up on
the prince's knee.

"Where do you come from, and what do you want?" asked the prince.

"I come from where you would like to be," said the cat.

"And where is that?" said the prince.

"Oh, where is that, indeed! as if I didn't know what you are thinking
of, and of whom you are thinking," said the cat; "and it would be far
better for you to try and save her."

"I would give my life a thousand times over for her," said the prince.
"For whom?" said the cat, with a wink. "I named no name, your highness,"
said he.

"You know very well who she is," said the prince, "if you knew what I
was thinking of; but do you know where she is?"

"She is in danger," said the cat. "She is in the castle of the giant
Trencoss, in the valley beyond the mountains."

"I will set out there at once," said the prince, "and I will challenge
the giant to battle, and will slay him."

"Easier said than done," said the cat. "There is no sword made by the
hands of man can kill him, and even if you could kill him, his hundred
hounds, with tongues of fire and claws of iron, would tear you to
pieces."

"Then, what am I to do?" asked the prince.

"Be said by me," said the cat. "Go to the wood that surrounds the
giant's castle, and climb the high tree that's nearest to the window
that looks towards the sunset, and shake the branches, and you will see
what you will see. Then hold out your hat with the silver plumes, and
three balls--one yellow, one red, and one blue--will be thrown into it.
And then come back here as fast as you can; but speak no word, for if
you utter a single word the hounds will hear you, and you shall be torn
to pieces."

Well, the prince set off at once, and after two days' journey he came to
the wood around the castle, and he climbed the tree that was nearest to
the window that looked towards the sunset, and he shook the branches.
As soon as he did so, the window opened and he saw the Princess Eileen,
looking lovelier than ever. He was going to call out her name, but she
placed her fingers on her lips, and he remembered what the cat had told
him, that he was to speak no word. In silence he held out the hat with
the silver plumes, and the princess threw into it the three balls, one
after another, and, blowing him a kiss, she shut the window. And well
it was she did so, for at that very moment she heard the voice of the
giant, who was coming back from hunting.

The prince waited until the giant had entered the castle before he
descended the tree. He set off as fast as he could. He went up hill and
down dale, and never stopped until he arrived at his own palace, and
there waiting for him was the little white cat.

"Have you brought the three balls?" said he.

"I have," said the prince.

"Then follow me," said the cat.

On they went until they left the palace far behind and came to the edge
of the sea.

"Now," said the cat, "unravel a thread of the red ball, hold the thread
in your right hand, drop the ball into the water, and you shall see what
you shall see."
The prince did as he was told, and the ball floated out to sea,
unraveling as it went, and it went on until it was out of sight.

"Pull now," said the cat.

The prince pulled, and, as he did, he saw far away something on the sea
shining like silver. It came nearer and nearer, and he saw it was a
little silver boat. At last it touched the strand.

"Now," said the cat, "step into this boat and it will bear you to the
palace on the island on which no man has ever placed his foot--the
island in the unknown seas that were never sailed by vessels made of
human hands. In that palace there is a sword with a diamond hilt, and
by that sword alone the giant Trencoss can be killed. There also are
a hundred cakes, and it is only on eating these the hundred hounds can
die. But mind what I say to you: if you eat or drink until you reach the
palace of the little cat in the island in the unknown seas, you will
forget the Princess Eileen."

"I will forget myself first," said the prince, as he stepped into the
silver boat, which floated away so quickly that it was soon out of sight
of land.

The day passed and the night fell, and the stars shone down upon the
waters, but the boat never stopped. On she went for two whole days
and nights, and on the third morning the prince saw an island in the
distance, and very glad he was; for he thought it was his journey's end,
and he was almost fainting with thirst and hunger. But the day passed
and the island was still before him.

At long last, on the following day, he saw by the first light of the
morning that he was quite close to it, and that trees laden with fruit
of every kind were bending down over the water. The boat sailed round
and round the island, going closer and closer every round, until, at
last, the drooping branches almost touched it. The sight of the fruit
within his reach made the prince hungrier and thirstier than he was
before, and forgetting his promise to the little cat--not to eat
anything until he entered the palace in the unknown seas--he caught one
of the branches, and, in a moment, was in the tree eating the delicious
fruit. While he was doing so the boat floated out to sea and soon was
lost to sight; but the prince, having eaten, forgot all about it, and,
worse still, forgot all about the princess in the giant's castle. When
he had eaten enough he descended the tree, and, turning his back on the
sea, set out straight before him. He had not gone far when he heard the
sound of music, and soon after he saw a number of maidens playing on
silver harps coming towards him. When they saw him they ceased playing,
and cried out:

"Welcome! welcome! Prince of the Silver River, welcome to the island of

fruits and flowers. Our king and queen saw you coming over the sea, and
they sent us to bring you to the palace."

The prince went with them, and at the palace gates the king and queen
and their daughter Kathleen received him, and gave him welcome. He
hardly saw the king and queen, for his eyes were fixed on the Princess
Kathleen, who looked more beautiful than a flower. He thought he had
never seen anyone so lovely, for, of course, he had forgotten all about
poor Eileen pining away in her castle prison in the lonely valley. When
the king and queen had given welcome to the prince a great feast was
spread, and all the lords and ladies of the court sat down to it, and
the prince sat between the queen and the Princess Kathleen, and long
before the feast was finished he was over head and ears in love with
her. When the feast was ended the queen ordered the ballroom to be made
ready, and when night fell the dancing began, and was kept up until the
morning star, and the prince danced all night with the princess, falling
deeper and deeper in love with her every minute. Between dancing by
night and feasting by day weeks went by. All the time poor Eileen in the
giant's castle was counting the hours, and all this time the dwarfs were
winding the balls, and a ball and a half were already wound. At last the
prince asked the king and queen for their daughter in marriage, and they
were delighted to be able to say yes, and the day was fixed for the
wedding. But on the evening before the day on which it was to take place
the prince was in his room, getting ready for a dance, when he felt
something rubbing against his leg, and, looking down, who should he see
but the little white cat. At the sight of him the prince remembered
everything, and sad and sorry he was when he thought of Eileen watching
and waiting and counting the days until he returned to save her. But he
was very fond of the Princess Kathleen, and so he did not know what to
do.

[Illustration: "At the sight of him the prince remembered everything"]

"You can't do anything to-night," said the cat, for he knew what the
prince was thinking of, "but when morning comes go down to the sea, and
look not to the right or the left, and let no living thing touch you,
for if you do you shall never leave the island. Drop the second ball
into the water, as you did the first, and when the boat comes step in
at once. Then you may look behind you, and you shall see what you shall
see, and you'll know which you love best, the Princess Eileen or the
Princess Kathleen, and you can either go or stay."

The prince didn't sleep a wink that night, and at the first glimpse of
the morning he stole from the palace. When he reached the sea he threw
out the ball, and when it had floated out of sight, he saw the little
boat sparkling on the horizon like a newly-risen star. The prince had
scarcely passed through the palace doors when he was missed, and the
king and queen and the princess, and all the lords and ladies of the
court, went in search of him, taking the quickest way to the sea. While
the maidens with the silver harps played sweetest music, the princess,
whose voice was sweeter than any music, called on the prince by his
name, and so moved his heart that he was about to look behind, when he
remembered how the cat had told him he should not do so until he was in
the boat. Just as it touched the shore the princess put out her hand and
almost caught the prince's arm, but he stepped into the boat in time
to save himself, and it sped away like a receding wave. A loud scream
caused the prince to look round suddenly, and when he did he saw no sign
of king or queen, or princess, or lords or ladies, but only big green
serpents, with red eyes and tongues, that hissed out fire and poison as
they writhed in a hundred horrible coils.

The prince, having escaped from the enchanted island, sailed away for
three days and three nights, and every night he hoped the coming morning
would show him the island he was in search of. He was faint with hunger
and beginning to despair, when on the fourth morning he saw in the
distance an island that, in the first rays of the sun, gleamed like
fire. On coming closer to it he saw that it was clad with trees, so
covered with bright red berries that hardly a leaf was to be seen. Soon
the boat was almost within a stone's cast of the island, and it began to
sail round and round until it was well under the bending branches. The
scent of the berries was so sweet that it sharpened the prince's hunger,
and he longed to pluck them; but, remembering what had happened to him
on the enchanted island, he was afraid to touch them. But the boat kept
on sailing round and round, and at last a great wind rose from the sea
and shook the branches, and the bright, sweet berries fell into the boat
until it was filled with them, and they fell upon the prince's hands,
and he took up some to look at them, and as he looked the desire to eat
them grew stronger, and he said to himself it would be no harm to taste
one; but when he tasted it the flavor was so delicious he swallowed it,
and, of course, at once he forgot all about Eileen, and the boat drifted
away from him and left him standing in the water.

He climbed on to the island, and having eaten enough of the berries, he

set out to see what might be before him, and it was not long until he
heard a great noise, and a huge iron ball knocked down one of the trees
in front of him, and before he knew where he was a hundred giants came
running after it. When they saw the prince they turned towards him, and
one of them caught him up in his hand and held him up that all might see
him. The prince was nearly squeezed to death, and seeing this the giant
put him on the ground again.

"Who are you, my little man?" asked the giant.

"I am a prince," replied the prince.

"Oh, you are a prince, are you?" said the giant. "And what are you good
for?" said he.

The prince did not know, for nobody had asked him that question before.

"I know what he's good for," said an old giantess, with one eye in her
forehead and one in her chin. "I know what he's good for. He's good to
eat."

When the giants heard this they laughed so loud that the prince was
frightened almost to death.

"Why," said one, "he wouldn't make a mouthful."

"Oh, leave him to me," said the giantess, "and I'll fatten him up; and
when he is cooked and dressed he will be a nice dainty dish for the
king."

The giants, on this, gave the prince into the hands of the old giantess.
She took him home with her to the kitchen, and fed him on sugar and
spice and all things nice, so that he should be a sweet morsel for the
king of the giants when he returned to the island. The poor prince would
not eat anything at first, but the giantess held him over the fire until
his feet were scorched, and then he said to himself it was better to eat
than to be burnt alive.

Well, day after day passed, and the prince grew sadder and sadder,
thinking that he would soon be cooked and dressed for the king; but sad
as the prince was, he was not half as sad as the Princess Eileen in the
giant's castle, watching and waiting for the prince to return and save
her.

And the dwarfs had wound two balls, and were winding a third.
At last the prince heard from the old giantess that the king of the
giants was to return on the following day, and she said to him:

"As this is the last night you have to live, tell me if you wish for
anything, for if you do your wish will be granted."

"I don't wish for anything," said the prince, whose heart was dead
within him.

"Well, I'll come back again," said the giantess, and she went away.

