{"collection":"myth-cosmogony","full_text_available":true,"graph_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/api/page/gutenberg_19691/graph","html_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/page/gutenberg_19691","id":"gutenberg_19691","license":"Public Domain (US)","rights_basis":"gutenberg_metadata_copyright_false","source":"gutenberg","source_url":"https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/19691","summary":null,"tags":["Category: British Literature","Category: Historical Novels","Category: Mythology, Legends & Folklore","\u00c6lfthryth, queen consort of Edgar, 945?-1000"],"text":"Produced by Susan Skinner, Mary Meehan and the Online\nDistributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n[Illustration: DEAD MAN'S PLACK.]\n\n\n\n\nDEAD MAN'S PLACK\n\nAND\n\nAN OLD THORN\n\nBY W. H. HUDSON\n\n1920\nLONDON & TORONTO\nJ. M. DENT & SONS LTD.\nNew York: E. P. DUTTON & CO.\n\n\n\n\nCONTENTS\n\n\nDEAD MAN'S PLACK:\n\nPreamble\n\nChapter\n\nI.\n\nII.\n\nIII.\n\nIV.\n\nV.\n\nVI.\n\nVII.\n\nVIII.\n\nIX.\n\nX.\n\nXI.\n\nXII.\n\n\nAN OLD THORN:\n\nChapter\n\nI.\n\nII.\n\nIII.\n\n\nPOSTSCRIPT\n\n\n\n\nILLUSTRATIONS\n\n\nDEAD MAN'S PLACK\n\nHAWTHORN AND IVY, NEAR THE GREAT RIDGE WOOD\n\n\n\n\nDEAD MAN'S PLACK\n\n\n\n\nPREAMBLE\n\n\n\"The insect tribes of human kind\" is a mode of expression we are\nfamiliar with in the poets, moralists and other superior persons, or\nbeings, who viewing mankind from their own vast elevation see us all\nmore or less of one size and very, very small. No doubt the comparison\ndates back to early, probably Pliocene, times, when some one climbed to\nthe summit of a very tall cliff, and looking down and seeing his fellows\nso diminished in size as to resemble insects, not so gross as beetles\nperhaps but rather like emmets, he laughed in the way they laughed then\nat the enormous difference between his stature and theirs. Hence the\ntime-honoured and serviceable metaphor.\n\nNow with me, in this particular instance, it was all the other way\nabout--from insect to man--seeing that it was when occupied in watching\nthe small comedies and tragedies of the insect world on its stage that I\nstumbled by chance upon a compelling reminder of one of the greatest\ntragedies in England's history--greatest, that is to say, in its\nconsequences. And this is how it happened.\n\nOne summer day, prowling in an extensive oak wood, in Hampshire, known\nas Harewood Forest, I discovered that it counted among its inhabitants\nno fewer than three species of insects of peculiar interest to me, and\nfrom that time I haunted it, going there day after day to spend long\nhours in pursuit of my small quarry. Not to kill and preserve their\ndiminutive corpses in a cabinet, but solely to witness the comedy of\ntheir brilliant little lives. And as I used to take my luncheon in my\npocket I fell into the habit of going to a particular spot, some opening\nin the dense wood with a big tree to lean against and give me shade,\nwhere after refreshing myself with food and drink I could smoke my pipe\nin solitude and peace. Eventually I came to prefer one spot for my\nmidday rest in the central part of the wood, where a stone cross,\nslender, beautifully proportioned and about eighteen feet high, had been\nerected some seventy or eighty years before by the lord of the manor. On\none side of the great stone block on which the cross stood there was an\ninscription which told that it was placed there to mark the spot known\nfrom of old as Dead Man's Plack; that, according to tradition, handed\nfrom father to son, it was just here that King Edgar slew his friend and\nfavourite Earl Athelwold, when hunting in the forest.\n\nI had sat there on many occasions, and had glanced from time to time at\nthe inscription cut on the stone, once actually reading it, without\nhaving my attention drawn away from the insect world I was living in. It\nwas not the tradition of the Saxon king nor the beauty of the cross in\nthat green wilderness which drew me daily to the spot, but its\nsolitariness and the little open space where I could sit in the shade\nand have my rest.\n\nThen something happened. Some friends from town came down to me at the\nhamlet I was staying at, and one of the party, the mother of most of\nthem, was not only older than the rest of us in years, but also in\nknowledge and wisdom; and at the same time she was younger than the\nyoungest of us, since she had the curious mind, the undying interest in\neverything on earth--the secret, in fact, of everlasting youth.\nNaturally, being of this temperament, she wanted to know what I was\ndoing and all about what I had seen, even to the minutest detail--the\nsmallest insect--and in telling her of my days I spoke casually of the\ncross placed at a spot called Dead Man's Plack. This at once reminded\nher of something she had heard about it before, but long ago, in the\nseventies of last century; then presently it all came back to her, and\nit proved to me an interesting story.\n\nIt chanced that in that far back time she was in correspondence on\ncertain scientific and literary subjects with a gentleman who was a\nnative of this part of Hampshire in which we were staying, and that they\ngot into a discussion about Freeman, the historian, during which he told\nher of an incident of his undergraduate days when Freeman was professor\nat Oxford. He attended a lecture by that man on the Mythical and\nRomantic Elements in Early English History, in which he stated for the\nguidance of all who study the past, that they must always bear in mind\nthe inevitable passion for romance in men, especially the uneducated,\nand that when the student comes upon a romantic incident in early\nhistory, even when it accords with the known character of the person it\nrelates to, he must reject it as false. Then, to rub the lesson in, he\ngave an account of the most flagrant of the romantic lies contained in\nthe history of the Saxon kings. This was the story of King Edgar, and\nhow his favourite, Earl Athelwold, deceived him as to the reputed beauty\nof Elfrida, and how Edgar in revenge slew Athelwold with his own hand\nwhen hunting. Then--to show how false it all was!--Edgar, the chronicles\nstate, was at Salisbury and rode in one day to Harewood Forest and there\nslew Athelwold. Now, said Freeman, as Harewood Forest is in Yorkshire,\nEdgar could not have ridden there from Salisbury in one day, nor in two,\nnor in three, which was enough to show that the whole story was a\nfabrication.\n\nThe undergraduate, listening to the lecturer, thought the Professor was\nwrong owing to his ignorance of the fact that the Harewood Forest in\nwhich the deed was done was in Hampshire, within a day's ride from\nSalisbury, and that local tradition points to the very spot in the\nforest where Athelwold was slain. Accordingly he wrote to the Professor\nand gave him these facts. His letter was not answered; and the poor\nyouth felt hurt, as he thought he was doing Professor Freeman a service\nby telling him something he didn't know. _He_ didn't know his Professor\nFreeman.\n\nThis story about Freeman tickled me, because I dislike him, but if any\none were to ask me why I dislike him I should probably have to answer\nlike a woman: Because I do. Or if stretched on the rack until I could\nfind or invent a better reason I should perhaps say it was because he\nwas so infernally cock-sure, so convinced that he and he alone had the\npower of distinguishing between the true and false; also that he was so\narbitrary and arrogant and ready to trample on those who doubted his\ninfallibility.\n\nAll this, I confess, would not be much to say against him, seeing that\nit is nothing but the ordinary professorial or academic mind, and I\nsuppose that the only difference between Freeman and the ruck of the\nprofessors was that he was more impulsive or articulate and had a\ngreater facility in expressing his scorn.\n\nHere I may mention in passing that when this lecture appeared in print\nin his _Historical Essays_ he had evidently been put out a little, and\nalso put on his mettle by that letter from an undergraduate, and had\ngone more deeply into the documents relating to the incident, seeing\nthat he now relied mainly on the discrepancies in half a dozen\nchronicles he was able to point out to prove its falsity. His former\nmain argument now appeared as a \"small matter of detail\"--a \"confusion\nof geography\" in the different versions of the old historians. But one\ntells us, Freeman writes, that Athelwold was killed in the Forest of\nWherwell on his way to York, and then he says: \"Now as Wherwell is in\nHampshire, it could not be on the road to York;\" and further on he says:\n\"Now Harewood Forest in Yorkshire is certainly not the same as Wherwell\nin Hampshire,\" and so on, and on, and on, but always careful not to say\nthat Wherwell Forest and Harewood Forest are two names for one and the\nsame place, although now the name of Wherwell is confined to the village\non the Test, where it is supposed Athelwold had his castle and lived\nwith his wife before he was killed, and where Elfrida in her declining\nyears, when trying to make her peace with God, came and built a Priory\nand took the habit herself and there finished her darkened life.\n\nThis then was how he juggled with words and documents and chronicles\n(his thimble-rigging), making a truth a lie or a lie a truth according\nas it suited a froward and prejudicate mind, to quote the expression of\nan older and simpler-minded historian--Sir Walter Raleigh.\n\nFinally, to wind up the whole controversy, he says you are to take it as\na positive truth that Edgar married Elfrida, and a positive falsehood\nthat Edgar killed Athelwold. Why--seeing there is as good authority and\nreason for believing the one statement as the other? A foolish question!\nWhy?--Because I, Professor or Pope Freeman, say so!\n\nThe main thing here is the effect the Freeman anecdote had on me, which\nwas that when I went back to continue my insect-watching and rested at\nnoon at Dead Man's Plack, the old legend would keep intruding itself on\nmy mind, until, wishing to have done with it, I said and I swore that it\nwas true--that the tradition preserved in the neighbourhood, that on\nthis very spot Athelwold was slain by the king, was better than any\ndocument or history. It was an act which had been witnessed by many\npersons, and the memory of it preserved and handed down from father to\nson for thirty generations; for it must be borne in mind that the\ninhabitants of this district of Andover and the villages on the Test\nhave never in the last thousand years been exterminated or expelled. And\nten centuries is not so long for an event of so startling a character to\npersist in the memory of the people when we consider that such\ntraditions have come down to us even from prehistoric times and have\nproved true. Our archaeologists, for example, after long study of the\nremains, cannot tell us how long ago--centuries or thousands of years--a\nwarrior with golden armour was buried under the great cairn at Mold in\nFlintshire.\n\nAnd now the curious part of all this matter comes in. Having taken my\nside in the controversy and made my pronouncement, I found that I was\nnot yet free of it. It remained with me, but in a new way--not as an old\nstory in old books, but as an event, or series of events, now being\nre-enacted before my very eyes. I actually saw and heard it all, from\nthe very beginning to the dreadful end; and this is what I am now going\nto relate. But whether or not I shall in my relation be in close accord\nwith what history tells us I know not, nor does it matter in the least.\nFor just as the religious mystic is exempt from the study of theology\nand the whole body of religious doctrine, and from all the observances\nnecessary to those who in fear and trembling are seeking their\nsalvation, even so those who have been brought to the _Gate of\nRemembrance_ are independent of written documents, chronicles and\nhistories, and of the weary task of separating the false from the true.\nThey have better sources of information. For I am not so vain as to\nimagine for one moment that without such external aid I am able to make\nshadows breathe, revive the dead, and know what silent mouths once said.\n\n\n\n\nI\n\n\nWhen, sitting at noon in the shade of an oak tree at Dead Man's Plack, I\nbeheld Edgar, I almost ceased to wonder at the miracle that had happened\nin this war-mad, desolated England, where Saxon and Dane, like two\ninfuriated bull-dogs, were everlastingly at grips, striving to tear each\nother's throats out, and deluging the country with blood; how, ceasing\nfrom their strife, they had all at once agreed to live in peace and\nunity side by side under the young king; and this seemingly unnatural\nstate of things endured even to the end of his life, on which account he\nwas called Edgar the Peaceful.\n\nHe was beautiful in person and had infinite charm, and these gifts,\ntogether with his kingly qualities, which have won the admiration of all\nmen of all ages, endeared him to his people. He was but thirteen when he\ncame to be king of united England, and small for his age, but even in\nthese terrible times he was remarkable for his courage, both physical\nand moral. Withal he had a subtle mind; indeed, I think he surpassed all\nour kings of the past thousand years in combining so many excellent\nqualities. His was the wisdom of the serpent combined with the\ngentleness--I will not say of the dove, but rather of the cat, our\nlittle tiger on the hearthrug, the most beautiful of four-footed things,\nso lithe, so soft, of so affectionate a disposition, yet capable when\nsuddenly roused to anger of striking with lightning rapidity and rending\nthe offender's flesh with its cruel, unsheathed claws.\n\nConsider the line he took, even as a boy! He recognised among all those\nwho surrounded him, in his priestly adviser, the one man of so great a\nmind as to be capable of assisting him effectually in ruling so divided,\nwar-loving and revengeful a people, and he allowed him practically\nunlimited power to do as he liked. He went even further by pretending to\nfall in with Dunstan's ambitions of purging the Church of the order of\npriests or half-priests, or canons, who were in possession of most of\nthe religious houses in England, and were priests that married wives and\nowned lands and had great power. Against this monstrous state of things\nEdgar rose up in his simulated wrath and cried out to Archbishop Dunstan\nin a speech he delivered to sweep them away and purify the Church and\ncountry from such a scandal!\n\nBut Edgar himself had a volcanic heart, and to witness it in full\neruption it was only necessary to convey to him the tidings of some\nwoman of a rare loveliness; and have her he would, in spite of all laws\nhuman and divine. Thus when inflamed with passion for a beautiful nun he\ndid not hesitate to smash the gates of a convent to drag her forth and\nforcibly make her his mistress. And this too was a dreadful scandal, but\nno great pother could be made about it, seeing that Edgar was so\npowerful a friend of the Church and of pure religion.\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nNow all the foregoing is contained in the histories, but in what follows\nI have for sole light and guide the vision that came to me at Dead Man's\nPlack, and have only to add to this introductory note that Edgar at the\nearly age of twenty-two was a widower, having already had to wife\nEthelfled the Fair, who was famous for her beauty, and who died shortly\nafter giving birth to a child who lived to figure later in history as\none of England's many Edwards.\n\n\n\n\nII\n\n\nNow although King Edgar had dearly loved his wife, who was also beloved\nby all his people on account of her sweet and gentle disposition as well\nas of her exceeding beauty, it was not in his nature to brood long over\nsuch a loss. He had too keen a zest for life and the many interests and\npleasures it had for him ever to become a melancholy man. It was a\ndelight to him to be king, and to perform all kingly duties and offices.\nAlso he was happy in his friends, especially in his favourite, the Earl\nAthelwold, who was like him in character, a man after his own heart.\nThey were indeed like brothers, and some of those who surrounded the\nking were not too well pleased to witness this close intimacy. Both were\nhandsome men, witty, of a genial disposition, yet under a light careless\nmanner brave and ardent, devoted to the pleasure of the chase and all\nother pleasures, especially to those bestowed by golden Aphrodite, their\nchosen saint, albeit her name did not figure in the Calendar.