“Four ut is, then,” said Mulvaney. “He an’
Dinah Shadd are your friends, but” He stood uneasily.
“But what?” I said.
“Savin’ your presence, sorr, an’ it’s more than onwillin’ I am to be hurtin’ you; you did not ondersthand. On my sowl an’ honour, sorr, you did not ondersthand. Come along, you two.”
But Ortheris stayed for a moment to whisper: “It’s Gawd’s own trewth, but there’s this ‘ere to think. ‘Tain’t the bloomin’ belt that’s wrong, as Peg Barney sez, when he’s up for bein’ dirty on p’rade. ‘Tain’t the bloomin’ belt, sir; it’s the bloomin’ pipeclay.” Ere I could seek an explanation he had joined his companions.
“For a private soldier, a singularly shrewd man,” said Mrs. Hauksbee, and she repeated Ortheris’s words. The last drop filled my cup, and I am ashamed to say that I bade her be quiet in a wholly unjustifiable tone. I was rewarded by what would have been a notable lecture on propriety, had I not said to the Devil: “Change that woman to a d — d doll again! Change ‘em all back as they were — as they are. I’m sick of them.”
“Poor wretch!” said the Devil of Discontent very quietly. “They are changed.”
The reproof died on Mrs. Hauksbee’s lips, and she moved away marionette-fashion, Mrs. Mallowe trailing after her. I hastened after the remainder of the Characters, and they were changed indeed — even as the Devil had said, who kept at my side.
They limped and stuttered and staggered and mouthed and staggered round me, till I could endure no more.
“So I am the master of this idiotic puppet- show, am I?” I said bitterly, watching Mulvaney trying to come to attention by spasms.
“In saecula saeculorum” said the Devil, bowing his head; “and you needn’t kick, my dear fellow, because they will concern no one but yourself by the time you whistle up to the door. Stop reviling me and uncover. Here’s the Master!”
Uncover! I would have dropped on my knees, had not the Devil prevented me, at sight of the portly form of Maitre Francois Rabelais, some time Cure of Meudon. lie wore a smoke-stained apron of the colours of Gargan- tua. I made a sign which was duly returned. “An Entered Apprentice in difficulties with his rough ashlar, Worshipful Sir,” explained the Devil. I was too angry to speak.
Said the Master, rubbing his chin: “Are those things yours?” “Even so, Worshipful Sir,” I muttered, praying inwardly that the Characters would at least keep quiet while the Master was near. He touched one or two thoughtfully, put his hand upon my shoulder and started: “By the Great Bells of Notre Dame, you are in the flesh — the warm flesh! — the flesh I quitted so long — ah, so long! And you fret and behave unseemly because of these shadows! Listen now! I, even I, would give my Three, Panurge, Gargantua and Panta- gruel, for one little hour of the life that is in you. And I am the Master!”
But the words gave me no comfort. I could hear Mrs. Mallowe’s joints cracking — or it might have been merely her stays.
“Worshipful Sir, he will not believe that,” said the Devil. “Who live by shadows lust for shadows. Tell him something more to his need.”
The Master grunted contemptuously: “And he is flesh and blood! Know this, then. The First Law is to make them stand upon their feet, and the Second is to make them stand upon their feet, and the Third is to make them stand upon their feet. But, for all that, Trajan is a fisher of frogs.” He passed on, and I could hear him say to himself: “One hour — one minute — of life in the flesh, and I would sell the Great Perhaps thrice over!”
“Well,” said the Devil, “you’ve made the Master angry, seen about all there is to be seen, except the Furnace of First Edition, and, as the Master is in charge of that, I should avoid it. Now you’d better go. You know what you ought to do?”
“I don’t need all Hell”
“Pardon me. Better men than you have called this Paradise.”
“All Hell, I said, and the Master to tell me what I knew before. What I want to know is how?” “Go and find out,” said the Devil. We turned to the door, and I was aware that my Characters had grouped themselves at the exit. “They are going to give you an ovation. Think o’ that, now!” said the Devil. I shuddered and dropped my eyes, while one-and-fifty voices broke into a wailing song, whereof the words, so far as I recollect, ran:
But we brought forth and reared in hours Of change, alarm, surprise. What shelter to grow ripe is ours — What leisure to grow wise?