The prince sat down in a corner, thinking and thinking, until he heard
close to his ear a sound like "purr, purr!" He looked around, and there
before him was the little white cat.

"I ought not to come to you," said the cat; "but, indeed, it is not for
your sake I come. I come for the sake of the Princess Eileen. Of course,
you forgot all about her, and, of course, she is always thinking of you.
It's always the way--

"'Favored lovers may forget,

Slighted lovers never yet.'"

The prince blushed with shame when he heard the name of the princess.

"'Tis you that ought to blush," said the cat; "but listen to me now, and
remember, if you don't obey my directions this time you'll never see me
again, and you'll never set your eyes on the Princess Eileen. When the
old giantess comes back tell her you wish, when the morning comes, to go
down to the sea to look at it for the last time. When you reach the sea
you will know what to do. But I must go now, as I hear the giantess
coming." And the cat jumped out of the window and disappeared.

"Well," said the giantess, when she came in, "is there anything you
wish?"

"Is it true I must die to-morrow?" asked the prince.

"It is."

"Then," said he, "I should like to go down to the sea to look at it for
the last time."

"You may do that," said the giantess, "if you get up early."

"I'll be up with the lark in the light of the morning," said the prince.

"Very well," said the giantess, and, saying "good night," she went away.

The prince thought the night would never pass, but at last it faded
away before the gray light of the dawn, and he sped down to the sea. He
threw out the third ball, and before long he saw the little boat coming
towards him swifter than the wind. He threw himself into it the moment
it touched the shore. Swifter than the wind it bore him out to sea, and
before he had time to look behind him the island of the giantess was
like a faint red speck in the distance. The day passed and the night
fell, and the stars looked down, and the boat sailed on, and just as the
sun rose above the sea it pushed its silver prow on the golden strand of
an island greener than the leaves in summer. The prince jumped out, and
went on and on until he entered a pleasant valley, at the head of which
he saw a palace white as snow.

As he approached the central door it opened for him. On entering the hall
he passed into several rooms without meeting with anyone; but, when he
reached the principal apartment, he found himself in a circular room, in
which were a thousand pillars, and every pillar was of marble, and on
every pillar save one, which stood in the centre of the room, was a
little white cat with black eyes. Ranged round the wall, from one
door-jamb to the other, were three rows of precious jewels. The first
was a row of brooches of gold and silver, with their pins fixed in the
wall and their heads outwards; the second a row of torques of gold and
silver; and the third a row of great swords, with hilts of gold and
silver. And on many tables was food of all kinds, and drinking horns
filled with foaming ale.[11]

While the prince was looking about him the cats kept on jumping from
pillar to pillar; but seeing that none of them jumped on to the pillar
in the centre of the room, he began to wonder why this was so, when, all
of a sudden, and before he could guess how it came about, there right
before him on the center pillar was the little white cat.

"Don't you know me?" said he.

"I do," said the prince.

"Ah, but you don't know who I am. This is the palace of the Little White
Cat, and I am the King of the Cats. But you must be hungry, and the
feast is spread."

Well, when the feast was ended, the King of the Cats called for the
sword that would kill the giant Trencoss, and the hundred cakes for the
hundred watch-dogs.

The cats brought the sword and the cakes and laid them before the king.

"Now," said the king, "take these; you have no time to lose. To-morrow
the dwarfs will wind the last ball, and to-morrow the giant will claim
the princess for his bride. So you should go at once; but before you go
take this from me to your little girl."

And the king gave him a brooch lovelier than any on the palace walls.

The king and the prince, followed by the cats, went down to the strand,
and when the prince stepped into the boat all the cats "mewed" three
times for good luck, and the prince waved his hat three times, and the
little boat sped over the waters all through the night as brightly and
as swiftly as a shooting star. In the first flush of the morning it
touched the strand. The prince jumped out and went on and on, up hill
and down dale, until he came to the giant's castle. When the hounds
saw him they barked furiously, and bounded towards him to tear him to
pieces. The prince flung the cakes to them, and as each hound swallowed
his cake he fell dead. The prince then struck his shield three times
with the sword which he had brought from the palace of the little white
cat.

When the giant heard the sound he cried out:

"Who comes to challenge me on my wedding-day?"

The dwarfs went out to see, and, returning, told him it was a prince who
challenged him to battle.

The giant, foaming with rage, seized his heaviest iron club, and rushed
out to the fight. The fight lasted the whole day, and when the sun went
down the giant said:

"We have had enough of fighting for the day. We can begin at sunrise
to-morrow."

"Not so," said the prince. "Now or never; win or die."

"Then take this," cried the giant, as he aimed a blow with all his force
at the prince's head; but the prince, darting forward like a flash of
lightning, drove his sword into the giant's heart, and, with a groan,
he fell over the bodies of the poisoned hounds.

When the dwarfs saw the giant dead they began to cry and tear their
hair. But the prince told them they had nothing to fear, and he bade
them go and tell the Princess Eileen he wished to speak with her. But
the princess had watched the battle from her window, and when she saw
the giant fall she rushed out to greet the prince, and that very night
he and she and all the dwarfs and harpers set out for the Palace of the
Silver River, which they reached the next morning, and from that day to
this there never has been a gayer wedding than the wedding of the Prince
of the Silver River and the Princess Eileen; and though she had diamonds
and pearls to spare, the only jewel she wore on her wedding-day was the
brooch which the prince had brought her from the Palace of the Little
White Cat in the far-off seas.

PRINCESS FINOLA AND THE DWARF

A long, long time ago there lived in a little hut in the midst of a
bare, brown, lonely moor an old woman and a young girl. The old woman
was withered, sour-tempered, and dumb. The young girl was as sweet and
as fresh as an opening rosebud, and her voice was as musical as the
whisper of a stream in the woods in the hot days of summer. The little
hut, made of branches woven closely together, was shaped like a beehive.
In the center of the hut a fire burned night and day from year's end to
year's end, though it was never touched or tended by human hand. In the
cold days and nights of winter it gave out light and heat that made the
hut cozy and warm, but in the summer nights and days it gave out light
only. With their heads to the wall of the hut and their feet towards the
fire were two sleeping-couches--one of plain woodwork, in which slept
the old woman; the other was Finola's. It was of bog-oak, polished as
a looking-glass, and on it were carved flowers and birds of all kinds,
that gleamed and shone in the light of the fire. This couch was fit for
a princess, and a princess Finola was, though she did not know it
herself.

Outside the hut the bare, brown, lonely moor stretched for miles on
every side, but towards the east it was bounded by a range of mountains
that looked to Finola blue in the daytime, but which put on a hundred
changing colors as the sun went down. Nowhere was a house to be seen,
nor a tree, nor a flower, nor sign of any living thing. From morning
till night, nor hum of bee, nor song of bird, nor voice of man, nor any
sound fell on Finola's ear. When the storm was in the air the great
waves thundered on the shore beyond the mountains, and the wind shouted
in the glens; but when it sped across the moor it lost its voice, and
passed as silently as the dead. At first the silence frightened Finola,
but she got used to it after a time, and often broke it by talking to
herself and singing.

The only other person beside the old woman Finola ever saw was a dumb
dwarf who, mounted on a broken-down horse, came once a month to the hut,
bringing with him a sack of corn for the old woman and Finola. Although
he couldn't speak to her, Finola was always glad to see the dwarf and
his old horse, and she used to give them cake made with her own white
hands. As for the dwarf he would have died for the little princess, he
was so much in love with her, and often and often his heart was heavy
and sad as he thought of her pining away in the lonely moor.

It chanced that he came one day, and she did not, as usual, come out to
greet him. He made signs to the old woman, but she took up a stick and
struck him, and beat his horse and drove him away; but as he was leaving
he caught a glimpse of Finola at the door of the hut, and saw that she
was crying. This sight made him so very miserable that he could think of
nothing else but her sad face that he had always seen so bright, and he
allowed the old horse to go on without minding where he was going.
Suddenly he heard a voice saying: "It is time for you to come."

The dwarf looked, and right before him, at the foot of a green hill, was
a little man not half as big as himself, dressed in a green jacket with
brass buttons, and a red cap and tassel.

"It is time for you to come," he said the second time; "but you are
welcome, anyhow. Get off your horse and come in with me, that I may
touch your lips with the wand of speech, that we may have a talk
together."

The dwarf got off his horse and followed the little man through a hole
in the side of a green hill. The hole was so small that he had to go on
his hands and knees to pass through it, and when he was able to stand
he was only the same height as the little fairyman. After walking three
or four steps they were in a splendid room, as bright as day. Diamonds
sparkled in the roof as stars sparkle in the sky when the night is
without a cloud. The roof rested on golden pillars, and between the
pillars were silver lamps, but their light was dimmed by that of the
diamonds. In the middle of the room was a table, on which were two
golden plates and two silver knives and forks, and a brass bell as big
as a hazelnut, and beside the table were two little chairs covered with
blue silk and satin.

"Take a chair," said the fairy, "and I will ring for the wand of
speech."

The dwarf sat down, and the fairyman rang the little brass bell, and in
came a little weeny dwarf no bigger than your hand.

"Bring me the wand of speech," said the fairy, and the weeny dwarf bowed
three times and walked out backwards, and in a minute he returned,
carrying a little black wand with a red berry at the top of it, and,
giving it to the fairy, he bowed three times and walked out backwards as
he had done before.

The little man waved the rod three times over the dwarf, and struck him
once on the right shoulder and once on the left shoulder, and then
touched his lips with the red berry, and said: "Speak!"

The dwarf spoke, and he was so rejoiced at hearing the sound of his own
voice that he danced about the room.

"Who are you at all, at all?" said he to the fairy.

"Who is yourself?" said the fairy. "But come, before we have any talk
let us have something to eat, for I am sure you are hungry."

Then they sat down to table, and the fairy rang the little brass bell
twice, and the weeny dwarf brought in two boiled snails in their shells,
and when they had eaten the snails he brought in a dormouse, and when
they had eaten the dormouse he brought in two wrens, and when they had
eaten the wrens he brought in two nuts full of wine, and they became
very merry, and the fairyman sang "Cooleen dhas," and the dwarf sang
"The little blackbird of the glen."

"Did you ever hear the 'Foggy Dew'?" said the fairy.

"No," said the dwarf.

"Well, then, I'll give it to you; but we must have some more wine."

And the wine was brought, and he sang the "Foggy Dew," and the dwarf
said it was the sweetest song he had ever heard, and that the fairyman's
voice would coax the birds off the bushes.

"You asked me who I am?" said the fairy.

"I did," said the dwarf.

"And I asked you who is yourself?"

"You did," said the dwarf.

"And who are you, then?"