\n\nHence it was not strange, when certain reports of the wonderful beauty\nof a woman in the West Country were brought to Edgar's ears that his\nheart began to burn within him, and that by and by he opened himself to\nhis friend on the subject. He told Athelwold that he had discovered the\none woman in England fit to be Ethelfled's successor, and that he had\nresolved to make her his queen although he had never seen her, since she\nand her father had never been to court. That, however, would not deter\nhim; there was no other woman in the land whose claims were equal to\nhers, seeing that she was the only daughter and part heiress of one of\nthe greatest men in the kingdom, Ongar, Earldoman of Devon and Somerset,\na man of vast possessions and great power. Yet all that was of less\naccount to him than her fame, her personal worth, since she was reputed\nto be the most beautiful woman in the land. It was for her beauty that\nhe desired her, and being of an exceedingly impatient temper in any case\nin which beauty in a woman was concerned, he desired his friend to\nproceed at once to Earl Ongar in Devon with an offer of marriage to his\ndaughter, Elfrida, from the king.\n\nAthelwold laughed at Edgar in this his most solemn and kingly mood, and\nwith a friend's privilege told him not to be so simple as to buy a pig\nin a poke. The lady, he said, had not been to court, consequently she\nhad not been seen by those best able to judge of her reputed beauty. Her\nfame rested wholly on the report of the people of her own country, who\nwere great as every one knew at blowing their own trumpets. Their red\nand green county was England's paradise; their men the bravest and\nhandsomest and their women the most beautiful in the land. For his part\nhe believed there were as good men and as fair women in Mercia and East\nAnglia as in the West. It would certainly be an awkward business if the\nking found himself bound in honour to wed with a person he did not like.\nAwkward because of her father's fierce pride and power. A better plan\nwould be to send some one he could trust not to make a mistake to find\nout the truth of the report.\n\nEdgar was pleased at his friend's wise caution, and praised him for his\ncandour, which was that of a true friend, and as he was the only man he\ncould thoroughly trust in such a matter he would send him. Accordingly,\nAthelwold, still much amused at Edgar's sudden wish to make an offer of\nmarriage to a woman he had never seen, set out on his journey in great\nstate with many attendants as befitted his person and his mission, which\nwas ostensibly to bear greetings and loving messages from the king to\nsome of his most important subjects in the West Country.\n\nIn this way he travelled through Wilts, Somerset and Devon, and in due\ntime arrived at Earl Ongar's castle on the Exe.\n\n\n\n\nIII\n\n\nAthelwold, who thought highly of himself, had undertaken his mission\nwith a light heart, but now when his progress in the West had brought\nhim to the great earldoman's castle it was borne in on him that he had\nput himself in a very responsible position. He was here to look at this\nwoman with cold, critical eyes, which was easy enough; and having looked\nat and measured and weighed her, he would make a true report to Edgar;\nthat too would be easy for him, since all his power and happiness in\nlife depended on the king's continual favour. But Ongar stood between\nhim and the woman he had come to see and take stock of with that clear\nunbiassed judgment which he could safely rely on. And Ongar was a proud\nand stern old man, jealous of his great position, who had not hesitated\nto say on Edgar's accession to the kingship, knowing well that his words\nwould be reported in due time, that he refused to be one of the crowd\nwho came flocking from all over the land to pay homage to a boy. It thus\ncame about that neither then nor at any subsequent period had there been\nany personal relations between the king and this English subject, who\nwas prouder than all the Welsh kings who had rushed at Edgar's call to\nmake their submission.\n\nBut now when Ongar had been informed that the king's intimate friend and\nconfidant was on his way to him with greetings and loving messages from\nEdgar, he was flattered, and resolved to receive him in a friendly and\nloyal spirit and do him all the honour in his power. For Edgar was no\nlonger a boy: he was king over all this hitherto turbulent realm, East\nand West from sea to sea and from the Land's End to the Tweed, and the\nstrange enduring peace of the times was a proof of his power.\n\nIt thus came to pass that Athelwold's mission was made smooth to him,\nand when they met and conversed, the fierce old Earl was so well pleased\nwith his visitor, that all trace of the sullen hostility he had\ncherished towards the court passed away like the shadow of a cloud. And\nlater, in the banqueting-room, Athelwold came face to face with the\nwoman he had come to look at with cold, critical eyes, like one who\nexamines a horse in the interests of a friend who desires to become its\npurchaser.\n\nDown to that fatal moment the one desire of his heart was to serve his\nfriend faithfully in this delicate business. Now, the first sight of\nher, the first touch of her hand, wrought a change in him, and all\nthought of Edgar and of the purpose of his visit vanished out of his\nmind. Even he, one of the great nobles of his time, the accomplished\ncourtier and life of the court, stood silent like a person spell-bound\nbefore this woman who had been to no court, but had lived always with\nthat sullen old man in comparative seclusion in a remote province. It\nwas not only the beautiful dignity and graciousness with which she\nreceived him, with the exquisite beauty in the lines and colour of her\nface, and her hair which, if unloosed, would have covered her to the\nknees as with a splendid mantle. That hair of a colour comparable only\nto that of the sweet gale when that sweet plant is in its golden withy\nor catkin stage in the month of May, and is clothed with catkins as with\na foliage of a deep shining red gold, that seems not a colour of earth\nbut rather one distilled from the sun itself. Nor was it the colour of\nher eyes, the deep pure blue of the lungwort, that blue loveliness seen\nin no other flower on earth. Rather it was the light from her eyes which\nwas like lightning that pierced and startled him; for that light, that\nexpression, was a living spirit looking through his eyes into the depths\nof his soul, knowing all its strength and weakness, and in the same\ninstant resolving to make it her own and have dominion over it.\n\nIt was only when he had escaped from the power and magic of her\npresence, when alone in his sleeping room, that reflection came to him\nand the recollection of Edgar and of his mission. And there was dismay\nin the thought. For the woman was his, part and parcel of his heart and\nsoul and life; for that was what her lightning glance had said to him,\nand she could not be given to another. No, not to the king! Had any man,\nany friend, ever been placed in so terrible a position? Honour? Loyalty?\nTo whichever side he inclined he could not escape the crime, the base\nbetrayal and abandonment! But loyalty to the king would be the greater\ncrime. Had not Edgar himself broken every law of God and man to gratify\nhis passion for a woman? Not a woman like this! Never would Edgar look\non her until he, Athelwold, had obeyed her and his own heart and made\nher his for ever! And what would come then! He would not consider it--he\nwould perish rather than yield her to another!\n\nThat was how the question came before him, and how it was settled,\nduring the long sleepless hours when his blood was in a fever and his\nbrain on fire; but when day dawned and his blood grew cold and his brain\nwas tired, the image of Edgar betrayed and in a deadly rage became\ninsistent, and he rose desponding and in dread of the meeting to come.\nAnd no sooner did he meet her than she overcame him as on the previous\nday; and so it continued during the whole period of his visit, racked\nwith passion, drawn now to this side, now to that, and when he was most\nresolved to have her then most furiously assaulted by loyalty, by\nfriendship, by honour, and he was like a stag at bay fighting for his\nlife against the hounds. And every time he met her--and the passionate\nwords he dared not speak were like confined fire, burning him up\ninwardly--seeing him pale and troubled she would greet him with a smile\nand look which told him she knew that he was troubled in heart, that a\ngreat conflict was raging in him, also that it was on her account and\nwas perhaps because he had already bound himself to some other woman,\nsome great lady of the land; and now this new passion had come to him.\nAnd her smile and look were like the world-irradiating sun when it\nrises, and the black menacing cloud that brooded over his soul would\nfade and vanish, and he knew that she had again claimed him and that he\nwas hers.\n\nSo it continued till the very moment of parting, and again as on their\nfirst meeting he stood silent and troubled before her; then in faltering\nwords told her that the thought of her would travel and be with him;\nthat in a little while, perhaps in a month or two, he would be rid of a\ngreat matter which had been weighing heavily on his mind, and once free\nhe could return to Devon, if she would consent to his paying her another\nvisit.\n\nShe replied smilingly with gracious words, with no change from that\nexquisite perfect dignity which was always hers; nor tremor in her\nspeech, but only that understanding look from her eyes, which said: Yes,\nyou shall come back to me in good time, when you have smoothed the way,\nto claim me for your own.\n\n\n\n\nIV\n\n\nOn Athelwold's return the king embraced him warmly, and was quick to\nobserve a change in him--the thinner, paler face and appearance\ngenerally of one lately recovered from a grievous illness or who had\nbeen troubled in mind. Athelwold explained that it had been a painful\nvisit to him, due in the first place to the anxiety he experienced of\nbeing placed in so responsible a position, and in the second place the\nmisery it was to him to be the guest for many days of such a person as\nthe earldoman, a man of a rough, harsh aspect and manner, who daily made\nhimself drunk at table, after which he would grow intolerably garrulous\nand boastful. Then, when his host had been carried to bed by his\nservants, his own wakeful, troubled hours would begin. For at first he\nhad been struck by the woman's fine, handsome presence, albeit she was\nnot the peerless beauty she had been reported; but when he had seen her\noften and more closely and had conversed with her he had been\ndisappointed. There was something lacking; she had not the softness, the\ncharm, desirable in a woman; she had something of her parent's\nharshness, and his final judgment was that she was not a suitable person\nfor the king to marry.\n\nEdgar was a little cast down at first, but quickly recovering his genial\nmanner, thanked his friend for having served him so well.\n\nFor several weeks following the king and the king's favourite were\nconstantly together; and during that period Athelwold developed a\npeculiar sweetness and affection towards Edgar, often recalling to him\ntheir happy boyhood's days in East Anglia, when they were like brothers,\nand cemented the close friendship which was to last them for the whole\nof their lives. Finally, when it seemed to his watchful, crafty mind\nthat Edgar had cast the whole subject of his wish to marry Elfrida into\noblivion, and that the time was now ripe for carrying out his own\nscheme, he reopened the subject, and said that although the lady was not\na suitable person to be the king's wife it would be good policy on his,\nAthelwold's, part, to win her on account of her position as only\ndaughter and part heiress of Ongar, who had great power and possessions\nin the West. But he would not move in the matter without Edgar's\nconsent.\n\nEdgar, ever ready to do anything to please his friend, freely gave it,\nand only asked him to give an assurance that the secret object of his\nformer visit to Devon would remain inviolate. Accordingly Athelwold took\na solemn oath that it would never be revealed, and Edgar then slapped\nhim on the back and wished him Godspeed in his wooing.\n\nVery soon after thus smoothing the way, Athelwold returned to Devon, and\nwas once more in the presence of the woman who had so enchanted him,\nwith that same meaning smile on her lips and light in her eyes which had\nbeen her good-bye and her greeting, only now it said to him: You have\nreturned as I knew you would, and I am ready to give myself to you.\n\nFrom every point of view it was a suitable union, seeing that Athelwold\nwould inherit power and great possessions from his father, Earldoman of\nEast Anglia, and before long the marriage took place, and by and by\nAthelwold took his wife to Wessex, to the castle he had built for\nhimself on his estate of Wherwell, on the Test. There they lived\ntogether, and as they had married for love they were happy.\n\nBut as the king's intimate friend and the companion of many of his\nfrequent journeys he could not always bide with her nor be with her for\nany great length of time. For Edgar had a restless spirit and was\nexceedingly vigilant, and liked to keep a watchful eye on the different\nlately hostile nations of Mercia, East Anglia, and Northumbria, so that\nhis journeys were frequent and long to these distant parts of his\nkingdom. And he also had his naval forces to inspect at frequent\nintervals. Thus it came about that he was often absent from her for\nweeks and months at a stretch. And so the time went on, and during these\nlong absences a change would come over Elfrida; the lovely colour, the\nenchanting smile, the light of her eyes--the outward sign of an intense\nbrilliant life--would fade, and with eyes cast down she would pace the\nfloors or the paths or sit brooding in silence by the hour.\n\nOf all this Athelwold knew nothing, since she made no complaint, and\nwhen he returned to her the light and life and brilliance would be hers\nagain, and there was no cloud or shadow on his delight. But the cloud\nwould come back over her when he again went away. Her only relief in her\ncondition was to sit before a fire or when out of doors to seat herself\non the bank of the stream and watch the current. For although it was\nstill summer, the month being August, she would have a fire of logs\nlighted in a large chamber and sit staring at the flames by the hour,\nand sometimes holding her outstretched hands before the flames until\nthey were hot, she would then press them to her lips. Or when the day\nwas warm and bright she would be out of doors and spend hours by the\nriver gazing at the swift crystal current below as if fascinated by the\nsight of the running water. It is a marvellously clear water, so that\nlooking down on it you can see the rounded pebbles in all their various\ncolours and markings lying at the bottom, and if there should be a trout\nlying there facing the current and slowly waving his tail from side to\nside, you could count the red spots on his side, so clear is the water.\nEven more did the floating water-grass hold her gaze--that bright green\ngrass that, rooted in the bed of the stream, sends its thin blades to\nthe surface where they float and wave like green floating hair.\nStooping, she would dip a hand in the stream and watch the bright clear\nwater running through the fingers of her white hand, then press the hand\nto her lips.\n\nThen again when day declined she would quit the stream to sit before the\nblazing logs, staring at the flames. What am I doing here? she would\nmurmur. And what is this my life? When I was at home in Devon I had a\ndream of Winchester, of Salisbury, or other great towns further away,\nwhere the men and women who are great in the land meet together, and\nwhere my eyes would perchance sometimes have the happiness to behold the\nking himself--my husband's close friend and companion. My waking has\nbrought a different scene before me; this castle in the wilderness, a\nsolitude where from an upper window I look upon leagues of forest, a\nhaunt of wild animals. I see great birds soaring in the sky and listen\nto the shrill screams of kite and buzzard; and sometimes when lying\nawake on a still night the distant long howl of a wolf. Also, it is\nsaid, there are great stags, and roe-deer, and wild boars, and it is\nAthelwold's joy to hunt them and slay them with his spear. A joy too\nwhen he returns from the hunt or from a long absence to play with his\nbeautiful wife--his caged bird of pretty feathers and a sweet song to\nsoothe him when he is tired. But of his life at court he tells me\nlittle, and of even that little I doubt the truth. Then he leaves me and\nI am alone with his retainers--the crowd of serving men and women and\nthe armed men to safeguard me. I am alone with my two friends which I\nhave found, one out of doors, the other in--the river which runs at the\nbottom of the ground where I take my walks, and the fire I sit before.