I ran the gauntlet, narrowly missed collision with an impetuous soul (I hoped he liked his Characters when he met them), and flung free into the night, where I should have knocked my head against the stars. But the Devil caught me.
******
The brain-fever bird was fluting across the grey, dewy lawn, and the punkah had stopped again. “Go to Jehannum and get another man to pull,” I said drowsily. “Exactly,” said a voice from the inkpot.
Now the proof that this story is absolutely true lies in the fact that there will be no other to follow it.
THE END
REWARDS AND FAIRIES
Published in 1910, this historical fantasy book is a sequel to Puck of Pook’s Hill. The title comes from the poem Farewell, Rewards and Fairies by Richard Corbet, which is referred to by the children in the previous book. Rewards and Fairies is set one year later and consists of a series of short stories set in historical times with a linking contemporary narrative. Dan and Una are two children, living in the Weald of Sussex in the area of Kipling’s own home Bateman’s. They have encountered Puck and he magically conjures up real and fictional individuals from the area’s past to tell the children some aspect of its history and prehistory, though the episodes are not always historically accurate. Another recurring character is Old Hobden who represents the continuity of the inhabitants of the land. His ancestors sometimes appear in the stories and seem very much like him.
CONTENTS
A CHARM
INTRODUCTION
COLD IRON
GLORIANA
THE LOOKING-GLASS
THE WRONG THING
MARKLAKE WITCHES
THE KNIFE AND THE NAKED CHALK
BROTHER SQUARE-TOES
‘A PRIEST IN SPITE OF HIMSELF’
THE CONVERSION OF ST WILFRID
A DOCTOR OF MEDICINE
SIMPLE SIMON
THE TREE OF JUSTICE
A CHARM
Take of English earth as much
As either hand may rightly clutch.
In the taking of it breathe
Prayer for all who lie beneath —
Not the great nor well-bespoke,
But the mere uncounted folk
Of whose life and death is none
Report or lamentation.
Lay that earth upon thy heart,
And thy sickness shall depart!
It shall sweeten and make whole
Fevered breath and festered soul;
It shall mightily restrain
Over-busy hand and brain;
it shall ease thy mortal strife
‘Gainst the immortal woe of life,
Till thyself restored shall prove
By what grace the Heavens do move.
Take of English flowers these —
Spring’s full-faced primroses,
Summer’s wild wide-hearted rose,
Autumn’s wall-flower of the close,
And, thy darkness to illume,
Winter’s bee-thronged ivy-bloom.
Seek and serve them where they bide
From Candlemas to Christmas-tide,
For these simples used aright
Shall restore a failing sight.
These shall cleanse and purify
Webbed and inward-turning eye;
These shall show thee treasure hid,
Thy familiar fields amid,
At thy threshold, on thy hearth,
Or about thy daily path;
And reveal (which is thy need)
Every man a King inde
ed!
INTRODUCTION
Once upon a time, Dan and Una, brother and sister, living in the English country, had the good fortune to meet with Puck, alias Robin Goodfellow, alias Nick o’ Lincoln, alias Lob-lie-by-the-Fire, the last survivor in England of those whom mortals call Fairies. Their proper name, of course, is ‘The People of the Hills’. This Puck, by means of the magic of Oak, Ash, and Thorn, gave the children power
To see what they should see and hear what they should hear,
Though it should have happened three thousand year.
The result was that from time to time, and in different places on the farm and in the fields and in the country about, they saw and talked to some rather interesting people. One of these, for instance, was a Knight of the Norman Conquest, another a young Centurion of a Roman Legion stationed in England, another a builder and decorator of King Henry VII’s time; and so on and so forth; as I have tried to explain in a book called PUCK OF POOK’S HILL.
A year or so later, the children met Puck once more, and though they were then older and wiser, and wore boots regularly instead of going barefooted when they got the chance, Puck was as kind to them as ever, and introduced them to more people of the old days.
He was careful, of course, to take away their memory of their walks and conversations afterwards, but otherwise he did not interfere; and Dan and Una would find the strangest sort of persons in their gardens or woods.
In the stories that follow I am trying to tell something about those people.