"Well, to tell the truth, I don't know," said the dwarf, and he blushed
like a rose.

"Well, tell me what you know about yourself."

"I remember nothing at all," said the dwarf, "before the day I found
myself going along with a crowd of all sorts of people to the great fair
of the Liffey. We had to pass by the king's palace on our way, and as we
were passing the king sent for a band of jugglers to come and show their
tricks before him. I followed the jugglers to look on, and when the play
was over the king called me to him, and asked me who I was and where I
came from. I was dumb then, and couldn't answer; but even if I could
speak I could not tell him what he wanted to know, for I remembered
nothing of myself before that day. Then the king asked the jugglers, but
they knew nothing about me, and no one knew anything, and then the king
said he would take me into his service; and the only work I have to do
is to go once a month with a bag of corn to the hut in the lonely moor."

"And there you fell in love with the little princess," said the fairy,
winking at the dwarf.

The poor dwarf blushed twice as much as he had done before.

"You need not blush," said the fairy; "it is a good man's case. And now
tell me, truly, do you love the princess, and what would you give to
free her from the spell of enchantment that is over her?"

"I would give my life," said the dwarf.

"Well, then, listen to me," said the fairy. "The Princess Finola was
banished to the lonely moor by the king, your master. He killed her
father, who was the rightful king, and would have killed Finola, only he
was told by an old sorceress that if he killed her he would die himself
on the same day, and she advised him to banish her to the lonely moor,
and she said she would fling a spell of enchantment over it, and that
until the spell was broken Finola could not leave the moor. And the
sorceress also promised that she would send an old woman to watch over
the princess by night and by day, so that no harm should come to her;
but she told the king that he himself should select a messenger to take
food to the hut, and that he should look out for someone who had never
seen or heard of the princess, and whom he could trust never to tell
anyone anything about her; and that is the reason he selected you."

"Since you know so much," said the dwarf, "can you tell me who I am, and
where I came from?"

"You will know that time enough," said the fairy. "I have given you back
your speech. It will depend solely on yourself whether you will get back
your memory of who and what you were before the day you entered the
king's service. But are you really willing to try and break the spell of
enchantment and free the princess?"

"I am," said the dwarf.

"Whatever it will cost you?"

"Yes, if it cost me my life," said the dwarf; "but tell me, how can the
spell be broken?"

"Oh, it is easy enough to break the spell if you have the weapons," said
the fairy.

"And what are they, and where are they?" said the dwarf.

"The spear of the shining haft and the dark blue blade and the silver
shield," said the fairy. "They are on the farther bank of the Mystic
Lake in the Island of the Western Seas. They are there for the man who
is bold enough to seek them. If you are the man who will bring them back
to the lonely moor you will only have to strike the shield three times
with the haft, and three times with the blade of the spear, and the
silence of the moor will be broken for ever, the spell of enchantment
will be removed, and the princess will be free."

"I will set out at once," said the dwarf, jumping from his chair.
"And whatever it cost you," said the fairy, "will you pay the price?"

"I will," said the dwarf.

"Well, then, mount your horse, give him his head, and he will take you
to the shore opposite the Island of the Mystic Lake. You must cross to
the island on his back, and make your way through the water-steeds that
swim around the island night and day to guard it; but woe betide you if
you attempt to cross without paying the price, for if you do the angry
water-steeds will rend you and your horse to pieces. And when you come
to the Mystic Lake you must wait until the waters are as red as wine,
and then swim your horse across it, and on the farther side you will
find the spear and shield; but woe betide you if you attempt to cross
the lake before you pay the price, for if you do, the black Cormorants
of the Western Seas will pick the flesh from your bones."

"What is the price?" said the dwarf.

"You will know that time enough," said the fairy; "but now go, and good
luck go with you."

The dwarf thanked the fairy, and said good-by. He then threw the reins
on his horse's neck, and started up the hill, that seemed to grow bigger
and bigger as he ascended, and the dwarf soon found that what he took
for a hill was a great mountain. After traveling all the day, toiling up
by steep crags and heathery passes, he reached the top as the sun was
setting in the ocean, and he saw far below him out in the waters the
island of the Mystic Lake.

He began his descent to the shore, but long before he reached it the sun
had set, and darkness, unpierced by a single star, dropped upon the sea.
The old horse, worn out by his long and painful journey, sank beneath
him, and the dwarf was so tired that he rolled off his back and fell
asleep by his side.

He awoke at the breaking of the morning, and saw that he was almost at
the water's edge. He looked out to sea, and saw the island, but nowhere
could he see the water-steeds, and he began to fear he must have taken
a wrong course in the night, and that the island before him was not the
one he was in search of. But even while he was so thinking he heard
fierce and angry snortings, and, coming swiftly from the island to the
shore, he saw the swimming and prancing steeds. Sometimes their heads
and manes only were visible, and sometimes, rearing, they rose half out
of the water, and, striking it with their hoofs, churned it into foam,
and tossed the white spray to the skies. As they approached nearer and
nearer their snortings became more terrible, and their nostrils shot
forth clouds of vapor. The dwarf trembled at the sight and sound, and
his old horse, quivering in every limb, moaned piteously, as if in pain.
On came the steeds, until they almost touched the shore, then rearing,
they seemed about to spring on to it. The frightened dwarf turned his
head to fly, and as he did so he heard the twang of a golden harp, and
right before him who should he see but the little man of the hills,
holding a harp in one hand and striking the strings with the other.

"Are you ready to pay the price?" said he, nodding gayly to the dwarf.

As he asked the question, the listening water-steeds snorted more

furiously than ever.
"Are you ready to pay the price?" said the little man a second time.

A shower of spray, tossed on shore by the angry steeds, drenched the

dwarf to the skin, and sent a cold shiver to his bones, and he was so
terrified that he could not answer.

"For the third and last time, are you ready to pay the price?" asked the
fairy, as he flung the harp behind him and turned to depart.

When the dwarf saw him going he thought of the little princess in the
lonely moor, and his courage came back, and he answered bravely:

"Yes, I am ready."

The water-steeds, hearing his answer, and snorting with rage, struck the
shore with their pounding hoofs.

"Back to your waves!" cried the little harper; and as he ran his fingers
across his lyre, the frightened steeds drew back into the waters.

"What is the price?" asked the dwarf.

"Your right eye," said the fairy; and before the dwarf could say
a word, the fairy scooped out the eye with his finger, and put it
into his pocket.

The dwarf suffered most terrible agony; but he resolved to bear it for
the sake of the little princess. Then the fairy sat down on a rock at
the edge of the sea, and, after striking a few notes, he began to play
the "Strains of Slumber."

The sound crept along the waters, and the steeds, so ferocious a moment
before, became perfectly still. They had no longer any motion of their
own, and they floated on the top of the tide like foam before a breeze.

"Now," said the fairy, as he led the dwarf's horse to the edge of the
tide.

The dwarf urged the horse into the water, and once out of his depth, the
old horse struck out boldly for the island. The sleeping water-steeds
drifted helplessly against him, and in a short time he reached the
island safely, and he neighed joyously as his hoofs touched solid
ground.

The dwarf rode on and on, until he came to a bridle-path, and following
this, it led him up through winding lanes, bordered with golden furze
that filled the air with fragrance, and brought him to the summit of the
green hills that girdled and looked down on the Mystic Lake. Here the
horse stopped of his own accord, and the dwarf's heart beat quickly as
his eye rested on the lake, that, clipped round by the ring of hills,
seemed in the breezeless and sunlit air--

"As still as death.

And as bright as life can be."

After gazing at it for a long time, he dismounted, and lay at his ease
in the pleasant grass. Hour after hour passed, but no change came over
the face of the waters, and when the night fell sleep closed the eyelids
of the dwarf.

The song of the lark awoke him in the early morning, and, starting up,
he looked at the lake, but its waters were as bright as they had been
the day before.

Towards midday he beheld what he thought was a black cloud sailing

across the sky from east to west. It seemed to grow larger as it came
nearer and nearer, and when it was high above the lake he saw it was
a huge bird, the shadow of whose outstretched wings darkened the waters
of the lake; and the dwarf knew it was one of the Cormorants of the
Western Seas. As it descended slowly, he saw that it held in one of its
claws a branch of a tree larger than a full-grown oak, and laden with
clusters of ripe red berries. It alighted at some distance from the
dwarf, and, after resting for a time, it began to eat the berries and to
throw the stones into the lake, and wherever a stone fell a bright red
stain appeared in the water. As he looked more closely at the bird the
dwarf saw that it had all the signs of old age, and he could not help
wondering how it was able to carry such a heavy tree.

Later in the day, two other birds, as large as the first, but younger,
came up from the west and settled down beside him. They also ate the
berries, and throwing the stones into the lake it was soon as red as
wine.

When they had eaten all the berries, the young birds began to pick the
decayed feathers off the old bird and to smooth his plumage. As soon as
they had completed their task, he rose slowly from the hill and sailed
out over the lake, and dropping down on the waters, dived beneath them.
In a moment he came to the surface, and shot up into the air with a
joyous cry, and flew off to the west in all the vigor of renewed youth,
followed by the other birds.

When they had gone so far that they were like specks in the sky, the
dwarf mounted his horse and descended towards the lake.

He was almost at the margin, and in another minute would have plunged
in, when he heard a fierce screaming in the air, and before he had time
to look up, the three birds were hovering over the lake.

The dwarf drew back frightened.

The birds wheeled over his head, and then, swooping down, they flew
close to the water, covering it with their wings, and uttering harsh
cries.

Then, rising to a great height, they folded their wings and dropped
headlong, like three rocks, on the lake, crashing its surface, and
scattering a wine-red shower upon the hills.[12]

Then the dwarf remembered what the fairy told him, that if he attempted
to swim the lake, without paying the price, the three Cormorants of the
Western Seas would pick the flesh off his bones. He knew not what to do,
and was about to turn away, when he heard once more the twang of the
golden harp, and the little fairy of the hills stood before him.

"Faint heart never won fair lady," said the little harper. "Are you
ready to pay the price? The spear and shield are on the opposite bank,
and the Princess Finola is crying this moment in the lonely moor."

At the mention of Finola's name the dwarf's heart grew strong.

"Yes," he said; "I am ready--win or die. What is the price?"

"Your left eye," said the fairy. And as soon as said he scooped out the
eye, and put it in his pocket.

The poor blind dwarf almost fainted with pain.

"It's your last trial," said the fairy, "and now do what I tell you.
Twist your horse's mane round your right hand, and I will lead him to
the water. Plunge in, and fear not. I gave you back your speech. When
you reach the opposite bank you will get back your memory, and you will
know who and what you are."

Then the fairy led the horse to the margin of the lake.

"In with you now, and good luck go with you," said the fairy.