\nThe two friends, companions, and lovers to whom all the secrets of my\nsoul are confided. I love them, having no other in the world to love,\nand here I hold my hands before the flames until it is hot and then kiss\nthe heat, and by the stream I kiss my wetted hands. And if I were to\nremain here until this life became unendurable I should consider as to\nwhich one of these two lovers I should give myself. This one I think is\ntoo ardent in his love--it would be terrible to be wrapped round in his\nfiery arms and feel his fiery mouth on mine. I should rather go to the\nother one to lie down on his pebbly bed, and give myself to him to hold\nme in his cool, shining arms and mix his green hair with my loosened\nhair. But my wish is to live and not die. Let me then wait a little\nlonger; let me watch and listen, and perhaps some day, by and by, from\nhis own lips, I shall capture the secret of this my caged solitary life.\n\nAnd the very next day Athelwold, having just returned with the king to\nSalisbury, was once more with her; and the brooding cloud had vanished\nfrom her life and countenance; she was once more his passionate bride,\nlavishing caresses on him, listening with childish delight to every word\nthat fell from his lips, and desiring no other life and no greater\nhappiness than this.\n\n\n\n\nV\n\n\nIt was early September, and the king with some of the nobles who were\nwith him, after hunting the deer over against Cranbourne, returned at\nevening to Salisbury, and after meat with some of his intimates they sat\nlate drinking wine and fell into a merry, boisterous mood. They spoke of\nAthelwold, who was not with them, and indulged in some mocking remarks\nabout his frequent and prolonged absences from the king's company. Edgar\ntook it in good part and smilingly replied that it had been reported to\nhim that the earl was now wedded to a woman with a will. Also he knew\nthat her father, the great Earldoman of Devon, had been famed for his\ntremendous physical strength. It was related of him that he had once\nbeen charged by a furious bull, that he had calmly waited the onset and\nhad dealt the animal a staggering blow with his fist on its head and had\nthen taken it up in his arms and hurled it into the river Exe. If, he\nconcluded, the daughter had inherited something of this power it was not\nto be wondered at that she was able to detain her husband at home.\n\nLoud laughter followed this pleasantry of the king's, then one of the\ncompany remarked that not a woman's will, though it might be like steel\nof the finest temper, nor her muscular power, would serve to change\nAthelwold's nature or keep him from his friend, but only a woman's\nexceeding beauty.\n\nThen Edgar, seeing that he had been put upon the defence of his absent\nfriend, and that all of them were eager to hear his next word, replied\nthat there was no possession a man was prouder of than that of a\nbeautiful wife; that it was more to him than his own best qualities, his\ngreatest actions, or than titles and lands and gold. If Athelwold had\nindeed been so happy as to secure the most beautiful woman he would have\nbeen glad to bring her to court to exhibit her to all--friends and foes\nalike--for his own satisfaction and glory.\n\nAgain they greeted his speech with laughter, and one cried out: Do you\nbelieve it?\n\nThen another, bolder still, exclaimed: It's God's truth that she is the\nfairest woman in the land--perhaps no fairer has been in any land since\nHelen of Troy. This I can swear to, he added, smiting the board with his\nhand, because I have it from one who saw her at her home in Devon before\nher marriage. One who is a better judge in such matters than I am or\nthan any one at this table, not excepting the king, seeing that he is\nnot only gifted with the serpent's wisdom but with that creature's cold\nblood as well.\n\nEdgar heard him frowningly, then ended the discussion by rising, and\nsilence fell on the company, for all saw that he was offended. But he\nwas not offended with them, since they knew nothing of his and\nAthelwold's secret, and what they thought and felt about his friend was\nnothing to him. But these fatal words about Elfrida's beauty had pierced\nhim with a sudden suspicion of his friend's treachery. And Athelwold was\nthe man he greatly loved--the companion of all his years since their\nboyhood together. Had he betrayed him in this monstrous way--wounding\nhim in his tenderest part? The very thought that such a thing might be\nwas like a madness in him. Then he reflected--then he remembered, and\nsaid to himself: Yes, let me follow his teaching in this matter too, as\nin the other, and exercise caution and look before I leap. I shall look\nand look well and see and judge for myself.\n\nThe result was that when his boon companions next met him there was no\nshadow of displeasure in him; he was in a peculiarly genial mood, and so\ncontinued. And when his friend returned he embraced him and gently\nupbraided him for having kept away for so long a time. He begged him to\nremember that he was his one friend and confidant who was more than a\nbrother to him, and that if wholly deprived of his company he would\nregard himself as the loneliest man in the kingdom. Then in a short time\nhe spoke once more in the same strain, and said he had not yet\nsufficiently honoured his friend before the world, and that he proposed\nvisiting him at his own castle to make the acquaintance of his wife and\nspend a day with him hunting the boar in Harewood Forest.\n\nAthelwold, secretly alarmed, made a suitable reply, expressing his\ndelight at the prospect of receiving the king, and begging him to give\nhim a couple of days' notice before making his visit, so as to give him\ntime to make all preparation for his entertainment.\n\nThis the king promised, and also said that this would be an informal\nvisit to a friend, that he would go alone with some of his servants and\nhuntsmen and ride there one day, hunt the next day and return to\nSalisbury on the third day. And a little later, when the day of his\nvisit was fixed on, Athelwold returned in haste with an anxious mind to\nhis castle.\n\nNow his hard task and the most painful moment of his life had come.\nAlone with Elfrida in her chamber he cast himself down before her, and\nwith his bowed head resting on her knees, made a clean breast of the\nwhole damning story of the deceit he had practised towards the king in\norder to win her for himself. In anguish and shedding tears he implored\nher forgiveness, begging her to think of that irresistible power of love\nshe had inspired in him, which would have made it worse than death to\nsee her the wife of another--even of Edgar himself--his friend, the\nbrother of his soul. Then he went on to speak of Edgar, who was of a\nsweet and lovable nature, yet capable of a deadly fury against those who\noffended him; and this was an offence he would take more to heart than\nany other; he would be implacable if he once thought that he had been\nwilfully deceived, and she only could now save them from certain\ndestruction. For now it seemed to him that Edgar had conceived a\nsuspicion that the account he had of her was not wholly true, which was\nthat she was a handsome woman but not surpassingly beautiful as had been\nreputed, not graceful, not charming in manner and conversation. She\ncould save them by justifying his description of her--by using a woman's\nart to lessen instead of enhancing her natural beauty, by putting away\nher natural charm and power to fascinate all who approached her.\n\nThus he pleaded, praying for mercy, even as a captive prays to his\nconqueror for life, and never once daring to lift his bowed head to look\nat her face; while she sat motionless and silent, not a word, not a\nsigh, escaping her; and she was like a woman carved in stone, with knees\nof stone on which his head rested.\n\nThen, at length, exhausted with his passionate pleading and frightened\nat her silence and deadly stillness, he raised his head and looked up at\nher face to behold it radiant and smiling. Then, looking down lovingly\ninto his eyes, she raised her hands to her head, and loosening the great\nmass of coiled tresses let them fall over him, covering his head and\nshoulders and back as with a splendid mantle of shining red gold. And\nhe, the awful fear now gone, continued silently gazing up at her,\nabsorbed in her wonderful loveliness.\n\nBending down she put her arms round his neck and spoke: Do you not know,\nO Athelwold, that I love you alone and could love no other, noble or\nking; that without you life would not be life to me? All you have told\nme endears you more to me, and all you wish me to do shall be done,\nthough it may cause your king and friend to think meanly of you for\nhaving given your hand to one so little worthy of you.\n\nShe having thus spoken, he was ready to pour forth his gratitude in\nburning words, but she would not have it. No more words, she said,\nputting her hand on his mouth. Your anxious day is over--your burden\ndropped. Rest here on the couch by my side, and let me think on all\nthere is to plan and do against to-morrow evening.\n\nAnd so they were silent, and he, reclining on the cushions, watched her\nface and saw her smile and wondered what was passing in her mind to\ncause that smile. Doubtless it was something to do with the question of\nher disguising arts.\n\nWhat had caused her to smile was a happy memory of the days with\nAthelwold before their marriage, when one day he came in to her with a\nleather bag in his hand and said: Do you, who are so beautiful yourself,\nlove all beautiful things? And do you love the beauty of gems? And when\nshe replied that she loved gems above all beautiful things, he poured\nout the contents of his bag in her lap--brilliants, sapphires, rubies,\nemeralds, opals, pearls in gold setting, in bracelets, necklets,\npendants, rings and brooches. And when she gloated over this splendid\ngift, taking up gem after gem, exclaiming delightedly at its size and\ncolour and lustre, he told her that he once knew a man who maintained\nthat it was a mistake for a beautiful woman to wear gems. Why? she\nasked, would he have then wholly unadorned? No, he replied, he liked to\nsee them wearing gold, saying that gold makes the most perfect setting\nfor a woman's beauty, just as it does for a precious stone, and its\neffect is to enhance the beauty it surrounds. But the woman's beauty has\nits meeting and central point in the eyes, and the light and soul in\nthem illumines the whole face. And in the stone nature simulates the\neye, and although without a soul its brilliant light and colour make it\nthe equal of the eye, and therefore when worn as an ornament it competes\nwith the eye, and in effect lessens the beauty it is supposed to\nenhance. He said that gems should be worn only by women who are not\nbeautiful, who must rely on something extraneous to attract attention,\nsince it would be better to a homely woman that men should look at her\nto admire a diamond or sapphire than not to look at her at all. She had\nlaughed and asked him who the man was who had such strange ideas, and he\nhad replied that he had forgotten his name.\n\nNow, recalling this incident after so long a time, it all at once\nflashed into her mind that Edgar was the man he had spoken of; she knew\nnow because, always secretly watchful, she had noted that he never spoke\nof Edgar or heard Edgar spoken of without a slight subtle change in the\nexpression of his face, also, if he spoke, in the tone of his voice. It\nwas the change that comes into the face, and into the tone, when one\nremembers or speaks of the person most loved in all the world. And she\nremembered now that he had that changed expression and tone of voice,\nwhen he had spoken of the man whose name he pretended to have forgotten.\n\nAnd while she sat thinking of this it grew dark in the room, the light\nof the fire having died down. Then presently, in the profound stillness\nof the room, she heard the sound of his deep, regular breathing and knew\nthat he slept, and that it was a sweet sleep after his anxious day.\nGoing softly to the hearth she moved the yet still glowing logs, until\nthey sent up a sudden flame and the light fell upon the sleeper's still\nface. Turning, she gazed steadily at it--the face of the man who had won\nher; but her own face in the firelight was white and still and wore a\nstrange expression. Now she moved noiselessly to his side and bent down\nas if to whisper in his ear, but suddenly drew back again and moved\ntowards the door, then turning gazed once more at his face and murmured:\nNo, no, even a word faintly whispered would bring him a dream, and it is\nbetter his sleep should be dreamless. For now he has had his day and it\nis finished, and to-morrow is mine.\n\n\n\n\nVI\n\n\nOn the following day Athelwold was occupied with preparations for the\nking's reception and for the next day's boar-hunt in the forest. At the\nsame time he was still somewhat anxious as to his wife's more difficult\npart, and from time to time he came to see and consult with her. He then\nobserved a singular change in her, both in her appearance and conduct.\nNo longer the radiant, loving Elfrida, her beauty now had been dimmed\nand she was unsmiling and her manner towards him repellant. She had\nnothing to say to him except that she wished him to leave her alone.\nAccordingly he withdrew, feeling a little hurt, and at the same time\nadmiring her extraordinary skill in disguising her natural loveliness\nand charm, but almost fearing that she was making too great a change in\nher appearance.\n\nThus passed the day, and in the late afternoon Edgar duly arrived, and\nwhen he had rested a little, was conducted to the banqueting-room, where\nthe meeting with Elfrida would take place.\n\nThen Elfrida came, and Athelwold hastened to the entrance to take her\nhand and conduct her to the king; then, seeing her, he stood still and\nstared in silent astonishment and dismay at the change he saw in her,\nfor never before had he beheld her so beautiful, so queenly and\nmagnificent. What did it mean--did she wish to destroy him? Seeing the\nstate he was in she placed her hand in his, and murmured softly: I know\nbest. And so, holding her hand, he conducted her to the king, who stood\nwaiting to receive her. For all she had done that day to please and to\ndeceive him had now been undone, and everything that had been possible\nhad been done to enhance her loveliness. She had arrayed herself in a\nviolet-coloured silk gown with a network of gold thread over the body\nand wide sleeves to the elbows, and rope of gold round her waist with\nits long ends falling to her knee. The great mass of her coiled hair was\nsurmounted with a golden comb, and golden pendants dropped from her ears\nto her shoulders. Also she wore gold armlets coiled serpent-wise round\nher white arms from elbow to wrist. Not a gem--nothing but pale yellow\ngold.\n\nEdgar himself was amazed at her loveliness, for never had he seen\nanything comparable to it; and when he gazed into her eyes she did not\nlower hers, but returned gaze for gaze, and there was that in her eyes\nand their strange eloquence which kindled a sudden flame of passion in\nhis heart, and for a moment it appeared in his countenance. Then,\nquickly recovering himself, he greeted her graciously but with his usual\nkingly dignity of manner, and for the rest of the time he conversed with\nher and Athelwold in such a pleasant and friendly way that his host\nbegan to recover somewhat from his apprehensions. But in his heart Edgar\nwas saying: And this is the woman that Athelwold, the close friend of\nall my days, from boyhood until now, the one man in the world I loved\nand trusted, has robbed me of!\n\nAnd Athelwold at the same time was revolving in his mind the mystery of\nElfrida's action. What did she mean when she whispered to him that she\nknew best? And why, when she wished to appear in that magnificent way\nbefore the king, had she worn nothing but gold ornaments--not one of the\nsplendid gems of which she possessed such a store?