COLD IRON
When Dan and Una had arranged to go out before breakfast, they did not remember that it was Midsummer Morning. They only wanted to see the otter which, old Hobden said, had been fishing their brook for weeks; and early morning was the time to surprise him. As they tiptoed out of the house into the wonderful stillness, the church clock struck five. Dan took a few steps across the dew-blobbed lawn, and looked at his black footprints.
‘I think we ought to be kind to our poor boots,’ he said. ‘They’ll get horrid wet.’
It was their first summer in boots, and they hated them, so they took them off, and slung them round their necks, and paddled joyfully over the dripping turf where the shadows lay the wrong way, like evening in the East. The sun was well up and warm, but by the brook the last of the night mist still fumed off the water. They picked up the chain of otter’s footprints on the mud, and followed it from the bank, between the weeds and the drenched mowing, while the birds shouted with surprise. Then the track left the brook and became a smear, as though a log had been dragged along.
They traced it into Three Cows meadow, over the mill-sluice to the Forge, round Hobden’s garden, and then up the slope till it ran out on the short turf and fern of Pook’s Hill, and they heard the cock-pheasants crowing in the woods behind them.
‘No use!’ said Dan, questing like a puzzled hound. ‘The dew’s drying off, and old Hobden says otters’ll travel for miles.’
‘I’m sure we’ve travelled miles.’ Una fanned herself with her hat. ‘How still it is! It’s going to be a regular roaster.’ She looked down the valley, where no chimney yet smoked.
‘Hobden’s up!’ Dan pointed to the open door of the Forge cottage. ‘What d’you suppose he has for breakfast?’ ‘One of them. He says they eat good all times of the year,’ Una jerked her head at some stately pheasants going down to the brook for a drink.
A few steps farther on a fox broke almost under their bare feet, yapped, and trotted off.
‘Ah, Mus’ Reynolds — Mus’ Reynolds’ — Dan was quoting from old Hobden, — ’if I knowed all you knowed, I’d know something.’ [See ‘The Winged Hats’ in PUCK OF POOK’S HILL.]
I say,’ — Una lowered her voice — ’you know that funny feeling of things having happened before. I felt it when you said “Mus’ Reynolds.”‘
‘So did I,’ Dan began. ‘What is it?’
They faced each other, stammering with excitement.
‘Wait a shake! I’ll remember in a minute. Wasn’t it something about a fox — last year? Oh, I nearly had it then!’ Dan cried.
‘Be quiet!’ said Una, prancing excitedly. ‘There was something happened before we met the fox last year. Hills! Broken Hills — the play at the theatre — see what you see — ’
‘I remember now,’ Dan shouted. ‘It’s as plain as the nose on your face — Pook’s Hill — Puck’s Hill — Puck!’
‘I remember, too,’ said Una. ‘And it’s Midsummer Day again!’ The young fern on a knoll rustled, and Puck walked out, chewing a green-topped rush.
‘Good Midsummer Morning to you! Here’s a happy meeting,’ said he. They shook hands all round, and asked questions.
‘You’ve wintered well,’ he said after a while, and looked them up and down. ‘Nothing much wrong with you, seemingly.’
‘They’ve put us into boots,’ said Una. ‘Look at my feet — they’re all pale white, and my toes are squidged together awfully.’
‘Yes — boots make a difference.’ Puck wriggled his brown, square, hairy foot, and cropped a dandelion flower between the big toe and the next.
‘I could do that — last year,’ Dan said dismally, as he tried and failed. ‘And boots simply ruin one’s climbing.’
‘There must be some advantage to them, I suppose,’said Puck, or folk wouldn’t wear them. Shall we come this way?’ They sauntered along side by side till they reached the gate at the far end of the hillside. Here they halted just like cattle, and let the sun warm their backs while they listened to the flies in the wood.
‘Little Lindens is awake,’ said Una, as she hung with her chin on the top rail. ‘See the chimney smoke?’
‘Today’s Thursday, isn’t it?’ Puck turned to look at the old pink farmhouse across the little valley. ‘Mrs Vincey’s baking day. Bread should rise well this weather.’ He yawned, and that set them both yawning.
The bracken about rustled and ticked and shook in every direction. They felt that little crowds were stealing past.