The dwarf urged the horse. He plunged into the lake, and went down
and down until his feet struck the bottom. Then he began to ascend,
and as he came near the surface of the water the dwarf thought he saw
a glimmering light, and when he rose above the water he saw the bright
sun shining and the green hills before him, and he shouted with joy at
finding his sight restored.

But he saw more. Instead of the old horse he had ridden into the lake he
was bestride a noble steed, and as the steed swam to the bank the dwarf
felt a change coming over himself, and an unknown vigor in his limbs.

When the steed touched the shore he galloped up the hillside, and on the
top of the hill was a silver shield, bright as the sun, resting against
a spear standing upright in the ground.

The dwarf jumped off, and, running towards the shield, he saw himself as
in a looking-glass.

He was no longer a dwarf, but a gallant knight. At that moment his

memory came back to him, and he knew he was Conal, one of the Knights
of the Red Branch, and he remembered now that the spell of dumbness
and deformity had been cast upon him by the Witch of the Palace of the
Quicken Trees.

Slinging his shield upon his left arm, he plucked the spear from the
ground and leaped on to his horse. With a light heart he swam back over
the lake, and nowhere could he see the black Cormorants of the Western
Seas, but three white swans floating abreast followed him to the bank.
When he reached the bank he galloped down to the sea, and crossed to the
shore.

Then he flung the reins upon his horse's neck, and swifter than the wind
the gallant horse swept on and on, and it was not long until he was
bounding over the enchanted moor. Wherever his hoofs struck the ground,
grass and flowers sprang up, and great trees with leafy branches rose on
every side.

At last the knight reached the little hut. Three times he struck the
shield with the haft and three times with the blade of his spear. At
the last blow the hut disappeared, and standing before him was the
little princess.

[Illustration: "Standing before him was the little princess"]

The knight took her in his arms and kissed her; then he lifted her on to
the horse, and, leaping up before her, he turned towards the north, to
the palace of the Red Branch Knights, and as they rode on beneath the
leafy trees from every tree the birds sang out, for the spell of silence
over the lonely moor was broken for ever.

NOTES

_Liban the Mermaid_

Liban was the daughter of Ecca, son of Mario, King of Munster. Ecca,
having conquered the lordship of the half of Ulster, settled down with
his people in the plain of the Gray Copse, which is now covered by the
waters of Lough Necca, now Lough Neagh. A magic well had sprung up in
the plain, and not being properly looked after by the woman in charge of
it, its waters burst forth over the plain, drowning Ecca and nearly all
his family. Liban, although swept away like the others, was not drowned.
She lived for a whole year, with her lap-dog, in a chamber beneath the
lake, and God protected her from the water. At the end of that time she
was weary, and when she saw the speckled salmon swimming and playing all
round her, she prayed to be changed into a salmon that she might swim
with the others through the green, salt sea. Her prayer was granted; she
took the shape of a salmon, except her face and breast, which did not
change. And her lap-dog was changed into an otter, and attended her
afterwards whithersoever she went as long as she lived in the sea.

It is nearly eight hundred years ago since the story was transcribed
from some old authority into the "Book of the Dun Cow," the oldest
manuscript of Gaelic literature we possess.--Joyce's "Old Celtic
Romances," p. 97.

* * * * *

II

_The House in the Lake_

In the Irish annals lake dwellings, which were formerly common in

Ireland, are called _crannogs_, from _crann_, a tree, either because of
the timber framework of which the island was formed or of the wooden
huts erected thereon.

Some _crannogs_ appear to have been veritable islands, the only means
of communication with the land being canoes. Remains of these have been
frequently found near the dwelling, in some instances alongside the
landing stage, as if sunk at their moorings.
"Favorite sites for _crannogs_ were marshes, small loughs surrounded
by woods and large sheets of water. As providing good fishing grounds
the entrance to or exit of a stream from a lake was eagerly
selected."--"Lake Dwellings of Ireland," Col. Wood Martin, M.R.I.A.

* * * * *

III

_Brian's Water-dress_

Brian, Ur, and Urcar, the three sons of Turenn, were Dedanaan chiefs.
They slew Kian, the father of Luga of the Long Arms, who was grandson
of Balor of the Evil Eye. Luga imposed an extraordinary eric fine on
the sons of Turenn, part of which was "the cooking-spit of the women of
Fincara." For a quarter of a year Brian and his brothers sailed hither
and thither over the wide ocean, landing on many shores, seeking tidings
of the Island of Fincara. At last they met a very old man, who told them
that the island lay deep down in the waters, having been sunk beneath
the waves by a spell in times long past.

Then Brian put on his water-dress, with his helmet of transparent

crystal on his head, telling his brothers to wait his return. He leaped
over the side of the ship, and sank at once out of sight. He walked about
for a fortnight down in the green salt sea, seeking for the Island of
Fincara, and at last he found it.

His brothers waited for him in the same spot the whole time, and when he
came not they began to fear he would return no more. At last they were
about to leave the place, when they saw the glitter of his crystal
helmet deep down in the water, and immediately after he came to the
surface with the cooking-spit in his hand.--"Old Celtic Romances"
(Joyce), p. 87.

* * * * *

IV

_Prince Cuglas_

In the list of the historic tales mentioned in the Book of Leinster,

and which is given in O'Curry's appendix to his "Lectures on the MSS.
Materials of Ancient Irish History," "The Cave of the Road of Cuglas"
finds place. O'Curry has the following note:--

"Cuglas was the son of Donn Desa, King of Leinster, and master of the
hounds to the monarch Conair� Mor. Having one day followed the chase
from Tara to this road, the chase suddenly disappeared in a cave,
into which he followed, and was _never seen after_. Hence the cave was
called _Uaimh Bealach Conglais_, or the cave of the road of Cuglas
(now Baltinglass, in the County of Wicklow). It is about this cave,
nevertheless, that so many of our pretended Irish antiquarians have
written so much nonsense in connection with some imaginary pagan worship
to which they gravely assure the world, on etymological authority,
the spot was devoted. The authority for the legend of Cuglas is the
_Dinnoean Chus_ on the place _Bealach Conglais_ (Book of Lecain).
The full tale has not come down to us."

* * * * *

_The Herald_

"Here comes a single champion towards us, O _Cuchulain_," said _Laegh_

(Cuchulain's charioteer). "What sort of a champion is he?" said
_Cuchulain_. "A brown-haired, broad-faced, beautiful youth; a splendid
brown cloak on him; a bright bronze spear-like brooch fastening his
cloak. A full and well-fitting shirt to his skin. Two firm shoes between
his two feet and the ground. A hand-staff of white hazel in one hand
of his; a single-edged sword with a sea-horse hilt in his other
hand." "Good, my lad," said _Cuchulain_; "these are the tokens of a
herald."--Description of the herald MacRoath in the story of _The Tain
bo Chuailgn�_.--O'Curry's "Manners and Customs of the Ancient Irish,"
Vol. II., p. 301.

* * * * *

VI

_Golden Bells_

In O'Curry's "Lectures on the Manners and Customs of the Ancient Irish"

are several dazzling descriptions of cavalcades taken from the old
tales. Silver and golden bells are frequently mentioned as part of the
horse furniture.

* * * * *

VII

_The Wild People of the Glen_

"And then he put on his helmet of battle and of combat and of fighting,
from every recess and from every angle of which issued the shout as it
were of an hundred warriors; because it was alike that woman of the
valley (_de bananaig_), and hobgoblins (_bacanaig_), and wild people
of the glen (_geinti glindi_), and demons of the air (_demna acoir_),
shouted in front of it, and in rear of it, and over it, and around it,
wherever he went, at the spurting of blood, and of heroes upon it."

Description of Cuchulain's helmet in the story of _The Tain bo

Chuailgn�_.--O'Curry's "Manners and Customs of the Ancient Irish,"
Vol. II., p. 301.

* * * * *

VIII

_The Fair of Tara_

"The great fairs anciently held in Ireland were not like their modern
representatives, mere markets, but were assemblies of the people to
celebrate funeral games, and other religious rites; during pagan times
to hold parliaments, promulgate laws, listen to the recitation of tales
and poems, engage in or witness contests in feats of arms, horse-racing,
and other popular games. They were analogous in many ways to the
Olympian and other celebrated games of ancient Greece.

"These assemblies were regulated by a strict by-law, a breach of which

was punishable by death. Women were especially protected, a certain
place being set apart for their exclusive use, as a place was set apart
at one side of the lists of medi�val tournaments for the Queen of Beauty
and the other ladies.

"At the opening of the assembly there was always a solemn proclamation
of peace, and the king who held the fair awarded prizes to the most
successful poets, musicians, and professors and masters of every
art."--See Dr. Sullivan's "Introduction to O'Curry's Lectures."

* * * * *

IX

_The Contest of the Bards_

"The three musical feats of the _Daghda_, a celebrated Dedanann chief

and Druid, were the _Suantraighe_, which from its deep murmuring caused
sleep. The _Goltraighe_, which from its meltive plaintiveness caused
weeping, and the _Goltraighe_, which from its merriment caused laughter.

"_Bose_, the great Norse harper, could give on his harp the Gyarslager,
or stroke of the sea gods, which produced mermaids' music."--O'Curry's
Lectures.

* * * * *

_The Fairy Tree of Dooros_

The forest of Dooros was in the district of Hy Fiera of the Moy (now the
barony of Tireragh, in Sligo).

On a certain occasion the Dedanns, returning from a hurling match

with the Feni, passed through the forest, carrying with them for
food during the journey crimson nuts, and arbutus apples, and scarlet
quicken-berries, which they had brought from the Land of Promise. One
of the quicken-berries dropped on the earth, and the Dedanns passed
on not heeding.

From this berry a great quicken-tree sprang up, which had the virtues of
the quicken-trees that grow in fairyland. Its berries had the taste of
honey, and those who ate of them felt a cheerful glow, as if they had
drunk of wine or old mead, and if a man were even a hundred years old he
returned to the age of thirty as soon as he had eaten three of them.

The Dedanns having heard of this tree, and not wishing that anyone
should eat of the berries but themselves, sent a giant of their own
people to guard it, namely, Sharvan the Surly of Lochlann.--"The
Pursuit of Diarmuid and Grania," "Old Celtic Romances," p. 313 (Joyce).

* * * * *

XI

_The Palace of the Little Cat_

The description of the rows of jewels ranged round the wall of the
palace of the Little Cat is taken from "The Voyage of Maildun."--See
Note XII.