\n\nShe had remembered something which he had forgotten.\n\nNow when the two friends were left alone together drinking wine,\nAthelwold was still troubled in his mind, although his suspicion and\nfear were not so acute as at first, and the longer they sat\ntalking--until the small hours--the more relieved did he feel from\nEdgar's manner towards him. Edgar in his cups opened his heart and was\nmore loving and free in his speech than ever before. He loved Athelwold\nas he loved no one else in the world, and to see him great and happy was\nhis first desire; and he congratulated him from his heart on having\nfound a wife who was worthy of him and would eventually bring him,\nthrough her father, such great possessions as would make him the chief\nnobleman in the land. All happiness and glory to them both; and when a\nchild was born to them he would be its godfather, and if happily by that\ntime there was a queen, she should be its godmother.\n\nThen he recalled their happy boyhood's days in East Anglia, that joyful\ntime when they first hunted and had many a mishap and fell from their\nhorses when they pursued hare and deer and bustard in the wide open\nstretches of sandy country; and in the autumn and winter months when\nthey were wild-fowling in the great level flooded lands where the geese\nand all wild-fowl came in clouds and myriads. And now he laughed and now\nhis eyes grew moist at the recollection of the irrecoverable glad days.\n\nLittle time was left for sleep; yet they were ready early next morning\nfor the day's great boar-hunt in the forest, and only when the king was\nabout to mount his horse did Elfrida make her appearance. She came out\nto him from the door, not richly dressed now, but in a simple white\nlinen robe and not an ornament on her except that splendid crown of the\nred-gold hair on her head. And her face too was almost colourless now,\nand grave and still. She brought wine in a golden cup and gave it to the\nking, and he once more fixed his eyes on her and for some moments they\ncontinued silently gazing, each in that fixed gaze seeming to devour the\nsecrets of the other's soul. Then she wished him a happy hunting, and he\nsaid in reply he hoped it would be the happiest hunting he had ever had.\nThen, after drinking the wine, he mounted his horse and rode away. And\nshe remained standing very still, the cup in her hand, gazing after him\nas he rode side by side with Athelwold, until in the distance the trees\nhid him from her sight.\n\nNow when they had ridden a distance of three miles or more into the\nheart of the forest, they came to a broad drive-like stretch of green\nturf, and the king cried: This is just what I have been wishing for!\nCome, let us give our horses a good gallop. And when they loosened the\nreins, the horses, glad to have a race on such a ground, instantly\nsprang forward; but Edgar, keeping a tight rein, was presently left\ntwenty or thirty yards behind; then, setting spurs to his horse, he\ndashed forward, and on coming abreast of his companion, drew his knife\nand struck him in the back, dealing the blow with such a concentrated\nfury that the knife was buried almost to the hilt. Then violently\nwrenching it out, he would have struck again had not the earl, with a\nscream of agony, tumbled from his seat. The horse, freed from its rider,\nrushed on in a sudden panic, and the king's horse side by side with it.\nEdgar, throwing himself back and exerting his whole strength, succeeded\nin bringing him to a stop at a distance of fifty or sixty yards, then\nturning, came riding back at a furious speed.\n\nNow when Athelwold fell, all those who were riding behind, the earl's\nand the king's men to the number of thirty or forty, dashed forward, and\nsome of them, hurriedly dismounting, gathered about him as he lay\ngroaning and writhing and pouring out his blood on the ground. But at\nthe king's approach they drew quickly back to make way for him, and he\ncame straight on and caused his horse to trample on the fallen man. Then\npointing to him with the knife he still had in his hand, he cried: That\nis how I serve a false friend and traitor! Then, wiping the stained\nknife-blade on his horse's neck and sheathing it, he shouted: Back to\nSalisbury! and setting spurs to his horse, galloped off towards the\nAndover road.\n\nHis men immediately mounted and followed, leaving the earl's men with\ntheir master. Lifting him up, they placed him on a horse, and with a\nmounted man on each side to hold him up, they moved back at a walking\npace towards Wherwell.\n\nMessengers were sent ahead to inform Elfrida of what had happened, and\nthen, an hour later, yet another messenger to tell that Athelwold, when\nhalf-way home, had breathed his last. Then at last the corpse was\nbrought to the castle and she met it with tears and lamentations. But\nafterwards in her own chamber, when she had dismissed all her\nattendants, as she desired to weep alone, her grief changed to joy. O,\nglorious Edgar, she said, the time will come when you will know what I\nfeel now, when at your feet, embracing your knees and kissing the\nblessed hand that with one blow has given me life and liberty. One blow\nand your revenge was satisfied and you had won me; I know it, I saw it\nall in that flame of love and fury in your eyes at our first meeting,\nwhich you permitted me to see, which, if he had seen, he would have\nknown that he was doomed. O perfect master of dissimulation, all the\nmore do I love and worship you for dealing with him as he dealt with you\nand with me; caressing him with flattering words until the moment came\nto strike and slay. And I love you all the more for making your horse\ntrample on him as he lay bleeding his life out on the ground. And now\nyou have opened the way with your knife you shall come back or call me\nto you when it pleases you, and for the rest of your life it will be a\nsatisfaction to you to know that you have taken a modest woman as well\nas the fairest in the land for wife and queen, and your pride in me will\nbe my happiness and glory. For men's love is little to me since\nAthelwold taught me to think meanly of all men, except you that slew\nhim. And you shall be free to follow your own mind and be ever strenuous\nand vigilant and run after kingly pleasures, pursuing deer and wolf and\nbeautiful women all over the land. And I shall listen to the tales of\nyour adventures and conquests with a smile like that of a mother who\nsees her child playing seriously with its dolls and toys, talking to and\ncaressing them. And in return you shall give me my desire, which is\npower and splendour; for these I crave, to be first and greatest, to\nraise up and cast down, and in all our life I shall be your help and\nstay in ruling this realm, so that our names may be linked together and\nshine in the annals of England for all time.\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nWhen Edgar slew Athelwold his age was twenty-two, and before he was a\nyear older he had married Elfrida, to the rage of that great man and\nprimate and more than premier, who, under Edgar, virtually ruled\nEngland. And in his rage, and remembering how he had dealt with a\nprevious boy king, whose beautiful young wife he had hounded to her\ndreadful end, he charged Elfrida with having instigated her husband's\nmurder, and commanded the king to put that woman away. This roused the\nman and passionate lover, and the tiger in the man, in Edgar, and the\nwise and subtle-minded ecclesiastic quickly recognised that he had set\nhimself against one of a will more powerful and dangerous than his own.\nHe remembered that it was Edgar, who, when he had been deprived of his\nabbey and driven in disgrace from the land, had recalled and made him so\ngreat, and he knew that the result of a quarrel between them would be a\nmighty upheaval in the land and the sweeping away of all his great\nreforms. And so, cursing the woman in his heart and secretly vowing\nvengeance on her, he was compelled in the interests of the Church to\nacquiesce in this fresh crime of the king.\n\n\n\n\nVII\n\n\nEight years had passed since the king's marriage with Elfrida, and the\none child born to them was now seven, the darling of his parents,\nEthelred the angelic child, who to the end of his long life would be\npraised for one thing only--his personal beauty. But Edward, his\nhalf-brother, now in his thirteenth year, was regarded by her with an\nalmost equal affection, on account of his beauty and charm, his devotion\nto his step-mother, the only mother he had known, and, above all, for\nhis love of his little half-brother. He was never happy unless he was\nwith him, acting the part of guide and instructor as well as playfellow.\n\nEdgar had recently completed one of his great works, the building of\nCorfe Castle, and now whenever he was in Wessex preferred it as a\nresidence, since he loved best that part of England with its wide moors\nand hunting forests, and its neighbourhood to the sea and to Portland\nand Poole water. He had been absent for many weeks on a journey to\nNorthumbria, and the last tidings of his movements were that he was on\nhis way to the south, travelling on the Welsh border, and intended\nvisiting the Abbot of Glastonbury before returning to Dorset. This\nreligious house was already very great in his day; he had conferred many\nbenefits on it, and contemplated still others.\n\nIt was summer time, a season of great heats, and Elfrida with the two\nlittle princes often went to the coast to spend a whole day in the open\nair by the sea. Her favourite spot was at the foot of a vast chalk down\nwith a slight strip of woodland between its lowest slope and the beach.\nShe was at this spot one day about noon where the trees were few and\nlarge, growing wide apart, and had settled herself on a pile of cushions\nplaced at the roots of a big old oak tree, where from her seat she could\nlook out over the blue expanse of water. But the hamlet and church close\nby on her left hand were hidden by the wood, though sounds issuing from\nit could be heard occasionally--shouts and bursts of laughter, and at\ntimes the music of a stringed instrument and a voice singing. These\nsounds came from her armed guard and other attendants who were speeding\nthe idle hours of waiting in their own way, in eating and drinking and\nin games and dancing. Only two women remained to attend to her wants,\nand one armed man to keep watch and guard over the two boys at their\nplay.\n\nThey were not now far off, not above fifty yards, among the big trees;\nbut for hours past they had been away out of her sight, racing on their\nponies over the great down; then bathing in the sea, Edward teaching his\nlittle brother to swim; then he had given him lessons in tree-climbing,\nand now, tired of all these exertions, and for variety's sake, they were\namusing themselves by standing on their heads. Little Ethelred had tried\nand failed repeatedly, then at last, with hands and head firmly planted\non the sward, he had succeeded in throwing his legs up and keeping them\nin a vertical position for a few seconds, this feat being loudly\napplauded by his young instructor.\n\nElfrida, who had witnessed this display from her seat, burst out\nlaughing, then said to herself: O how I love these two beautiful boys\nalmost with an equal love, albeit one is not mine! But Edward must be\never dear to me because of his sweetness and his love of me and, even\nmore, his love and tender care of my darling. Yet am I not wholly free\nfrom an anxious thought of the distant future. Ah, no, let me not think\nof such a thing! This sweet child of a boy-father and girl-mother--the\nfrail mother that died in her teens--he can never grow to be a proud,\nmasterful, ambitious man--never aspire to wear his father's crown!\nEdgar's first-born, it is true, but not mine, and he can never be king.\nFor Edgar and I are one; is it conceivable that he should oppose me in\nthis--that we that are one in mind and soul shall at the last be divided\nand at enmity? Have we not said it an hundred times that we are one? One\nin all things except in passion. Yet this very coldness in me in which I\ndiffer from others is my chief strength and glory, and has made our two\nlives one life. And when he is tired and satiated with the common beauty\nand the common passions of other women he returns to me only to have his\nfirst love kindled afresh, and when in love and pity I give myself to\nhim and am his bride afresh as when first he had my body in his arms, it\nis to him as if one of the immortals had stooped to a mortal, and he\ntells me I am the flower of womankind and of the world, that my white\nbody is a perfect white flower, my hair a shining gold flower, my mouth\na fragrant scarlet flower, and my eyes a sacred blue flower, surpassing\nall others in loveliness. And when I have satisfied him, and the tempest\nin his blood has abated, then for the rapture he has had I have mine,\nwhen, ashamed at his violence, as if it had been an insult to me, he\ncovers his face with my hair and sheds tears of love and contrition on\nmy breasts. O nothing can ever disunite us! Even from the first, before\nI ever saw him, when he was coming to me I knew that we were destined to\nbe one. And he too knew it from the moment of seeing me, and knew that I\nknew it; and when he sat at meat with us and looked smilingly at the\nfriend of his bosom and spoke merrily to him, and resolved at the same\ntime to take his life, he knew that by so doing he would fulfil my\ndesire, and as my knowledge of the betrayal was first, so the desire to\nshed that abhorred blood was in me first. Nevertheless, I cannot be free\nof all anxious thoughts, and fear too of my implacable enemy and\ntraducer who from a distance watches all my movements, who reads Edgar's\nmind even as he would a book, and what he finds there writ by me he\nseeks to blot out; and thus does he ever thwart me. But though I cannot\nmeasure my strength against his, it will not always be so, seeing that\nhe is old and I am young, with Time and Death on my side, who will like\ngood and faithful servants bring him to the dust, so that my triumph\nmust come. And when he is no more I shall have time to unbuild the\nstructure he has raised with lies for stones and my name coupled with\nsome evil deed cut in every stone. For I look ever to the future, even\nto the end to see this Edgar, with the light of life shining so brightly\nin him now, a venerable king with silver hair, his passions cool, his\nstrength failing, leaning more heavily on me; until at last, persuaded\nby me, he will step down from the throne and resign his crown to our\nson--our Ethelred. And in him and his son after him, and in his son's\nsons we shall live still in their blood, and with them rule this kingdom\nof Edgar the Peaceful--a realm of everlasting peace.\n\nThus she mused, until overcome by her swift, crowding thoughts and\npassions, love and hate, with memories dreadful or beautiful, of her\npast and strivings of her mind to pierce the future, she burst into a\nviolent storm of tears so that her frame was shaken, and covering her\neyes with her hands she strove to get the better of her agitation lest\nher weakness should be witnessed by her attendants. But when this\ntempest had left her and she lifted her eyes again, it seemed to her\nthat the burning tears which had relieved her heart had also washed away\nsome trouble that had been like a dimness on all visible nature, and\nearth and sea and sky were glorified as if the sunlight flooding the\nworld fell direct from the heavenly throne, and she sat drinking in pure\ndelight from the sight of it and the soft, warm air she breathed.\n\nThen, to complete her happiness, the silence that reigned around her was\nbroken by a sweet, musical sound of a little bird that sang from the\ntree-top high above her head. This was the redstart, and the tree under\nwhich she sat was its singing-tree, to which it resorted many times a\nday to spend half an hour or so repeating its brief song at intervals of\na few seconds--a small song that was like the song of the redbreast,\nsubdued, refined and spiritualised, as of a spirit that lived within the\ntree.\n\nListening to it in that happy, tender mood which had followed her tears,\nshe gazed up and tried to catch sight of it, but could see nothing but\nthe deep-cut, green, translucent, clustering oak leaves showing the blue\nof heaven and shining like emeralds in the sunlight. O sweet, blessed\nlittle bird, she said, are you indeed a bird? I think you are a\nmessenger sent to assure me that all my hopes and dreams of the distant\ndays to come will be fulfilled. Sing again and again and again; I could\nlisten for hours to that selfsame song.