‘Doesn’t that sound like — er — the People of the Hills?’said Una.
‘It’s the birds and wild things drawing up to the woods before people get about,’ said Puck, as though he were Ridley the keeper.
‘Oh, we know that. I only said it sounded like.’
‘As I remember ‘em, the People of the Hills used to make more noise. They’d settle down for the day rather like small birds settling down for the night. But that was in the days when they carried the high hand. Oh, me! The deeds that I’ve had act and part in, you’d scarcely believe!’
‘I like that!’ said Dan. ‘After all you told us last year, too!’
‘Only, the minute you went away, you made us forget everything,’ said Una.
Puck laughed and shook his head. ‘I shall this year, too. I’ve given you seizin of Old England, and I’ve taken away your Doubt and Fear, but your memory and remembrance between whiles I’ll keep where old Billy Trott kept his night-lines — and that’s where he could draw ‘em up and hide ‘em at need. Does that suit?’ He twinkled mischievously.
‘It’s got to suit,’said Una, and laughed. ‘We Can’t magic back at you.’ She folded her arms and leaned against the gate. ‘Suppose, now, you wanted to magic me into something — an otter? Could you?’
‘Not with those boots round your neck.’ ‘I’ll take them off.’ She threw them on the turf. Dan’s followed immediately. ‘Now!’ she said.
‘Less than ever now you’ve trusted me. Where there’s true faith, there’s no call for magic.’ Puck’s slow smile broadened all over his face.
‘But what have boots to do with it?’ said Una, perching on the gate.
‘There’s Cold Iron in them,’ said Puck, and settled beside her. ‘Nails in the soles, I mean. It makes a difference.’
‘How?’ ‘Can’t you feel it does? You wouldn’t like to go back to bare feet again, same as last year, would you? Not really?’
‘No-o. I suppose I shouldn’t — not for a
lways. I’m growing up, you know,’ said Una.
‘But you told us last year, in the Long Slip — at the theatre — that you didn’t mind Cold Iron,’said Dan.
‘I don’t; but folks in housen, as the People of the Hills call them, must be ruled by Cold Iron. Folk in housen are born on the near side of Cold Iron — there’s iron ‘in every man’s house, isn’t there? They handle Cold Iron every day of their lives, and their fortune’s made or spoilt by Cold Iron in some shape or other. That’s how it goes with Flesh and Blood, and one can’t prevent it.’
‘I don’t quite see. How do you mean?’said Dan.
‘It would take me some time to tell you.’
‘Oh, it’s ever so long to breakfast,’ said Dan. ‘We looked in the larder before we came out.’ He unpocketed one big hunk of bread and Una another, which they shared with Puck.
‘That’s Little Lindens’ baking,’ he said, as his white teeth sunk in it. ‘I know Mrs Vincey’s hand.’ He ate with a slow sideways thrust and grind, just like old Hobden, and, like Hobden, hardly dropped a crumb. The sun flashed on Little Lindens’ windows, and the cloudless sky grew stiller and hotter in the valley.
‘AH — Cold Iron,’ he said at last to the impatient children. ‘Folk in housen, as the People of the Hills say, grow careless about Cold Iron. They’ll nail the Horseshoe over the front door, and forget to put it over the back. Then, some time or other, the People of the Hills slip in, find the cradle-babe in the corner, and — ’
‘Oh, I know. Steal it and leave a changeling,’Una cried.
‘No,’ said Puck firmly. ‘All that talk of changelings is people’s excuse for their own neglect. Never believe ‘em. I’d whip ‘em at the cart-tail through three parishes if I had my way.’
‘But they don’t do it now,’ said Una.
‘Whip, or neglect children? Umm! Some folks and some fields never alter. But the People of the Hills didn’t work any changeling tricks. They’d tiptoe in and whisper and weave round the cradle-babe in the chimney-corner — a fag-end of a charm here, or half a spell there — like kettles singing; but when the babe’s mind came to bud out afterwards, it would act differently from other people in its station. That’s no advantage to man or maid. So I wouldn’t allow it with my folks’ babies here. I told Sir Huon so once.’
Complete Works of Rudyard Kipling (Illustrated) Page 451