* * * * *

XII

_The Birds of the Mystic Lake_

The incident of the birds coming to the mystic lake is taken from
"The Voyage of Maildun," a translation of which is given in Joyce's
"Old Celtic Romances." The operations of the birds were witnessed by
Maildun and his companions, who, in the course of their wanderings, had
arrived at the Isle of the Mystic Lake. One of Maildun's companions,
Diuran, on seeing the wonder, said to the others: "Let us bathe in the
lake, and we shall obtain a renewal of our youth like the birds."

But they said: "Not so, for the bird has left the poison of his old age
and decay in the water."

_Diuran_, however, plunged in, and swam about for some time; after which
he took a little of the water and mixed it in his mouth, and in the end
he swallowed a small quantity. He then came out perfectly sound and
whole, and remained so ever after as long as he lived. But none of the
others ventured in.

The return of the birds in the character of the cormorants of the

western seas and guardians of the lake does not occur in the old tale.
The oldest copy of the voyage is in the "Book of the Dun Cow" (about the
year 1100). O'Curry says the voyage was undertaken about the year 700.
It was made by Maildun in search of pirates who had slain his father.
The story is full of fancy.

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The Project Gutenberg EBook of A Primary Reader, by E. Louise Smythe

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Title: A Primary Reader

Old-time Stories, Fairy Tales and Myths Retold by Children

Author: E. Louise Smythe

Release Date: April, 2005 [EBook #7841]

[Yes, we are more than one year ahead of schedule]
[This file was first posted on May 21, 2003]

Edition: 10

Language: English

*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK A PRIMARY READER ***

Produced by Juliet Sutherland, Tonya Allen and the Online Distributed Proofreading
Team

A PRIMARY READER

Old-time Stories, Fairy Tales and Myths Retold by Children

By

E. LOUISE SMYTHE
PREFACE.

This book originated in a series of little reading lessons prepared

for the first grade pupils in the Santa Rosa public schools. The
object of the lessons was three-fold: to provide reading matter for
the little ones who had only a small vocabulary of sight-words; to
acquaint them early with the heroes who have come down to us in song
and story; and to create a desire for literature.

It has been my endeavor to follow Dr. G. Stanley Hall's suggestions in

his monograph, "How to Teach Reading," where he asks for "true
child-editions, made by testing many children with the work piece-meal
and cutting and adapting the material till it really and closely
fitted the minds and hearts of the children."

Various stories were given to the pupils; discussions followed. After

a time the story was produced orally by the children. Notes were made
on expressions used and points of interest dwelt upon. Later the story
was either written on the blackboard or mimeographed and put into the
pupils' hands to read.

It gave great delight to the children to recognize an old friend in a

new dress, and as interest was aroused, but little difficulty was
encountered in recognizing words that were indeed "new" in their sight
vocabulary, but old servants in their oral vocabulary.

The spirit of the book may be illustrated by referring to the roast

turkey in the story of The Little Match Girl. The story was told as
dear old Hans Christian Andersen gave it to the little German children
of fifty years ago. But American children have a different idea of the
fowl which graces the table at Christmas time. The story as it came
from the lips of the children referred to the "turkey," and "goose"
was used in only one instance. As the story was to appeal to our
children, the word was changed to suit their ideas.

Again, in the story of Red Riding-Hood we preferred to use the German

ending, as it leaves a far happier impression on the minds of the
children than the accepted English version. The incongruity of the
wolf's swallowing whole the grandmother and child does not destroy the
child's enjoyment of the story, while the happy release of both
grandmother and little girl forms a suitable close.

Also, as this old story handed down in so many languages is an

interpretation of one of the Sun myths, it seems better to cling to
the original, especially when it meets so entirely with the child's
approval.

Before presenting the Norse myths for reading, they had been the
subject of many conversations, queries and illustrations. Some were
even dramatized--in a childlike way, of course. Detailed descriptions
of Mt. Ida, Asgard, and some of the principal heroes, were given. But,
though the little audience seemed interested in the introductory
remarks, these never came back when the children were called upon to
reproduce the story. The narrator at once plunged into the story part.
It is for this reason descriptions of heroes and places have been
omitted in these stories. It is thus left for each teacher who uses
this book to employ her own method of introducing the gods of the
hardy Norseman to her pupils.

The following works will be found useful and quite available to most
teachers: Andersen's Norse Mythology, Mabie's Norse Stories, Mara
Pratt's Stories from Norseland, Fiske's Myths and Myth Makers,
Taylor's Primitive Culture, Vol. I.; and Longfellow's Poems.

Hoping these stories will interest other children as they have

interested those who helped build them, I send them forth.

E. LOUISE SMYTHE.

_Santa Rosa, California._

CONTENTS.

THE UGLY DUCKLING

THE LITTLE PINE TREE
THE LITTLE MATCH GIRL
LITTLE RED RIDING-HOOD
THE APPLES OF IDUN
HOW THOR GOT THE HAMMER
THE HAMMER LOST AND FOUND
THE STORY OF THE SHEEP
THE GOOD SHIP ARGO
JASON AND THE HARPIES
THE BRASS BULLS
JASON AND THE DRAGON

[Illustration: THEY DRESSED THOR LIKE FREYJA.]

THE UGLY DUCKLING.

under broke does

keep only turkey
warm ugly water

A duck made her nest under some leaves.

[Illustration: THE DUCK'S NEST.]

She sat on the eggs to keep them warm.

At last the eggs broke, one after the other. Little ducks came out.

Only one egg was left. It was a very large one.

At last it broke, and out came a big, ugly duckling.

"What a big duckling!" said the old duck. "He does not look like
us. Can he be a turkey?--We will see. If he does not like the water,
he is not a duck."

* * * * * * *

mother jumped duckling

splash swim bigger
called began little

The next day the mother duck took her ducklings to the pond.

[Illustration: THE DUCK TAKES HER DUCKLINGS TO SWIM.]

Splash! Splash! The mother duck was in the water. Then she called
the ducklings to come in. They all jumped in and began to swim. The
big, ugly duckling swam, too.

The mother duck said, "He is not a turkey. He is my own little duck.
He will not be so ugly when he is bigger."

* * * * * * *

yard alone while

noise hurt that
eating know want

Then she said to the ducklings, "Come with me. I want you to see the
other ducks. Stay by me and look out for the cat."

They all went into the duck yard. What a noise the ducks made!

While the mother duck was eating a big bug, an old duck bit the ugly
duckling.

"Let him alone," said the mother duck. "He did not hurt you."

[Illustration: "HE DID NOT HURT YOU," SAID THE MOTHER DUCK.]

"I know that," said the duck, "but he is so ugly, I bit him."

* * * * * * *

lovely help there

walked bushes afraid

The next duck they met, said, "You have lovely ducklings. They
are all pretty but one. He is very ugly."

[Illustration: "YOUR CHILDREN ARE ALL PRETTY EXCEPT ONE."]

The mother duck said, "I know he is not pretty. But he is very good."

Then she said to the ducklings, "Now, my dears, have a good time."

But the poor, big, ugly duckling did not have a good time.

The hens all bit him. The big ducks walked on him.
The poor duckling was very sad. He did not want to be so ugly. But
he could not help it.

He ran to hide under some bushes. The little birds in the bushes were
afraid and flew away.

* * * * * * *

because house would

away hard lived

"It is all because I am so ugly," said the duckling. So he ran away.

At night he came to an old house. The house looked as if it would fall

down. It was so old. But the wind blew so hard that the duckling went
into the house.

[Illustration: THE UGLY DUCKLING FINDS THE OLD HOUSE.]

An old woman lived there with her cat and her hen.

The old woman said, "I will keep the duck. I will have some eggs."

* * * * * * *

growl walk
corner animals

The next day, the cat saw the duckling and began to growl.

The hen said, "Can you lay eggs?" The duckling said, "No."

"Then keep still," said the hen. The cat said, "Can you growl?"

[Illustration: THE CAT SAID, "CAN YOU GROWL?"]

"No," said the duckling.

"Then keep still," said the cat.

And the duckling hid in a corner. The next day he went for a walk. He
saw a big pond. He said, "I will have a good swim."

But all of the animals made fun of him. He was so ugly.

* * * * *

summer away cake

winter swans spring
flew bread leaves

The summer went by.

Then the leaves fell and it was very cold. The poor duckling had a
hard time.

It is too sad to tell what he did all winter.

At last it was spring.

The birds sang. The ugly duckling was big now.

One day he flew far away.

[Illustration: "OH, SEE THE LOVELY SWAN!"]

Soon he saw three white swans on the lake.

He said, "I am going to see those birds. I am afraid they will kill
me, for I am so ugly."

He put his head down to the water. What did he see? He saw himself in
the water. But he was not an ugly duck. He was a white swan.

The other swans came to see him.

The children said, "Oh, see the lovely swans. The one that came last
is the best."

And they gave him bread and cake.

It was a happy time for the ugly duckling.

THE LITTLE PINE TREE

pine leaves other

woods needles better
fairy gold sleep

A little pine tree was in the woods.

It had no leaves. It had needles.

The little tree said, "I do not like needles. All the other trees in
the woods have pretty leaves. I want leaves, too. But I will have
better leaves. I want gold leaves."

Night came and the little tree went to sleep. A fairy came by and gave
it gold leaves.

[Illustration: THE FAIRY GIVES THE PINK TREE GOLD LEAVES.]

woke cried glass

little again pretty

When the little tree woke it had leaves of gold.

It said, "Oh, I am so pretty! No other tree has gold leaves."

Night came.

A man came by with a bag. He saw the gold leaves. He took them all and
put them into his bag.
The poor little tree cried, "I do not want gold leaves again. I will
have glass leaves."

* * * * * * *

night sunshine bright

looked wind blew

So the little tree went to sleep. The fairy came by and put the glass
leaves on it.

The little tree woke and saw its glass leaves.

How pretty they looked in the sunshine! 'No other tree was so bright.

Then a wind came up. It blew and blew.

The glass leaves all fell from the tree and were broken.

* * * * *

again green
goat hungry

Again the little tree had no leaves. It was very sad, and said, "I
will not have gold leaves and I will not have glass leaves. I want
green leaves. I want to be like the other trees."

And the little tree went to sleep. When it woke, it was like other
trees. It had green leaves.

A goat came by. He saw the green leaves on the little tree. The
goat was hungry and he ate all the leaves.

[Illustration: THE GOAT EATS THE GREEN LEAVES.]

happy best

Then the little tree said, "I do not want any leaves. I will not
have green leaves, nor glass leaves, nor gold leaves. I like my
needles best."

[Illustration: THE PINE TREE WITH NEEDLES.]

And the little tree went to sleep. The fairy gave it what it wanted.

When it woke, it had its needles again. Then the little pine tree
was happy.

THE LITTLE MATCH GIRL.

almost match across

dark running bare
year slippers fell
It was very cold. The snow fell and it was almost dark.