\n\nBut she heard it no more; the bird had flown away. Then, still\nlistening, she caught a different sound--the loud hoof-beats of horses\nbeing ridden at furious speed towards the hamlet. Listening intently to\nthat sound she heard, on its arrival at the hamlet, a sudden, great cry\nas if all the men gathered there had united their voices in one cry; and\nshe stood up, and her women came to her, and all together stood silently\ngazing in that direction. Then the two boys who had been lying on the\nturf not far off came running to them and caught her by the hands, one\non each side, and Edward, looking up at her white, still face, cried,\nMother, what is it you fear? But she answered no word. Then again the\nsound of hoofs was heard and they knew the riders were now coming at a\nswift gallop to them. And in a few moments they appeared among the\ntrees, and reining up their horses at a distance of some yards, one\nsprang to the ground, and advancing to the queen, made his obeisance,\nthen told her he had been sent to inform her of Edgar's death. He had\nbeen seized by a sudden violent fever in Gloucestershire, on his way to\nGlastonbury, and had died after two days' illness. He had been\nunconscious all the time, but more than once he had cried out, On to\nGlastonbury! and now in obedience to that command his body was being\nconveyed thither for interment at the abbey.\n\n\n\n\nVIII\n\n\nShe had no tears to shed, no word to say, nor was there any sense of\ngrief at her loss. She had loved him--once upon a time; she had always\nadmired him for his better qualities; even his excessive pride and\nostentation had been pleasing to her; finally she had been more than\ntolerant of his vices or weaknesses, regarding them as matters beneath\nher attention. Nevertheless, in their eight years of married life they\nhad become increasingly repugnant to her stronger and colder nature. He\nhad degenerated, bodily and mentally, and was not now like that shining\none who had come to her at Wherwell Castle, who had not hesitated to\nstrike the blow that had set her free. The tidings of his death had all\nat once sprung the truth on her mind that the old love was dead, that it\nhad indeed been long dead, and that she had actually come to despise\nhim.\n\nBut what should she do--what be--without him! She had been his queen,\nloved to adoration, and he had been her shield; now she was alone, face\nto face with her bitter, powerful enemy. Now it seemed to her that she\nhad been living in a beautiful peaceful land, a paradise of fruit and\nflowers and all delightful things; that in a moment, as by a miracle, it\nhad turned to a waste of black ashes still hot and smoking from the\ndesolating flames that had passed over it. But she was not one to give\nherself over to despondency so long as there was anything to be done.\nVery quickly she roused herself to action, and despatched messengers to\nall those powerful friends who shared her hatred of the great\narchbishop, and would be glad of the opportunity now offered of wresting\nthe rule from his hands. Until now he had triumphed because he had had\nthe king to support him even in his most arbitrary and tyrannical\nmeasures; now was the time to show a bold front, to proclaim her son as\nthe right successor, and with herself, assisted by chosen councillors to\ndirect her boy, the power would be in her hands, and once more, as in\nKing Edwin's day, the great Dunstan, disgraced and denounced, would be\ncompelled to fly from the country lest a more dreadful punishment should\nbefall him. Finally, leaving the two little princes at Corfe Castle, she\ntravelled to Mercia to be with and animate her powerful friends and\nfellow-plotters with her presence.\n\nAll their plottings and movements were known to Dunstan, and he was too\nquick for them. Whilst they, divided among themselves, were debating and\narranging their plans, he had called together all the leading bishops\nand councillors of the late king, and they had agreed that Edward must\nbe proclaimed as the first-born; and although but a boy of thirteen, the\ndanger to the country would not be so great as it would to give the\nsuccession to a child of seven years. Accordingly Edward was proclaimed\nking and removed from Corfe Castle while the queen was still absent in\nMercia.\n\nFor a while it looked as if this bold and prompt act on the part of\nDunstan would have led to civil war; but a great majority of the nobles\ngave their adhesion to Edward, and Elfrida's friends soon concluded that\nthey were not strong enough to set her boy up and try to overthrow\nEdward, or to divide England again between two boy kings as in Edwin and\nEdgar's early years.\n\nShe accordingly returned discomfited to Corfe and to her child, now\nalways crying for his beloved brother who had been taken from him; and\nthere was not in all England a more miserable woman than Elfrida the\nqueen. For after this defeat she could hope no more; her power was gone\npast recovery--all that had made her life beautiful and glorious was\ngone. Now Corfe was like that other castle at Wherwell, where Earl\nAthelwold had kept her like a caged bird for his pleasure when he\nvisited her; only worse, since she was eight years younger then, her\nbeauty fresher, her heart burning with secret hopes and ambitions, and\nthe great world where there were towns and a king, and many noble men\nand women gathered round him yet to be known. And all these things had\ncome to her and were now lost--now nothing was left but bitterest\nregrets and hatred of all those who had failed her at the last. Hatred\nfirst of all and above all of her great triumphant enemy, and hatred of\nthe boy king she had loved with a mother's love until now, and cherished\nfor many years. Hatred too of herself when she recalled the part she had\nrecently played in Mercia, where she had not disdained to practise all\nher fascinating arts on many persons she despised in order to bind them\nto her cause, and had thereby given cause to her monkish enemy to charge\nher with immodesty. It was with something like hatred too that she\nregarded her own child when he would come crying to her, begging her to\ntake him to his beloved brother; carried away with sudden rage, she\nwould strike and thrust him violently from her, then order her women to\ntake him away and keep him out of her sight.\n\nThree years had gone by, during which she had continued living alone at\nCorfe, still under a cloud and nursing her bitter revengeful feeling in\nher heart, until that fatal afternoon on the eighteenth day of March,\n978.\n\nThe young king, now in his seventeenth year, had come to these favourite\nhunting-grounds of his late father, and was out hunting on that day. He\nhad lost sight of his companions in a wood or thicket of thorn and\nfurze, and galloping in search of them he came out from the wood on the\nfurther side; and there before him, not a mile away, was Corfe Castle,\nhis old beloved home, and the home still of the two beings he loved best\nin the world--his step-mother and his little half-brother. And although\nhe had been sternly warned that they were his secret enemies, that it\nwould be dangerous to hold any intercourse with them, the sight of the\ncastle and his craving to look again on their dear faces overcame his\nscruples. There would be no harm, no danger to him and no great\ndisobedience on his part to ride to the gates and see and greet them\nwithout dismounting.\n\nWhen Elfrida was told that Edward himself was at the gates calling to\nher and Ethelred to come out to him she became violently excited, and\ncried out that God himself was on her side, and had delivered the boy\ninto her hands. She ordered her servants to go out and persuade him to\ncome in to her, to take away his horse as soon as he had dismounted, and\nnot to allow him to leave the castle. Then, when they returned to say\nthe king refused to dismount and again begged them to go to him, she\nwent to the gates, but without the boy, and greeted him joyfully, while\nhe, glad at the meeting, bent down and embraced her and kissed her face.\nBut when she refused to send for Ethelred, and urged him persistently to\ndismount and come in to see his little brother who was crying for him,\nhe began to notice the extreme excitement which burned in her eyes and\nmade her voice tremble, and beginning to fear some design against him,\nhe refused again more firmly to obey her wish; then she, to gain time,\nsent for wine for him to drink before parting from her. And during all\nthis time while his departure was being delayed, her people, men and\nwomen, had been coming out until, sitting on his horse, he was in the\nmidst of a crowd, and these too all looked on him with excited faces,\nwhich increased his apprehension, so that when he had drunk the wine he\nall at once set spurs to his horse to break away from among them. Then\nshe, looking at her men, cried out: Is this the way you serve me? And no\nsooner had the words fallen from her lips than one man bounded forward,\nlike a hound on its quarry, and coming abreast of the horse, dealt the\nking a blow with his knife in the side. The next moment the horse and\nrider were free of the crowd and rushing away over the moor. A cry of\nhorror had burst from the women gathered there when the blow was struck;\nnow all were silent, watching with white, scared faces as he rode\nswiftly away. Then presently they saw him swerve on his horse, then\nfall, with his right foot still remaining caught in the stirrup, and\nthat the panic-stricken horse was dragging him at furious speed over the\nrough moor.\n\nOnly then the queen spoke, and in an agitated voice told them to mount\nand follow; and charged them that if they overtook the horse and found\nthat the king had been killed, to bury the body where it would not be\nfound, so that the manner of his death should not be known.\n\nWhen the men returned they reported that they had found the dead body of\nthe king a mile away, where the horse had got free of it, and they had\nburied it in a thicket where it would never be discovered.\n\n\n\n\nIX\n\n\nWhen Edward in sudden terror set spurs to his horse: when at the same\nmoment a knife flashed out and the fatal blow was delivered, Elfrida\ntoo, like the other women witnesses in the crowd, had uttered a cry of\nhorror. But once the deed was accomplished and the assurance received\nthat the body had been hidden where it would never be found, the feeling\nexperienced at the spectacle was changed to one of exultation. For now\nat last, after three miserable years of brooding on her defeat, she had\nunexpectedly triumphed, and it was as if she already had her foot set on\nher enemies' necks. For now her boy would be king--happily there was no\nother candidate in the field; now her great friends from all over the\nland would fly to her aid, and with them for her councillors she would\npractically be the ruler during the king's long minority.\n\nThus she exulted; then, when that first tempest of passionate excitement\nhad abated, came a revulsion of feeling when the vivid recollections of\nthat pitiful scene returned and would not be thrust away; when she saw\nagain the change from affection and delight at beholding her to\nsuspicion and fear, then terror, come into the face of the boy she had\nloved; when she witnessed the dreadful blow and watched him when he\nswerved and fell from the saddle and the frightened horse galloped\nwildly away dragging him over the rough moor. For now she knew that in\nher heart she had never hated him: the animosity had been only on the\nsurface and was an overflow of her consuming hatred of the primate. She\nhad always loved the boy, and now that he no longer stood in her way to\npower she loved him again. And she had slain him! O no, she was thankful\nto think she had not! His death had come about by chance. Her commands\nto her people had been that he was not to be allowed to leave the\ncastle; she had resolved to detain him, to hide and hold him a captive,\nto persuade or in some way compel him to abdicate in his brother's\nfavour. She could not now say just how she had intended to deal with\nhim, but it was never her intention to murder him. Her commands had been\nmisunderstood, and she could not be blamed for his death, however much\nshe was to benefit by it. God would not hold her accountable.\n\nCould she then believe that she was guiltless in God's sight? Alas! on\nsecond thoughts she dared not affirm it. She was guiltless only in the\nway that she had been guiltless of Athelwold's murder; had she not\nrejoiced at the part she had had in that act? Athelwold had deserved his\nfate, and she had never repented that deed, nor had Edgar. She had not\ndealt the fatal blow then nor now, but she had wished for Edward's death\neven as she had wished for Athelwold's, and it was for her the blow was\nstruck. It was a difficult and dreadful question. She was not equal to\nit. Let it be put off, the pressing question now was, what would man's\njudgment be--how would she now stand before the world?\n\nAnd now the hope came that the secret of the king's disappearance would\nnever be known; that after a time it would be assumed that he was dead,\nand that his death would never be traced to her door.\n\nA vain hope, as she quickly found! There had been too many witnesses of\nthe deed both of the castle people and those who lived outside the\ngates. The news spread fast and far as if carried by winged messengers,\nso that it was soon known throughout the kingdom, and everywhere it was\ntold and believed that the queen herself had dealt the fatal blow.\n\nNot Elfrida nor any one living at that time could have foretold the\neffect on the people generally of this deed, described as the foulest\nwhich had been done in Saxon times. There had in fact been a thousand\nblacker deeds in the England of that dreadful period, but never one that\ntouched the heart and imagination of the whole people in the same way.\nFurthermore, it came after a long pause, a serene interval of many years\nin the everlasting turmoil--the years of the reign of Edgar the\nPeaceful, whose early death had up till then been its one great sorrow.\nA time too of recovery from a state of insensibility to evil deeds; of\nincreasing civilisation and the softening of hearts. For Edward was the\nchild of Edgar and his child-wife, who was beautiful and beloved and\ndied young; and he had inherited the beauty, charm, and all engaging\nqualities of his parents. It is true that these qualities were known at\nfirst-hand only by those who were about him; but from these the feeling\ninspired had been communicated to those outside in ever-widening circles\nuntil it was spread over all the land, so that there was no habitation,\nfrom the castle to the hovel, in which the name of Edward was not as\nmusic on man's lips. And we of the present generation can perhaps\nunderstand this better than those of any other in the past centuries,\nfor having a prince and heir to the English throne of this same name so\ngreat in our annals, one as universally loved as was Edward the Second,\nafterwards called the Martyr, in his day.\n\nOne result of this general outburst of feeling was that all those who\nhad been, openly or secretly, in alliance with Elfrida now hastened to\ndissociate themselves from her. She was told that by her own rash act in\nkilling the king before the world she had ruined her own cause for ever.\n\nAnd Dunstan was not defeated after all. He made haste to proclaim the\nson, the boy of ten years, king of England, and at the same time to\ndenounce the mother as a murderess. Nor did she dare to resist him when\nhe removed the little prince from Corfe Castle and placed him with some\nof his own creatures, with monks for schoolmasters and guardians, whose\nfirst lesson to him would be detestation of his mother. This lesson too\nhad to be impressed on the public mind; and at once, in obedience to\nthis command, every preaching monk in every chapel in the land raged\nagainst the queen, the enemy of the archbishop and of religion, the\ntigress in human shape, and author of the greatest crime known in the\nland since Cerdic's landing. No fortitude could stand against such a\nstorm of execration. It overwhelmed her. It was, she believed, a\npreparation for the dreadful doom about to fall on her. This was her\ngreat enemy's day, and he would no longer be baulked of his revenge. She\nremembered that Edwin had died by the assassin's hand, and the awful\nfate of his queen Elgitha, whose too beautiful face was branded with hot\nirons, and who was hamstrung and left to perish in unimaginable agony.\nShe was like the hunted roe deer hiding in a close thicket and\nlistening, trembling, to the hunters shouting and blowing on their horns\nand to the baying of their dogs, seeking for her in the wood.\n\nCould she defend herself against them in her castle? She consulted her\nguard as to this, with the result that most of the men secretly left\nher. There was nothing for her to do but wait in dreadful suspense, and\nthereafter she would spend many hours every day in a tower commanding a\nwide view of the surrounding level country to watch the road with\nanxious eyes. But the feared hunters came not; the sound of the cry for\nvengeance grew fainter and fainter until it died into silence. It was at\nlength borne in on her that she was not to be punished--at all events,\nnot here and by man. It came as a surprise to every one, herself\nincluded. But it had been remembered that she was Edgar's widow and the\nking's mother, and that her power and influence were dead. Never again\nwould she lift her head in England. Furthermore, Dunstan was growing\nold; and albeit his zeal for religion, pure and undefiled as he\nunderstood it, was not abated, the cruel, ruthless instincts and temper,\nwhich had accompanied and made it effective in the great day of conflict\nwhen he was engaged in sweeping from England the sin and scandal of a\nmarried clergy, had by now burnt themselves out. Vengeance is mine,\nsaith the Lord, I will repay, and he was satisfied to have no more to do\nwith her. Let the abhorred woman answer to God for her crimes.\n\nBut now that all fear of punishment by man was over, this dreadful\nthought that she was answerable to God weighed more and more heavily on\nher. Nor could she escape by day or night from the persistent image of\nthe murdered boy. It haunted her like a ghost in every room, and when\nshe climbed to a tower to look out it was to see his horse rushing madly\naway dragging his bleeding body over the moor. Or when she went out to\nthe gate it was still to find him there, sitting on his horse, his face\nlighting up with love and joy at beholding her again; then the\nchange--the surprise, the fear, the wine-cup, the attempt to break away,\nher cry--the unconsidered words she had uttered--and the fatal blow! The\ncry that rose from all England calling on God to destroy her! would that\nbe her torment--would it sound in her ears through all eternity?\n\nCorfe became unendurable to her, and eventually she moved to Bere, in\nDorset, where the lands were her property and she possessed a house of\nher own, and there for upwards of a year she resided in the strictest\nseclusion.\n\nIt then came out and was quickly noised abroad that the king's body had\nbeen discovered long ago--miraculously it was said--in that brake near\nCorfe where it had been hidden; that it had been removed to and secretly\nburied at Wareham, and it was also said that miracles were occurring at\nthat spot. This caused a fresh outburst of excitement in the country;\nthe cry of miracles roused the religious houses all over Wessex, and\nthere was a clamour for possession of the remains. This was a question\nfor the heads of the Church to decide, and it was eventually decreed\nthat the monastery of Shaftesbury, founded by King Alfred, Edward's\ngreat-great-grandfather, should have the body. Shaftesbury then, in\norder to advertise so important an acquisition to the world, resolved to\nmake the removal of the remains the occasion of a great ceremony, a\nmagnificent procession bearing the sacred remains from Wareham to the\ndistant little city on the hill, attended by representatives from\nreligious houses all over the country and by the pious generally.\n\nElfrida, sitting alone in her house, brooding on her desolation, heard\nof all these happenings and doings with increasing excitement; then all\nat once resolved to take part herself in the procession. This was\nseemingly a strange, almost incredible departure for one of her\nindomitable character and so embittered against the primate, even as he\nwas against her. But her fight with him was now ended; she was defeated,\nbroken, deprived of everything that she valued in life; it was time to\nthink about the life to come. Furthermore, it now came to her that this\nwas not her own thought, but that it had been whispered to her soul by\nsome compassionate being of a higher order, and it was suggested to her\nthat here was an opportunity for a first step towards a reconciliation\nwith God and man. She dared not disregard it. Once more she would appear\nbefore the world, not as the beautiful, magnificent Elfrida, the proud\nand powerful woman of other days, but as a humble penitent doing her\nbitter penance in public, one of a thousand or ten thousand humble\npilgrims, clad in mean garments, riding only when overcome with fatigue,\nand at the last stage of that long twenty-five-mile journey casting off\nher shoes to climb the steep stony road on naked, bleeding feet.\n\nThis resolution, in which she was strongly supported by the local\npriesthood, had a mollifying effect on the people, and something like\ncompassion began to mingle with their feelings of hatred towards her.\nBut when it was reported to Dunstan, he fell into a rage, and imagined\nor pretended to believe that some sinister design was hidden under it.\nShe was the same woman, he said, who had instigated the murder of her\nfirst husband by means of a trick of this kind. She must not be allowed\nto show her face again. He then despatched a stern and threatening\nmessage forbidding her to take any part in or show herself at the\nprocession.\n\nThis came at the last moment when all her preparations had been made;\nbut she dared not disobey. The effect was to increase her misery. It was\nas if the gates of mercy and deliverance, which had been opened,\nmiraculously as she believed, had now been once more closed against her;\nand it was also as if her enemy had said: I have spared you the branding\nwith hot irons and slashing of sinews with sharp knives, not out of\ncompassion, but in order to subject you to a more terrible punishment.\n\nDespair possessed her, which turned to sullen rage when she found that\nthe feeling of the people around her had again become hostile, owing to\nthe report that her non-appearance at the procession was due to the\ndiscovery by Dunstan in good time of a secret plot against the State on\nher part. Her house at Bere became unendurable to her; she resolved to\nquit it, and made choice of Salisbury as her next place of residence. It\nwas not far to go, and she had a good house there which had not been\nused since Edgar's death, but was always kept ready for her occupation.\n\n\n\n\nX\n\n\nIt was about the middle of the afternoon when Elfrida on horseback and\nattended by her mounted guard of twenty or more men, followed by a\nconvoy of carts with her servants and luggage, arrived at Salisbury, and\nwas surprised and disturbed at the sight of a vast concourse of people\nstanding without the gates.\n\nIt had got abroad that she was coming to Salisbury on that day, and it\nwas also now known throughout Wessex that she had not been allowed to\nattend the procession to Shaftesbury. This had excited the people, and a\nlarge part of the inhabitants of the town and the adjacent hamlets had\ncongregated to witness her arrival.\n\nOn her approach the crowd opened out on either side to make way for her\nand her men, and glancing to this side and that she saw that every pair\nof eyes in all that vast silent crowd were fixed intently on her face.\n\nThen came a fresh surprise when she found a mounted guard standing with\ndrawn swords before the gates. The captain of the guard, lifting his\nhand, cried out to her to halt, then in a loud voice he informed her he\nhad been ordered to turn her back from the gates. Was it then to witness\nthis fresh insult that the people had now been brought together? Anger\nand apprehension struggled for mastery in her breast and choked her\nutterance when she attempted to speak. She could only turn to her men,\nand in instant response to her look they drew their swords and pressed\nforward as if about to force their way in. This movement on their part\nwas greeted with a loud burst of derisive laughter from the town guard.\nThen from out of the middle of the crowd of lookers-on came a cry of\nMurderess! quickly followed by another shout of Go back, murderess, you\nare not wanted here! This was a signal for all the unruly spirits in the\nthrong--all those whose delight is to trample upon the fallen--and from\nall sides there arose a storm of jeers and execrations, and it was as if\nshe was in the midst of a frantic bellowing herd eager to gore and\ntrample her to death. And these were the same people that a few short\nyears ago would rush out from their houses to gaze with pride and\ndelight at her, their beautiful queen, and applaud her to the echo\nwhenever she appeared at their gates! Now, better than ever before, she\nrealised the change of feeling towards her from affectionate loyalty to\nabhorrence, and drained to the last bitterest dregs the cup of shame and\nhumiliation.\n\nWith trembling hand she turned her horse round, and bending her ashen\nwhite face low rode slowly out of the crowd, her men close to her on\neither side, threatening with their swords those that pressed nearest\nand followed in their retreat by shouts and jeers. But when well out of\nsight and sound of the people she dismounted and sat down on the turf to\nrest and consider what was to be done. By and by a mounted man was seen\ncoming from Salisbury at a fast gallop. He came with a letter and\nmessage to the queen from an aged nobleman, one she had known in former\nyears at court. He informed her that he owned a large house at or near\nAmesbury which he could not now use on account of his age and\ninfirmities, which compelled him to remain in Salisbury. This house she\nmight occupy for as long as she wished to remain in the neighbourhood.\nHe had received permission from the governor of the town to offer it to\nher, and the only condition was that she must not return to Salisbury.\n\nThere was thus one friend left to the reviled and outcast queen--this\naged dying man!\n\nOnce more she set forth with the messenger as guide, and about set of\nsun arrived at the house, which was to be her home for the next two to\nthree years, in this darkest period of her life. Yet she could not have\nfound a habitation and surroundings more perfectly suited to her wants\nand the mood she was in. The house, which was large enough to\naccommodate all her people, was on the west side of the Avon, a quarter\nof a mile below Amesbury and two to three hundred yards distant from the\nriver bank, and was surrounded by enclosed land with gardens and\norchards, the river itself forming the boundary on one side. Here was\nthe perfect seclusion she desired: here she could spend her hours and\ndays as she ever loved to do in the open air without sight of any human\ncountenance excepting those of her own people, since now strange faces\nhad become hateful to her. Then, again, she loved riding, and just\noutside of her gates was the great green expanse of the Downs, where she\ncould spend hours on horseback without meeting or seeing a human figure\nexcept occasionally a solitary shepherd guarding his flock. So great was\nthe attraction the Downs had for her she herself marvelled at it. It was\nnot merely the sense of power and freedom the rider feels on a horse\nwith the exhilarating effect of swift motion and a wide horizon. Here\nshe had got out of the old and into a new world better suited to her\nchanged spirit. For in that world of men and women in which she had\nlived until now all nature had become interfused with her own and other\npeople's lives--passions and hopes and fears and dreams and ambitions.\nNow it was as if an obscuring purple mist had been blown away, leaving\nthe prospect sharp and clear to her sight as it had never appeared\nbefore. A wide prospect, whose grateful silence was only broken by the\ncry or song of some wild bird. Great thickets of dwarf thorn tree and\nbrambles and gorse, aflame with yellow flowers or dark to blackness by\ncontrast with the pale verdure of the earth. And open reaches of elastic\nturf, its green suffused or sprinkled with red or blue or yellow,\naccording to the kind of flowers proper to the season and place. The\nsight, too, of wild creatures: fallow deer, looking yellow in the\ndistance when seen amid the black gorse; a flock of bustards taking to\nflight on her approach would rush away, their spread wings flashing\nsilver-white in the brilliant sunshine. She was like them on her horse,\nborne swiftly as on wings above the earth, but always near it. Then,\ncasting her eyes up, she would watch the soarers, the buzzards, or\nharriers and others, circling up from earth on broad motionless wings,\nbird above bird, ever rising and diminishing to fade away at last into\nthe universal blue. Then, as if aspiring too, she would seek the highest\npoint on some high down, and sitting on her horse survey the prospect\nbefore her--the sea of rounded hills, hills beyond hills, stretching\naway to the dim horizon, and over it all the vast blue dome of heaven.\nSky and earth, with thorny brakes and grass and flowers and wild\ncreatures, with birds that flew low and others soaring up into\nheaven--what was the secret meaning it had for her? She was like one\ngroping for a key in a dark place. Not a human figure visible, not a\nsign of human occupancy on that expanse! Was this then the secret of her\nelation? The all-powerful, dreadful God she was at enmity with, whom she\nfeared and fled from, was not here. He, or his spirit, was where man\ninhabited, in cities and other centres of population, where there were\nchurches and monasteries.\n\nTo think this was a veritable relief to her. God was where men\nworshipped him, and not here! She hugged the new belief and it made her\nbold and defiant. Doubtless, if he is here, she would say, and can read\nmy thoughts, my horse in his very next gallop will put his foot in a\nmole-run, and bring me down and break my neck. Or when yon black cloud\ncomes over me, if it is a thunder-cloud, the lightning out of it will\nstrike me dead. If he will but listen to his servant Dunstan this will\nsurely happen. Was it God or the head shepherd of his sheep, here in\nEngland, who, when I tried to enter the fold, beat me off with his staff\nand set his dogs on me so that I was driven away, torn and bleeding, to\nhide myself in a solitary place? Would it then be better for me to go\nwith my cries for mercy to his seat? O no, I could not come to him\nthere; his doorkeepers would bar the way, and perhaps bring together a\ncrowd of their people to howl at me--Go away, Murderess, you are not\nwanted here!\n\nNow in spite of those moments, or even hours, of elation, during which\nher mind would recover its old independence until the sense of freedom\nwas like an intoxication; when she cried out against God that he was\ncruel and unjust in his dealings with his creatures, that he had raised\nup and given power to the man who held the rod over her, one who in\nGod's holy name had committed crimes infinitely greater than hers, and\nshe refused to submit to him--in spite of it all she could never shake\noff the terrible thought that in the end, at God's judgment seat, she\nwould have to answer for her own dark deeds. She could not be free of\nher religion. She was like one who tears a written paper to pieces and\nscatters the pieces in anger to see them blown away like snow-flakes on\nthe wind; who by and by discovers one small fragment clinging to his\ngarments, and looking at the half a dozen words and half words appearing\non it, adds others from memory or of his own invention. So she with what\nwas left when she thrust her religion away built for herself a different\none which was yet like the old; and even here in this solitude she was\nable to find a house and sacred place for meditation and prayer, in\nwhich she prayed indirectly to the God she was at enmity with. For now\ninvariably on returning from her ride to her house at Amesbury she would\npay a visit to the Great Stones, the ancient temple of Stonehenge.\nDismounting, she would order her attendants to take her horse away and\nwait for her at a distance, so as not to be disturbed by the sound of\ntheir talking. Going in she would seat herself on the central or altar\nstone and give a little time to meditation--to the tuning of her mind.