It was the last day of the year.

A little match girl was running in the street. Her name was Gretchen.
She had no hat on.

Her feet were bare. When she left home, she had on some big slippers
of her mama's. But they were so large that she lost them when she ran
across the street.

* * * * * * *

apron curly lights

bunch about smelled
could matches cooking

Gretchen had a lot of matches in her old apron.

She had a little bunch in her hand.

But she could not sell her matches. No one would buy them.

Poor little Gretchen!

She was cold and hungry.

The snow fell on her curly hair. But she did not think about that.

She saw lights in the houses.

She smelled good things cooking.

She said to herself, "This is the last night of the year."

* * * * * * *

knew window fire

money even pile

Gretchen got colder and colder.

She was afraid to go home. She knew her papa would whip her, if she
did not take some money to him.

It was as cold at home as in the street. They were too poor to have
a fire. They had to put rags in the windows to keep out the wind.

Gretchen did not even have a bed. She had to sleep on a pile of rags.

* * * * * * *

frozen candle sitting

lighted thought stove
near think step

She sat down on a door step.

[Illustration: GRETCHEN ON THE DOOR STEP.]

Her little hands were almost frozen.

She took a match and lighted it to warm her hands. The match looked
like a little candle.

Gretchen thought she was sitting by a big stove. It was so bright.

She put the match near her feet, to warm them. Then the light went
out. She did not think that she was by the stove any more.

* * * * * * *

another dishes roast

table cloth ready
fork knife turkey

Gretchen lighted another match.

Now she thought she could look into a room. In this room was a table.

A white cloth and pretty dishes were on the table. There was a roast
turkey, too. It was cooked and ready to eat. The knife and fork were
in his back. The turkey jumped from the dish and ran to the little
girl.

The light went out and she was in the cold and dark again.

Christmas candles
many until

Gretchen lighted another match. Then she thought she was sitting by
a Christmas tree. Very many candles were on the tree. It was full
of pretty things.

Gretchen put up her little hands. The light went out.

The lights on the Christmas tree went up, up--until she saw they
were the stars.

* * * * * * *

grandma never before

dying going been

Then she saw a star fall.

"Some one is dying," said little Gretchen.

Her grandma had been very good to the little girl. But she was dead.

The grandma had said, "When a star falls some one is going to God."

The little girl lighted another match. It made a big light.

Gretchen thought she saw her grandma. She never looked so pretty
before. She looked so sweet and happy.
 * * * * * * *

take goes

"O grandma," said the little girl, "take me. When the light goes out
you will go away. The stove and the turkey and the Christmas tree all
went away."

Then Gretchen lighted a bunch of matches. She wanted to keep her

grandma with her. The matches made it very light.

The grandma took the little girl in her arms. They went up, up--where
they would never be cold or hungry.

They were with God.

* * * * * * *

found next burned

dead froze death

The next day came.

Some men found a little girl in the street. She was dead.

In her hand were the burned matches.

They said, "Poor little thing, she froze to death."

They did not know how happy she was in heaven.

LITTLE RED RIDING-HOOD.

six take cake

coat butter basket
hood always off

When May was six years old, her grandma made her a red coat with a
hood. She looked so pretty in it that the children all called her
"Red Riding-Hood."

One day her mama said, "I want you to take this cake and some butter
to grandma."

Red Riding-Hood was very glad to go. She always had a good time at
grandma's.

[Illustration: LITTLE RED RIDING-HOOD AND HER MOTHER]

She put the things into her little basket and ran off.

* * * * * * *

wolf mill shall

going first wood
When Red Riding-Hood came to the wood, she met a big wolf.

[Illustration: SHE MEETS THE WOLF.]

"Where are you going?" said the wolf.

Red Riding-Hood said, "I am going to see my grandma. Mama has made
her a cake and some butter."

"Does she live far?" said the wolf.

"Yes," said Red Riding-Hood, "in the white house by the mill."

"I will go too, and we shall see who will get there first," said the
wolf.

* * * * * * *

short flowers soft

stopped tapped pull
pick voice string

The wolf ran off and took a short way, but Red Riding-Hood stopped to
pick some flowers.

When the wolf got to the house, he tapped on the door.

The grandma said, "Who is there?" The wolf made his voice as soft as
he could. He said, "It is little Red Riding-Hood, grandma."

Then the old lady said, "Pull the string and the door will open."

The wolf pulled the string and the door opened.

He ran in and ate the poor old lady.

Then he jumped into her bed and put on her cap.

* * * * * * *

tapped thank dear

arms hug called

When Red Riding-Hood tapped on the door, the wolf called out, "Who is
there?" Red Riding-Hood said, "It is your little Red Riding-Hood,
grandma."

Then the wolf said, "Pull the string and the door will open."

When she went in, she said, "Look, grandma, see the cake and butter
mama has sent you."

"Thank you, dear, put them on the table and come here."

* * * * * * *

better hear eyes

 ears how teeth
ate cruel poor

When Red Riding-Hood went near the bed, she said, "Oh, grandma, how
big your arms are!"

"The better to hug you, my dear."

"How big your ears are, grandma."

"The better to hear you, my dear."

"How big your eyes are, grandma."

"The better to see you, my dear."

"How big your teeth are, grandma!"

"The better to eat you."

Then the cruel wolf jumped up and ate poor little Red Riding-Hood.

* * * * * * *

just hunter scream

killed heard open

Just then a hunter came by. He heard Red Riding-Hood scream. The
hunter ran into the house and killed the old wolf.

[Illustration: THE GRANDMOTHER, THE HUNTER AND LITTLE RED RIDING-

HOOD.]

When he cut the wolf open, out jumped Little Red Riding-Hood and
her grandma.

THE APPLES OF IDUN.

once hills field

journey rocks cattle
walked pieces three

Once upon a time three of the gods went on a journey.

One was Thor and one was Loki. Loki was ugly and mean.

The gods liked to walk over the hills and rocks. They could go very
fast for they were so big.

The gods walked on and on.

At last they got very hungry. Then they came to a field with cattle.

[Illustration: LOKI AND ANOTHER GOD TAKE A WALK.]

Thor killed a big ox and put the pieces into a pot.

* * * * *

meat share talking

cross eagle right

They made a big fire but the meat would not cook. They made the fire
bigger and bigger, but the meat would not cook.

Then the gods were very cross.

Some one said, "Give me my share, and I will make the meat cook."

The gods looked to see who was talking. There in an oak tree was a big
eagle.

[Illustration: THE THREE GODS TRY TO COOK THE OX.]

The gods were so hungry that they said, "Well, we will."

* * * * *

supper stuck enough

minute claws stones
pole against flew

The supper was ready in a minute.

Then the eagle flew down to get his share. He took the four legs
and there was not much left but the ribs.

This made Loki cross for he was very hungry. He took a long pole
to hit the eagle. But the pole stuck to the eagle's claws. The other
end stuck to Loki.

Then the eagle flew away. He did not fly high. He flew just high
enough for Loki to hit against the stones.

* * * * *

please giant flying

tried feathers suit

Loki said, "Please let me go! Oh, please let me go!"

But the eagle said, "No, you tried to kill me. I will not let you go."

And the eagle hit him against the stones.

Loki said again, "Please let me go!"

But the eagle said, "No, I have you now."

Then Loki knew the eagle was a giant and not a bird.

This giant had a suit of eagle's feathers. He was flying in his eagle
suit when he saw Loki.
 * * * * *

city beautiful apples

felt growing young

Now the gods lived in a city named Asgard.

In this city Idun kept the beautiful golden apples. When the gods
felt they were growing old, they ate the apples and were young again.

The giant wanted to be like the gods. So he said to Loki, "I will
let you go, if you will get me the apples of Idun."

[Illustration: IDUN WITH HER APPLES.]

But Loki said, "I can't do that."

* * * * *

bumped gate putting

stayed golden morning

So the eagle bumped him on the stones again.

Then Loki said, "I can't stand this. I will get the apples for you."

Loki and the eagle went to the city. The eagle stayed by the gate, but
Loki went into the city. He went up to Idun. She was putting the
apples into a beautiful golden box.

[Illustration: LOKI AND IDUN]

Loki said, "Good morning, Idun Those are beautiful apples."

And Idun said, "Yes, they are beautiful." "I saw some just like them,
the other day," said Loki.

[Illustration: IDUN WITH HER APPLES.]

strange show
bring picked

Idun knew there were no other apples like these, and she said, "That
is strange. I would like to see them."

Loki said, "Come with me and I will show them to you. It is only a
little way. Bring your apples with you."

As soon as Idun was out of the gates the eagle flew down. He picked
her up in his claws. Then he flew away with her to his home.

* * * * *

after pale falcon

passed story began

Day after day passed and Idun did not come back. The gods did not have
the golden apples to eat, so they began to get old.
At last they said, "Who let the apples go?"

Then Loki looked pale and the gods said, "Loki, you did it." And Loki
said, "Yes, I did."

[Illustration: THE GODS ASK WHERE IDUN IS.]

He did not tell a story that time.

Then Loki said, "I will get Idun and the apples back, if I may have
the falcon suit."

* * * * *

changed faster

The gods said, "You may have it, if you will bring the apples back."

Loki put on the falcon suit and flew away. He looked like a big bird
flying.

When Loki came to the giant's home, he was glad the giant was not
there. He changed Idun into a nut and then flew away with the nut.

[Illustration: THE GIANT SEES THE BIRD FLY AWAY]

When the giant came home, Idun was gone. The golden apples were gone,
too.

Then the giant put on his eagle suit and flew after Loki.

Loki heard the eagle coming. Loki flew faster.

* * * * *

breath over changed

walls blazed burned

Poor Loki was all out of breath. The eagle flew faster and faster.

Then the gods got on the walls to look for Loki. They saw him coming
and the eagle after him.

So they made fires on the walls. At last Loki flew over the walls.

Then the gods lighted the fires. The fires blazed up.

The eagle flew into the fire and was burned.

As soon as Loki put the nut down, it changed to Idun.

The gods ate the beautiful golden apples and were young again.

[Illustration]

HOW THOR GOT THE HAMMER.

 proud porch lying
journeys tricks wife
always alone asleep

Sif was Thor's wife.

Sif had long golden hair. Thor was very proud of Sif's golden hair.

Thor was always going on long journeys. One day he went off and left
Sif alone. She went out on the porch and fell asleep.

Loki came along. He was always playing tricks.

He saw Sif lying asleep. He said, "I am going to cut off her hair."

[Illustration]

So Loki went up on the porch and cut off Sif's golden hair.

* * * * *

where around crying

answer found somebody

When Sif woke up and saw that her hair was gone, she cried and
cried. Then she ran to hide. She did not want Thor to see her.