\nThat circle of rough-hewn stones, rough with grey lichen, were the\npillars of her cathedral, with the infinite blue sky for roof, and for\nincense the smell of flowers and aromatic herbs, and for music the\nfar-off faintly heard sounds that came to her from the surrounding\nwilderness--the tremulous bleating of sheep and the sudden wild cry of\nhawk or stone curlew. Closing her eyes she would summon the familiar\nimage and vision of the murdered boy, always coming so quickly, so\nvividly, that she had brought herself to believe that it was not a mere\ncreation of her own mind and of remorse, a memory, but that he was\nactually there with her. Moving her hand over the rough stone she would\nby and by let it rest, pressing it on the stone, and would say, Now I\nhave your hand in mine, and am looking with my soul's eyes into yours,\nlisten again to the words I have spoken so many times. You would not be\nhere if you did not remember me and pity and even love me still. Know\nthen that I am now alone in the world, that I am hated by the world\nbecause of your bitter death. And there is not now one living being in\nthe world that I love, for I have ceased to love even my own boy, your\nold beloved playmate, seeing that he has long been taken from me and\ntaught with all others to despise and hate me. And of all those who\ninhabit the regions above, in all that innumerable multitude of angels\nand saints, and of all who have died on earth and been forgiven, you\nalone have any feeling of compassion for me and can intercede for me.\nPlead for me--plead for me, O my son; for who is there in heaven or\nearth that can plead so powerfully for me that am stained with your\nblood!\n\nThen, having finished her prayer, and wiped away all trace of tears and\npainful emotions, she would summon her attendants and ride home, in\nappearance and bearing still the Elfrida of her great days--the calm,\nproud-faced, beautiful woman who was once Edgar's queen.\n\n\n\n\nXI\n\n\nThe time had arrived when Elfrida was deprived of this her one relief\nand consolation--her rides on the Downs and the exercise of her religion\nat the temple of the Great Stones--when in the second winter of her\nresidence at Amesbury there fell a greater darkness than that of winter\non England, when the pirate kings of the north began once more to\nfrequent our shores, and the daily dreadful tale of battles and\nmassacres and burning of villages and monasteries was heard throughout\nthe kingdom. These invasions were at first confined to the eastern\ncounties, but the agitation, with movements of men and outbreaks of\nlawlessness, were everywhere in the country, and the queen was warned\nthat it was no longer safe for her to go out on Salisbury Plain.\n\nThe close seclusion in which she had now to live, confined to house and\nenclosed land, affected her spirits, and this was her darkest period,\nand it was also the turning-point in her life. For I now come to the\nstrange story of her maid Editha, who, despite her humble position in\nthe house, and albeit she was but a young girl in years, one, moreover,\nof a meek, timid disposition, was yet destined to play an exceedingly\nimportant part in the queen's history.\n\nIt happened that by chance or design the queen's maid, who was her\nclosest attendant, who dressed and undressed her, was suddenly called\naway on some urgent matter, and this girl Editha, a stranger to all, was\nput in her place. The queen, who was in a moody and irritable state,\npresently discovered that the sight and presence of this girl produced a\nsoothing effect on her darkened mind. She began to notice her when the\nmaid combed her hair, when sitting with half-closed eyes in profound\ndejection she first looked attentively at that face behind her head in\nthe mirror and marvelled at its fairness, the perfection of its lines\nand its delicate colouring, the pale gold hair and strangely serious\ngrey eyes that were never lifted to meet her own.\n\nWhat was it in this face, she asked herself, that held her and gave some\nrest to her tormented spirit? It reminded her of that crystal stream of\nsweet and bitter memories, at Wherwell, on which she used to gaze and in\nwhich she used to dip her hands, then to press the wetted hands to her\nlips. It also reminded her of an early morning sky, seen beyond and\nabove the green dew-wet earth, so infinitely far away, so peaceful with\na peace that was not of this earth.\n\nIt was not then merely its beauty that made this face so much to her,\nbut something greater behind it, some inner grace, the peace of God in\nher soul.\n\nOne day there came for the queen as a gift from some distant town a\nvolume of parables and fables for her entertainment. It was beautiful to\nthe sight, being richly bound in silk and gold embroidery; but on\nopening it she soon found that there was little pleasure to be got from\nit on account of the difficulty she found in reading the crabbed\nhandwriting. After spending some minutes in trying to decipher a\nparagraph or two she threw the book in disgust on the floor.\n\nThe maid picked it up, and after a glance at the first page said it was\neasy to her, and she asked if the queen would allow her to read it to\nher.\n\nElfrida, surprised, asked how it came about that her maid was able to\nread a difficult script with ease, or was able to read at all; and this\nwas the first question she had condescended to put to the girl. Editha\nreplied that she had been taught as a child by a great-uncle, a learned\nman; that she had been made to read volumes in a great variety of\nscripts to him, until reading had come easy to her, both Saxon and\nLatin.\n\nThen, having received permission, she read the first fable aloud, and\nElfrida listening, albeit without interest in the tale itself, found\nthat the voice increased the girl's attraction for her. From that time\nthe queen made her read to her every day. She would make her sit a\nlittle distance from her, and reclining on her couch, her head resting\non her hand, she would let her eyes dwell on that sweet saint-like face\nuntil the reading was finished.\n\nOne day she read from the same book a tale of a great noble, an\nearldoman who was ruler under the king of that part of the country where\nhis possessions were, whose power was practically unlimited and his word\nlaw. But he was a wise and just man, regardful of the rights of others,\neven of the meanest of men, so that he was greatly reverenced and loved\nby the people. Nevertheless, he too, like all men in authority, both\ngood and bad, had his enemies, and the chief of these was a noble of a\nproud and froward temper who had quarrelled with him about their\nrespective rights in certain properties where their lands adjoined.\nAgain and again it was shown to him that his contention was wrong; the\njudgments against him only served to increase his bitterness and\nhostility until it seemed that there would never be an end to that\nstrife. This at length so incensed his powerful overlord that he was\nforcibly deprived of his possessions and driven out beggared from his\nhome. But no punishment, however severe, could change his nature; it\nonly roused him to greater fury, a more fixed determination to have his\nrevenge, so that outcast as he was his enmity was still to be feared and\nhe was a danger to the ruler and the community in general. Then, at\nlast, the great earl said he would suffer this state of things no\nlonger, and he ordered his men to go out and seek and take him captive\nand bring him up for a final judgment. This was done, and the ruler then\nsaid he would not have him put to death as he was advised to do, so as\nto be rid of him once for all, but would inflict a greater punishment on\nhim. He then made them put heavy irons on his ankles, riveted so that\nthey should never be removed, and condemned him to slavery and to labour\nevery day in his fields and pleasure-grounds for the rest of his life.\nTo see his hated enemy reduced to that condition would, he said, be a\nsatisfaction to him whenever he walked in his gardens.\n\nThese stern commands were obeyed, and when the miserable man refused to\ndo his task and cried out in a rage that he would rather die, he was\nscourged until the blood ran from the wounds made by the lash; and at\nlast, to escape from this torture, he was compelled to obey, and from\nmorning to night he laboured on the land, planting and digging and doing\nwhatever there was to do, always watched by his overseer, his food\nthrown to him as to a dog; laughed and jeered at by the meanest of the\nservants.\n\nAfter a certain time, when his body grew hardened so that he could\nlabour all day without pain, and, being fatigued, sleep all night\nwithout waking, though he had nothing but straw on a stone floor to lie\nupon; and when he was no longer mocked or punished or threatened with\nthe lash, he began to reflect more and more on his condition, and to\nthink that it would be possible to him to make it more endurable. When\nbrooding on it, when he repined and cursed, it then seemed to him worse\nthan death; but when, occupied with his task, he forgot that he was the\nslave of his enemy, who had overcome and broken him, then it no longer\nseemed so heavy. The sun still shone for him as for others; the earth\nwas as green, the sky as blue, the flowers as fragrant. This reflection\nmade his misery less; and by and by it came into his mind that it would\nbe lessened more and more if he could forget that his master was his\nenemy and cruel persecutor, who took delight in the thought of his\nsufferings; if he could imagine that he had a different master, a great\nand good man who had ever been kind to him and whom his sole desire was\nto please. This thought working in his mind began to give him a\nsatisfaction in his toil, and this change in him was noticed by his\ntaskmaster, who began to see that he did his work with an understanding\nso much above that of his fellows that all those who laboured with him\nwere influenced by his example, and whatsoever the toil was in which he\nhad a part the work was better done. From the taskmaster this change\nbecame known to the chief head of all the lands, who thereupon had him\nset to other more important tasks, so that at last he was not only a\ntoiler with pick and spade and pruning knife, but his counsel was sought\nin everything that concerned the larger works on the land; in forming\nplantations, in the draining of wet grounds and building of houses and\nbridges and the making of new roads. And in all these works he acquitted\nhimself well.\n\nThus he laboured for years, and it all became known to the ruler, who at\nlength ordered the man to be brought before him to receive yet another\nfinal judgment. And when he stood before him, hairy, dirty and unkempt,\nin his ragged raiment, with toil-hardened hands and heavy irons on his\nlegs, he first ordered the irons to be removed.\n\nThe smiths came with their files and hammers, and with much labour took\nthem off.\n\nThen the ruler, his powerful old enemy, spoke these words to him: I do\nnot know what your motives were in doing what you have done in all these\nyears of your slavery; nor do I ask to be told. It is sufficient for me\nto know you have done these things, which are for my benefit and are a\ndebt which must now be paid. You are henceforth free, and the\npossessions you were deprived of shall be restored to you, and as to the\npast and all the evil thoughts you had of me and all you did against me,\nit is forgiven and from this day will be forgotten. Go now in peace.\n\nWhen this last word had been spoken by his enemy, all that remained of\nthe old hatred and bitterness went out of him, and it was as if his soul\nas well as his feet had been burdened with heavy irons and that they had\nnow been removed, and that he was free with a freedom he had never known\nbefore.\n\nWhen the reading was finished, the queen with eyes cast down remained\nfor some time immersed in thought; then with a keen glance at the maid's\nface she asked for the book, and opening it began slowly turning the\nleaves. By and by her face darkened, and in a stern tone of voice she\nsaid: Come here and show me in this book the parable you have just read,\nand then you shall also show me two or three other parables you have\nread to me on former occasions, which I cannot find.\n\nThe maid, pale and trembling, came and dropped on her knees and begged\nforgiveness for having recited these three or four tales, which she had\nheard or read elsewhere and committed to memory, and had pretended to\nread them out of the book.\n\nThen the queen in a sudden rage said: Go from me and let me not see you\nagain if you do not wish to be stripped and scourged and thrust naked\nout of the gates! And you only escape this punishment because the deceit\nyou have been practising on me is, to my thinking, not of your own\ninvention, but that of some crafty monk who is making you his\ninstrument.\n\nEditha, terrified and weeping, hurriedly quitted the room.\n\nBy and by, when that sudden tempest of rage had subsided, the\ndespondence, which had been somewhat lightened by the maid's presence,\ncame back on her so heavily that it was almost past endurance. She rose\nand went to her sleeping-room, and knelt before a table on which stood a\ncrucifix with an image of the Saviour on it--the emblem of the religion\nshe had so great a quarrel with. But not to pray. Folding her arms on\nthe table and dropping her face on them she said: What have I done? And\nagain and again she repeated: What have I done? Was it indeed a monk who\ntaught her this deceit, or some higher being who put it in her mind to\nwhisper a hope to my soul? To show me a way of escape from everlasting\ndeath--to labour in his fields and pleasure-grounds, a wretched slave\nwith irons on her feet, to be scourged and mocked at, and in this state\nto cast out hatred and bitterness from my own soul and all remembrance\nof the injuries he had inflicted on me--to teach myself through long\nmiserable years that this powerful enemy and persecutor is a kind and\nloving master? This is the parable, and now my soul tells me it would be\na light punishment when I look at the red stains on these hands, and\nwhen the image of the boy I loved and murdered comes back to me. This\nthen was the message, and I drove the messenger from me with cruel\nthreats and insult.\n\nSuddenly she rose, and going hurriedly out, called to her maids to bring\nEditha to her. They told her the maid had departed instantly on being\ndismissed, and had gone upwards of an hour. Then she ordered them to go\nand search for her in all the neighbourhood, at every house, and when\nthey had found her to bring her back by persuasion or by force.\n\nThey returned after a time only to say they had sought for her\neverywhere and had failed to find or hear any report of her, but that\nsome of the mounted men who had gone to look for her on the roads had\nnot yet returned.\n\nLeft alone once more she turned to a window which looked towards\nSalisbury, and saw the westering sun hanging low in a sky of broken\nclouds over the valley of the Avon and the green downs on either side.\nAnd, still communing with herself, she said: I know that I shall not\nendure it long--this great fear of God--I know that it will madden me.\nAnd for the unforgiven who die mad there can be no hope. Only the sight\nof my maid's face with God's peace in it could save me from madness. No,\nI shall not go mad! I shall take it as a sign that I cannot be forgiven\nif the sun goes down without my seeing her again. I shall kill myself\nbefore madness comes and rest oblivious of life and all things, even of\nGod's wrath, until the dreadful waking.\n\nFor some time longer she continued standing motionless, watching the\nsun, now sinking behind a dark cloud, then emerging and lighting up the\ndim interior of her room and her stone-white, desolate face.\n\nThen once more her servants came back, and with them Editha, who had\nbeen found on the road to Salisbury, half-way there.\n\nLeft alone together, the queen took the maid by the hand and led her to\na seat, then fell on her knees before her and clasped her legs and\nbegged her forgiveness. When the maid replied that she had forgiven her,\nand tried to raise her up, she resisted, and cried: No, I cannot rise\nfrom my knees nor loose my hold on you until I have confessed to you and\nyou have promised to save me. Now I see in you not my maid who combs my\nhair and ties my shoe-strings, but one that God loves, whom he exalts\nabove the queens and nobles of the earth, and while I cling to you he\nwill not strike. Look into this heart that has hated him, look at its\nfrightful passions, its blood-guiltiness, and have compassion on me! And\nif you, O Editha, should reply to me that it is his will, for he has\nsaid it, that every soul shall save itself, show me the way. How shall I\napproach him? Teach me humility!