When Thor came home, he could not find Sif.

"Sif! Sif!" he called, "Where are you?"

But Sif did not answer.

Thor looked all around the house. At last he found her crying.

[Illustration: "OH THOR, ALL MY HAIR, IS GONE!"]

"Oh, Thor, look, all my hair is gone! Somebody has cut it off. It was
a man. He ran away with it."

* * * * *

angry mischief right

getting cutting something

Then Thor was very angry. He said, "I know it was Loki. He is always
getting into mischief. Just wait until I get him!"

And Thor went out to find Loki. Pretty soon he found him.

Thor said, "Did you cut off Sif's hair?" Loki said, "Yes, I did."

"Then you must pay for cutting off my wife's hair," said Thor.

[Illustration: "DID YOU CUT OFF SIF'S HAIR?"]

"All right," said Loki, "I will get you something better than the
hair."

* * * * *

ground thumb beads

dwarfs crooked crown
worked

Loki went down, down into the ground to the home of the dwarfs. It was
very dark down there. The only light came from the dwarfs' fires.

The dwarfs were ugly little black men. They were not any bigger than
your thumb. They had crooked backs and crooked legs. Their eyes looked
like black beads.

[Illustration: LOKI AND THE DWARFS.]

Loki said, "Can you make me a gold crown that will grow like real
hair?"

The dwarfs said, "Yes, we can." So the busy little dwarfs worked all
night.

* * * * *

morning showed laughed

spear wonderful three
ship standing brother
nobody stepped else

When morning came the dwarfs gave Loki his crown of golden hair. They
gave him a spear and a ship, too.

[Illustration: THE DWARFS BRING TO LOKI THE SHIP, THE SPEAR AND THE
CROWN OF HAIR.]

Loki took the things up to Asgard, where the gods all lived.

Then the gods all came up to him. He showed them the things.

The gods said, "They are very wonderful."

And Loki said, "Oh, nobody else can make such things as my little
dwarfs."

A little dwarf, named Brok, was standing near by. He heard Loki say
that. Then he stepped up and said, "My brother can make just as good
things as these."

Loki laughed and said, "If you can get three things as wonderful as
these, I will give you my head."

[Illustration: BROK TELLS LOKI THAT HIS BROTHER CAN MAKE BETTER GIFTS]

* * * * *

anywhere misses
spear mark
Brok went down into the ground where his little dwarfs were working.

Brok's brother was named Sindre. He said to his brother, "Loki says
that you can't make such nice things as his dwarfs can. He said that
he would give me his head if I could get him such wonderful things as
his."

This made the dwarfs angry. Their eyes grew big. They said, "He will
see what we can do."

Sindre wanted to know what the wonderful things were.

Brok said, "Loki has a golden crown that will grow like real hair. A
ship that can go anywhere. A spear that never misses the mark."

"We will show him," said the dwarfs.

* * * * * *

burning blow pigskin

bellows blew blowing

The dwarfs soon had the fires burning. Then Sindre put a pigskin into
the fire.

He gave the bellows to Brok and said, "Now blow as hard as you can."

Then Sindre went out. Brok blew and blew.

A little fly came in and bit him on the hand.

The fly bit him so hard that Brok thought he would have to stop
blowing, but he did not.

Then Sindre came back. He took out a golden pig from the fire.
* * * * *

stand lump ring

He next put a lump of gold into the fire.

He said to Brok, "Blow and blow and blow, and do not stop."

Then Sindre went out again.

So Brok blew as hard as he could.

Then the same fly came in and bit him again.

Brok thought that he could not stand it, but he kept on.

When Sindre came back, he took a gold ring from the fire.

* * * * *

hard forehead brush

iron blood hammer
handle spoiled mean
Then Sindre put a lump of iron into the fire.

He said to Brok, "Now blow as hard as you can."

And Sindre went out. Brok blew and blew. The same mean fly came again,
and bit him on the forehead. It bit so hard that the blood ran into
his eyes.

Brok put up his hand to brush away the fly.

Just then Sindre came back.

He took the hammer out of the fire.

[Illustration: THE DWARFS WITH THE GOLDEN PIG, THE RING AND THE
HAMMER.]

"There!" he said, "You have almost spoiled it. The handle is too
short, but it cannot be helped now."

* * * * *

hurried proud
came pocket

Brok hurried up to Asgard with his things.

All the gods came around to see. Then Loki came up to show his things.

He put the crown of gold on Sif's head and it began to grow like real
hair.

He gave the spear to Odin and said, "This spear will never miss its
mark."

[Illustration: SIF WITH THE GOLDEN CROWN]

Then he took out the ship. He said, "This is a wonderful ship. It will
sail on any sea, and yet you can fold it up and put it into your
pocket."

Loki felt very proud, for he thought his things were the best.

* * * * *

fold sail afraid

sorry each ring
shining faster gave

All the gods felt very sorry for little Brok. They thought Loki's
things were fine. They were afraid Brok's would not be so nice.

[Illustration: BROK SHOWS HIS THINGS TO THE GODS.]

They said, "Now, Brok, show your things."

Brok took out the gold ring. He said, "Each night this ring will
throw off a ring just like it. He gave the ring to Odin."
Then Brok took out the golden pig. He said, "This pig can go anywhere,
on the ground or in the air. It can go faster than any horse. If the
night is dark, the shining pig will make it light."

* * * * *

frost giants
turned blowing

[Illustration: THOR WITH HIS HAMMER]

Then Brok showed the hammer. He said, "This is not a very pretty
hammer. When I was making it, Loki turned himself into a fly and made
me spoil it. The fly bit me so hard that I had to stop blowing. So the
handle is a little short. But it is a wonderful hammer. If you throw
it at anything, it will hit the mark and come back to you."

The gods picked up the hammer and passed it around.

They said, "It will be just the things with which to keep the Frost
Giants out of Asgard."

* * * * *

touch neck
without way

The gods said, "Brok's things are the best."

Brok gave the hammer to Thor. That is the way Thor got his wonderful
hammer.

Then Brok said to Loki, "You said I could have your head if my things
were the best."

And Loki was angry and said, "Yes, I told you that you could have my
head. But you can't touch my neck."

Of course, Brok could not get his head without touching his neck.

So Brok did not get Loki's head.

[Illustration: THE FROST GIANT]

THE HAMMER LOST AND FOUND.

everything planned

The Frost Giants did not like the sunshine. They did not like to see
the flowers. They did not like to hear the birds sing. They wanted to
spoil everything.

The Frost Giants wanted to get into Asgard. But they did not know how.
They were afraid of Thor and his hammer. They said, "If we can only
get the hammer, we can get into Asgard."
They talked and planned all night. At last one Frost Giant said, "I
know how we can get the hammer. I will dress in a bird suit. Then I
will fly up to Thor's house and get the hammer."

[Illustration: THE FROST GIANTS TALKED AND PLANNED ALL NIGHT.]

* * * * *

Freyja

The next night the Frost Giant flew into the house while Thor was
asleep.

He took the hammer and flew away with it.

When Thor woke, he put out his hand to get the hammer. It was gone.

He said, "Loki, the hammer is gone. The Frost Giants have taken it. We
must get it back."

[Illustration: THE FROST GIANT FLEW INTO THE HOUSE WHILE THOR WAS
ASLEEP.]

Loki said, "I can get it back, if Freyja will let me have her falcon
suit."

So he went to Freyja and said, "Will you let me have your falcon suit?
I can get the hammer back if you will." Freyja said, "Yes, of course I
will. If I had a gold suit you could have it. Any thing to get the
hammer back."

* * * * *

people city Thrym

strange buried eight
miles deep falcon

Loki took the falcon suit and put it on. He flew over the city. All
the people saw him flying. They said, "What a strange bird!" They did
not know that it was Loki going for the hammer.

[Illustration: LOKI BORROWS THE FALCON SUIT.]

When Loki came to the city of the Frost Giants, he took off the falcon
suit. He walked and walked until he came to Thrym's house. Thrym was
the giant who took the hammer.

Thrym was sitting on the porch, making gold collars for his dogs.

When he saw Loki, he said, "What do you want?"

Loki said, "I have come for the hammer."

The old giant laughed and said, "You will never get that hammer. It is
buried eight miles deep in the ground.

"But there is one way you can get it. I will give you the hammer if
you get Freyja for my wife."
 * * * * *

clothes shook necklace

So Loki went back to Asgard.

Thor said, "Well, did you get the hammer?"

"No, but we can get it if Freyja will be Thrym's wife."

Then they went to Freyja's house. They said, "Put on your very best
clothes and come with us. You must be Thrym's wife."

Freyja said, "Do you think I will be the Frost Giant's wife? I won't
be his wife."

Thor said, "We can get the hammer back if you will."

But Freyja said, "No, I will not be his wife."

Loki said, "You will have to, if we get the hammer back."

Still Freyja said, "I will not go." And she was very angry. She shook
so hard that she broke her necklace and it fell to the floor.

* * * * *

bride braided wagon

vail servant goat

Then the gods said, "Thor, you must dress like Freyja. You will have
to play you are the bride."

Thor said, "I won't do it. You will all laugh at me. I won't dress up
like a girl."

They said, "Well, that is the only way we can get the hammer back."

Thor said, "I do not like to dress like a girl, but I will do it."
Then they dressed Thor up like Freyja.

They put on Freyja's dress, necklace and vail, and braided his hair.

Loki said, "I will dress up too, and be your servant."

They got into Thor's goat wagon and went to the Giants' home.

[Illustration: THOR AND LOKI APPROACH THE HOUSE OF THE GIANTS]

* * * * *

dinner salmon mead

whole thirsty barrels

When the Frost Giants saw them coming, they said, "Get ready, here
comes the bride! We will sit down to the table as soon as they come."

The dinner was ready on time. The table was full of good things. All
sat down.

The bride ate a whole ox and eight salmon before the others had a
bite.

"She must be very hungry," the Frost Giants said.

"Yes," Loki said, "she was so glad to come. She hasn't eaten anything
for eight days."

Then they brought in the mead.

[Illustration: THOR AND LOKI MET BY THRYM]

The bride drank three barrels of mead.

"How thirsty she is!" said the Frost Giants.

Loki said, "Yes, she is very thirsty. She was so glad to come. She did
not drink anything for eight days."

* * * * *

kiss stepped whirled

lifted shone lap

Old Thrym said, "I had every thing I wanted but Freyja. Now I have
Freyja."

And Thrym went to kiss the bride. He lifted her vail, but her eyes
shone like fire.

[Illustration: THRYM PUTS THE HAMMER IN THOR'S LAP.]

[Illustration: THOR AND HIS HAMMER.]

Thrym stepped back. He said, "What makes Freyja's eyes shine so?"

Loki said, "Oh, she was so glad to come. She did not sleep for eight
nights."

Then Loki said, "It is time for the hammer. Go and get it and put it
in the bride's lap."

As soon as the hammer was in his lap, Thor tore off the vail.

He took the hammer and whirled it around. Fire flew from it. The
fire burned the house and the Frost Giants ran away.

So Thor got his hammer back.

The following stories by Miss Smythe were originally published

under the title of "The Golden Fleece." They have been carefully
revised and illustrated for this book.
THE STORY OF THE SHEEP.

ago horns fleece

king Greece loved
playing Helle grass
garden catch clouds

Long, long ago there lived a king in Greece. He had two little
children, a boy and a girl.

They were good children and loved each other very much.

One day they were playing in the garden.

"Oh, Helle, look!" said the boy.

There on the grass was a fine large sheep. This sheep had a fleece of
gold and his horns were gold, too.

[Illustration: THE KING AND HIS TWO CHILDREN.]

The children wanted to pat the sheep, but they could not catch him.
When they went near, he ran away on the clouds.

* * * * *

grew golden hold

tame ride tight

Every day they played in the garden and every day the sheep came, too.

By and by he grew tame and let the children pat his golden fleece.

One day the boy said, "Helle, let us take a ride."

First he helped his sister on the sheep's back.

Then he got on and held to the horns.

"Hold tight to me, Helle," he said.

* * * * *

sky dizzy sea

sister land dragon
lose nailed Colchis

The sheep went up, up into the sky, and ran a long way on the clouds.
But Helle got dizzy and fell down into the sea.

The boy felt very bad to lose his sister, but went right on.

Then he came to the land Colchis. He killed the sheep and gave the
golden fleece to the king.

[Illustration: THE BOY GIVES THE GOLDEN FLEECE TO THE KING.]

The king was glad to have it and nailed it to an oak tree.

[Illustration: THE SHEEP WENT UP INTO THE SKY AND RAN A LONG WAY ON
THE CLOUDS]

By the tree was a dragon. The dragon never went to sleep. He would not
let any one but the king come to the tree.

So no one could get the golden fleece.

THE GOOD SHIP ARGO.

across untied wade

Jason brave party
rained creek bridge
shoe-strings invited

Jason was a brave young man. He lived a little way from the king's
city.

One day the king gave a big party and invited Jason.

It was a very dark night and it rained hard.

Jason had to go across a creek, but there was no bridge.

[Illustration: JASON COMES TO THE KING'S HOUSE.]

The creek was full of water and Jason had to wade.

One of his shoe-strings came untied and he lost his shoe in the
water.

When he came to the king's house, he had but one shoe.

* * * * *

knew bring fight

wild Argo asked
animals shoe Argonauts

The king did not like this, for a fairy had said, "The man who shall
come to your house with one shoe, will be king."

So he knew Jason was to be king.

Then he said to Jason, "You may be king when you bring me the golden
fleece."

Jason was glad to go, and asked many brave men to go with him.

To get the golden fleece they would have to fight wild men and
animals.
They made a big ship which they named "Argo."

The men who went on the Argo were called Argonauts.

JASON AND THE HARPIES.

wings blind nobody

strong iron hard
skin drive claws
scratched brass Harpies

The ship Argo sailed a long way. There were two strong men on the
ship. They had wings and could fly.

One day the Argo came to a land where the blind king lived.

This poor king had a hard time. When he sat down to the table to eat,
some ugly birds called Harpies, came too. The Harpies had skin like
brass and nobody could hurt them. They had claws of iron, and
scratched people when they tried to drive them away.

When the king's dinner was ready, the Harpies came and took it away.
When Jason and his men came, the king told them all about it. Jason
said they would help him.

* * * * *

food drowned tired

swords hurt flying

They all sat down to the table. When the food was put on the table,
the Harpies came flying in. Jason and his men took their swords.

[Illustration: JASON TRIES TO KILL THE HARPIES.]

They cut at the Harpies but could not hurt them.

Then the two men with wings flew up in the air. The Harpies were
afraid and flew away. The men flew after them.

At last the Harpies grew very tired and fell into the sea and were
drowned.

Then the men with wings came back.

Now the blind king could eat all he wanted.

* * * * *

thanked rocks moved

friends helping good-bye
over apart icebergs

It was now time for Jason and his friends to go away.

The king thanked them over and over again for helping him.

When they said good-bye, he told them how to get to the land where
they would find the golden fleece.

On the sea where Jason and his men had to sail, were two big rocks.
These rocks moved on the waterlike icebergs.

They were as high as a big hill. They would come close to each other,
then they would go far apart.

* * * * *

fishes pieces dove

past break together
row almost rocks

When fishes swam in the water the rocks would come together and kill
the fishes.

If birds flew in the air, the rocks would come together and kill
birds.

If a boat sailed on the water, the rocks would come together and break
the boat into little pieces.

These rocks had been put in the sea, so no one could go to the land
where the golden fleece was.

When the ship Argo came to the rocks, Jason sent a dove out.

The rocks came together when the dove was almost past.

Then they went far apart. Jason made his men row as hard as they
could.

The rocks began to come together. "Row hard, my men," said Jason.

Just as they got past, the rocks hit, but Jason and his men were all
right.

So they came to Colchis.

THE BRASS BULLS.

something plow bulls

stronger chains noses
mouths smoke plant
stone flew stall

When Jason came to Colchis, he went to the king and said, "Will you
give me the golden fleece?"

The king wanted to keep the fleece.

So he said to Jason, "You may have it, but you must do something
for me first."

"You must plow with the brass bulls, and plant the dragon's teeth."

The brass bulls looked like real bulls, but they were larger and
stronger.

They blew out fire and smoke from their noses and mouths.

The bulls had a stall made of iron and stone. They had to be tied
with strong iron chains.

* * * * *

daughter Medea carriage

snakes through pulled

When the dragon's teeth were planted, iron men grew up.

They always killed the one who had planted them.

The king wanted the bulls to kill Jason.

[Illustration: MEDEA GATHERS FLOWERS.]

He said, "If the bulls do not kill him the iron men will."

The king had a daughter named Medea. She saw Jason was a brave
young man and did not want him killed.

She knew how to help him. She stepped into her carriage, which was
pulled by flying snakes.

Then Medea flew through the air. She went to hills and creeks and
picked all kinds of flowers.

She took the flowers home and cooked them.

* * * * *

nothing face rub

juice legs cut

Then Medea went to Jason when the king did not know it.

She said to Jason, "Rub your face and hands and legs with this juice."

[Illustration: MEDEA GIVES JASON THE JUICE.]

When he did this, he was as strong as a giant.

Nothing could hurt him then. Fire could not burn him, and swords
could not cut him.

The next day Jason had to plow with the brass bulls and plant the
dragon's teeth.
 * * * * *

climbed early tied

princess seats hold
untied opened place

Early in the morning, the king and princess went out to the place.

They had good seats where they could see well.

All the people in the city came out to see Jason plow.

The little boys climbed the trees so they could see better.

Then Jason came to the place. The stall where the brass bulls were
tied was not far off.

The door was opened and Jason went in.

He untied the bulls and took hold of their horns.

Then he made the bulls come out of their stall.

* * * * *

pushed kicked until

The bulls were very angry and blew fire and smoke from their mouths.

This made the cruel king glad. But the people who saw it were afraid.
They did not want Jason killed. They did not know that the princess
had helped him.

Jason pushed the bulls' heads down to the ground. Then they kicked at
him with their feet, but could not hurt him.

He held their heads down on the ground until the plow was ready.

* * * * *

handle slowly noon

wheat lie just

Jason took the chains in one hand. He took the handle of the plow in
the other.

The bulls jumped and wanted to run away.

But Jason held so hard they had to go very slowly.

When it was noon the ground was all plowed.

Then Jason let the bulls go.

They were so angry that they ran away to the woods.

Now Jason went to the king and said, "Give me the dragon's teeth."

The king gave him his hat full.

Then Jason planted the dragon's teeth, just as a man plants wheat.

By this time he was very tired, so he went to lie down.

[Illustration: JASON SOWS THE DRAGON'S TEETH.]

evening knees marble

threw growing fight

In the evening he came back.

The iron men were growing up. Some of the men had only their feet in
the ground.

Some of them were in the ground up to their knees.

Some had only their heads out. They all tried to get out so they could
kill Jason.

Then Jason did what Medea told him he should do.

He took a giant's marble and threw it near the men.

All the iron men wanted to get the marble.

So they began to fight each other. As soon as one had his feet out of
the ground, he cut at the man next to him. So they killed each other.

Then Jason took his sword and cut off all the heads that were out of
the ground.

So all the iron men were killed and the king was very angry.

But Medea and the people were glad.

JASON AND THE DRAGON.

yourself fond father

The next day Jason went to the king and said, "Now, give me the
golden fleece."

The king did not give it to him, but said, "Come again."

Then Medea said, "If you want the golden fleece, you must help
yourself. My father will not give it to you. A dragon is by the tree
where the golden fleece is, and he never sleeps. He is always hungry
and eats people if they go near him. I can not kill him but I can make
him sleep. He is very fond of cake. I will make some cake and put in
something to make the dragon sleep."

* * * * *

became climbed angry

So Medea made the cakes and Jason took them and threw them to the
dragon.

The dragon ate them all and went to sleep.

Then Jason climbed over the dragon and took the nail out of the tree.

He put the golden fleece under his coat and ran to the ship Argo.

Medea went with him and became his wife.

[Illustration: THE DRAGON FINDS THE FLEECE IS GONE.]

Oh, how angry the king was! He had lost the golden fleece and the
brass bulls and the dragon's teeth. And now his daughter was gone.

* * * * *

through nine stones

He sent his men in ships to take Jason, but they could not get him.

At last Medea and Jason and the other Argonauts came to Greece.

Jason's father was there. He was a very old man. Jason wanted his
father to be king, so he asked Medea to make the old man young.

Then Medea took her carriage and flew through the air.

She did not come back for nine days. She picked flowers from the
hills. She found all kinds of stones, too.

* * * * *

stick died woke

When she went home she put all these things into a pot and cooked
them.

[Illustration: MEDEA MAKES THE OLD KING YOUNG.]

Then she put a stick into the pot and leaves grew on it.

Some of the juice fell on the ground and grass grew up.

So Medea knew the juice would make things grow.

Jason's father went to sleep and Medea put some of the juice into his
mouth.

His white hair turned black and teeth grew in his mouth.

When he woke up, he looked and felt like a young man.

He lived many years and when he died Jason was king.

End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of A Primary Reader, by E. Louise Smythe

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