\n\nThus she pleaded and abased herself. Nevertheless it was a hard task she\nimposed upon her helper, seeing that humility, of all virtues, was the\nmost contrary to her nature. And when she was told that the first step\nto be taken was to be reconciled to the church, and to the head of the\nchurch, her chief enemy and persecutor, whose monks, obedient to his\ncommand, had blackened her name in all the land, her soul was in fierce\nrevolt. Nevertheless she had to submit, seeing that God himself through\nhis Son when on earth and his Son's disciples had established the\nchurch, and by that door only could any soul approach him. So there was\nan end to that conflict, and Elfrida, beaten and broken, although ever\nsecretly hating the tonsured keepers of her soul, set forth under their\nguidance on her weary pilgrimage--the long last years of her bitter\nexpiation.\n\nYet there was to be one more conflict between the two women--the\nimperious mistress and the humble-minded maid. This was when Editha\nannounced to the other that the time had now come for her to depart. But\nthe queen wished to keep her, and tried by all means to do so, by\npleading with her and by threatening to detain her by force. Then\nrepenting her anger and remembering the great debt of gratitude owing to\nthe girl, she resolved to reward her generously, to bestow wealth on\nher, but in such a form that it would appear to the girl as a beautiful\nparting gift from one who had loved her: only afterwards, when they were\nfar apart, would she discover its real value.\n\nA memory of the past had come to her--of that day, sixteen years ago,\nwhen her lover came to her and using sweet flattering words poured out\nfrom a bag a great quantity of priceless jewels into her lap, and of the\njoy she had in the gift. Also how from the day of Athelwold's death she\nhad kept those treasures put away in the same bag out of her sight. Nor\nin all the days of her life with Edgar had she ever worn a gem, though\nshe had always loved to array herself magnificently, but her ornaments\nhad been gold only, the work of the best artists in Europe. Now, in\nimitation of Athelwold, when his manner of bestowing the jewels had so\ncharmed her, she would bestow them on the girl.\n\nAccordingly when the moment of separation came and Editha was made to\nseat herself, the queen standing over her with the bag in her hand said:\nDo you, Editha, love all beautiful things? And when the maid had replied\nthat she did, the other said: Then take these gems, which are beautiful,\nas a parting gift from me. And with that she poured out the mass of\nglittering jewels into the girl's lap.\n\nBut the maid without touching or even looking at them, and with a cry, I\nwant no jewels! started to her feet so that they were all scattered upon\nthe floor.\n\nThe queen stared astonished at the face before her with its new look of\npride and excitement, then with rising anger she said: Is my maid too\nproud then to accept a gift from me? Does she not know that a single one\nof those gems thrown on the floor would be more than a fortune to her?\n\nThe girl replied in the same proud way: I am not your maid, and gems are\nno more to me than pebbles from the brook!\n\nThen all at once recovering her meek, gentle manner she cried in a voice\nthat pierced the queen's heart: O, not your maid, only your\nfellow-worker in our Master's fields and pleasure-grounds! Before I ever\nbeheld your face, and since we have been together, my heart has bled for\nyou, and my daily cry to God has been: Forgive her! Forgive her, for his\nsake who died for our sins! And this shall I continue to cry though I\nshall see you no more on earth. But we shall meet again. Not, O unhappy\nqueen, at life's end, but long afterwards--long, long years! long ages!\n\nDropping on her knees she caught and kissed the queen's hand, shedding\nabundant tears on it, then rose and was quickly gone.\n\nElfrida, left to herself, scarcely recovered from the shock of surprise\nat that sudden change in the girl's manner, began to wonder at her own\nblindness in not having seen through her disguise from the first. The\nrevelation had come to her only at the last moment in that proud gesture\nand speech when her gift was rejected, not without scorn. A child of\nnobles great as any in the land, what had made her do this thing? What\nindeed but the heavenly spirit that was in her, the spirit that was in\nChrist--the divine passion to save!\n\nNow she began to ponder on those last words the maid had spoken, and the\nmore she thought of them the greater became her sadness until it was\nlike the approach of death. O terrible words! Yet it was what she had\nfeared, even when she had dared to hope for forgiveness. Now she knew\nwhat her life after death was to be since the word had been spoken by\nthose inspired lips. O dreadful destiny! To dwell alone, to tread alone\nthat desert desolate, that illimitable waste of burning sand stretching\nfrom star to star through infinite space, where was no rock nor tree to\ngive her shade, no fountain to quench her fiery thirst! For that was how\nshe imaged the future life, as a desert to be dwelt in until in the end,\nwhen in God's good time--the time of One to whom a thousand years are as\none day--she would receive the final pardon and be admitted to rest in a\ngreen and shaded place.\n\nOvercome with the agonising thought she sank down on her couch and fell\ninto a faint. In that state she was found by her women, reclining, still\nas death, with eyes closed, the whiteness of death in her face; and\nthinking her dead they rushed out terrified, crying aloud and lamenting\nthat the queen was dead.\n\n\n\n\nXII\n\n\nShe was not dead. She recovered from that swoon, but never from the\ndeep, unbroken sadness caused by those last words of the maid Editha,\nwhich had overcome and nearly slain her. She now abandoned her\nseclusion, but the world she returned to was not the old one. The\nthought that every person she met was saying in his or her heart: This\nis Elfrida; this is the queen who murdered Edward the Martyr, her\nstep-son, made that world impossible. The men and women she now\nconsorted with were the religious and ecclesiastics of all degrees, and\nabbots and abbesses. These were the people she loved least, yet now into\ntheir hands she deliberately gave herself; and to those who questioned\nher, to her spiritual guides, she revealed all her life and thoughts and\npassions, opening her soul to their eyes like a manuscript for them to\nread and consider; and when they told her that in God's sight she was\nguilty of the murder both of Edward and Athelwold, she replied that they\ndoubtless knew best what was in God's mind, and whatever they commanded\nher to do that should be done, and if in her own mind it was not as they\nsaid this could be taken as a defect in her understanding. For in her\nheart she was not changed, and had not yet and never would learn the\nbitter lesson of humility. Furthermore, she knew better than they what\nlife and death had in store for her, since it had been revealed to her\nby holier lips than those of any priest. Lips on which had been laid a\ncoal from the heavenly altar, and what they had foretold would come to\npass--that unearthly pilgrimage and purification--that destiny,\ndreadful, ineluctable, that made her soul faint to think of it. Here, on\nthis earth, it was for her to toil, a slave with heavy irons on her\nfeet, in her master's fields and pleasure-grounds, and these gowned men\nwith shaven heads, wearing ropes of beads and crucifixes as emblems of\ntheir authority--these were the taskmasters set over her, and to these,\nshe, Elfrida, one time queen in England, would bend in submission and\nhumbly confess her sins, and uncomplainingly take whatever austerities\nor other punishments they decreed.\n\nHere, then, at Amesbury itself, she began her works of expiation, and\nfound that she, too, like the unhappy man in the parable, could\nexperience some relief and satisfaction in her solitary embittered\nexistence in the work itself.\n\nHaving been told that at this village where she was living a monastery\nhad existed and had been destroyed in the dreadful wars of two to three\ncenturies ago, she conceived the idea of founding a new one, a nunnery,\nand endowing it richly, and accordingly the Abbey of Amesbury was built\nand generously endowed by her.\n\nThis religious house became famous in after days, and was resorted to by\nthe noblest ladies in the land who desired to take the veil, including\nprincesses and widow queens; and it continued to flourish for centuries,\ndown to the Dissolution.\n\nThis work completed, she returned, after nineteen years, to her old home\nat Wherwell. Since she had lost sight of her maid Editha, she had been\npossessed with a desire to re-visit that spot, where she had been happy\nas a young bride and had repined in solitude and had had her glorious\ntriumph and stained her soul with crime. She craved for it again,\nespecially to look once more at the crystal current of the Test in which\nshe had been accustomed to dip her hands. The grave, saintly face of\nEditha had reminded her of that stream; and Editha she might not see.\nShe could not seek for her, nor speak to her, nor cry to her to come\nback to her, since she had said that they would meet no more on earth.\n\nHaving become possessed of the castle which she had once regarded as her\nprison and cage, she ordered its demolition and used the materials in\nbuilding the abbey she founded at that spot, and it was taken for\ngranted by the Church that this was done in expiation of the part she\nhad taken in Athelwold's murder. At this spot where the stream became\nassociated in her mind with the thought of Editha, and was a sacred\nstream, she resolved to end her days. But the time of her retirement was\nnot yet, there was much still waiting for her to do in her master's\nfields and pleasure-grounds. For no sooner had the tidings of her work\nin founding these monasteries and the lavish use she was making of her\ngreat wealth been spread abroad, than from many religious houses all\nover the land the cry was sent to her--the Macedonian cry to St. Paul to\ncome over and help us.\n\nFrom the houses founded by Edgar the cry was particularly loud and\ninsistent. There were forty-seven of them, and had not Edgar died so\nsoon there would have been fifty, that being the number he had set his\nheart on in his fervid zeal for religion. All, alas! were insufficiently\nendowed; and it was for Elfrida, as they were careful to point out, to\nincrease their income from her great wealth, seeing that this would\nenable them to associate her name with that of Edgar and keep it in\nmemory, and this would be good for her soul.\n\nTo all such calls she listened, and she performed many and long journeys\nto the religious houses all over the country to look closely into their\nconditions and needs, and to all she gave freely or in moderation, but\nnot always without a gesture of scorn. For in her heart of hearts she\nwas still Elfrida and unchanged, albeit outwardly she had attained to\nhumility; only once during these years of travel and toil when she was\ngetting rid of her wealth did she allow her secret bitterness and\nhostility to her ecclesiastical guides and advisers to break out.\n\nShe was at Worcester, engaged in a conference with the bishop and\nseveral of his clergy; they were sitting at an oak table with some\npapers and plans before them, when the news was brought into the room\nthat Archbishop Dunstan was dead.\n\nThey all, except Elfrida, started to their feet with the looks and\nexclamations of dismay, as if some frightful calamity had come to pass.\nThen dropping to their knees with bowed heads and lifted hands they\nprayed for the repose of his soul. They prayed silently, but the silence\nwas broken by a laugh from the queen. Starting to his feet the bishop\nturned on her a severe countenance, and asked why she laughed at that\nsolemn moment.\n\nShe replied that she had laughed unthinkingly, as the linnet sings, from\npure joy of heart at the glad tidings that their holy archbishop had\nbeen translated to paradise. For if he had done so much for England when\nburdened with the flesh, how much more would he be able to do now from\nthe seat or throne to which he would be exalted in heaven in virtue of\nthe position his blessed mother now occupied in that place.\n\nThe bishop, angered at her mocking words, turned his back on her, and\nthe others, following his example, averted their faces, but not one word\ndid they utter.\n\nThey remembered that Dunstan in former years, when striving to make\nhimself all powerful in the kingdom, had made free use of a supernatural\nmachinery; that when he wanted something done and it could not be done\nin any other way, he received a command from heaven, brought to him by\nsome saint or angel, to have it done, and the command had then to be\nobeyed. They also remembered that when Dunstan, as he informed them, had\nbeen snatched up into the seventh heaven, he did not on his return to\nearth modestly, like St. Paul, that it was not lawful for him to speak\nof the things which he had heard and seen, but he proclaimed them to an\nastonished world in his loudest trumpet voice. Also, that when, by these\nmeans, he had established his power and influence and knew that he could\ntrust his own subtle brains to maintain his position, he had dropped the\nmiracles and visions. And it had come to pass that when the archbishop\nhad seen fit to leave the supernatural element out of his policy, the\nheads of the Church in England were only too pleased to have it so. The\nworld had gaped with astonishment at these revelations long enough, and\nits credulity had come near to the breaking point, on which account the\nraking up of these perilous matters by the queen was fiercely resented.\n\nBut the queen was not yet satisfied that enough had been said by her.\nNow she was in full revolt she must give out once for all the hatred of\nher old enemy, which his death had not appeased.\n\nWhat mean you, Fathers, she cried, by turning your backs on me and\nkeeping silence? Is it an insult to me you intend or to the memory of\nthat great and holy man who has just quitted the earth? Will you dare to\nsay that the reports he brought to us of the marvellous doings he\nwitnessed in heaven, when he was taken there, were false and the lies\nand inventions of Satan, whose servant he was?\n\nMore than that she was not allowed to say, for now the bishop in a\nmighty rage swung round, and dealt a blow on the table with such fury\nthat his arm was disabled by it, he shouted at her: Not another word!\nHold your mocking tongue, fiendish woman! Then plucking up his gown with\nhis left hand for fear of being tripped up by it he rushed out of the\nroom.\n\nThe others, still keeping their faces averted from her, followed at a\nmore dignified pace; and seeing them depart she cried after them: Go,\nFathers, and tell your bishop that if he had not run away so soon he\nwould have been rewarded for his insolence by a slap in the face.\n\nThis outburst on her part caused no lasting break in her relations with\nthe Church. It was to her merely an incident in her long day's toil in\nher master's fields--a quarrel she had had with an overseer; while he,\non his side, even before he recovered the use of his injured arm,\nthought it best for their souls, as well as for the interests of the\nChurch, to say no more about it. Her great works of expiation were\naccordingly continued. But the time at length arrived for her to take\nher long-desired rest before facing the unknown dreaded future. She was\nnot old in years, but remorse and a deep settled melancholy and her\nfrequent fierce wrestlings with her own rebellious nature as with an\nuntamed dangerous animal chained to her had made her old. Furthermore,\nshe had by now well-nigh expended all her possessions and wealth, even\nto the gems she had once prized and then thrust away out of sight for\nmany years, and which her maid Editha had rejected with scorn, saying\nthey were no more to her than pebbles from the brook.\n\nOnce more at Wherwell, she entered the Abbey, and albeit she took the\nveil herself she was not under the same strict rule as her sister nuns.\nThe Abbess herself retired to Winchester and ruled the convent from that\ncity, while Elfrida had the liberty she desired, to live and do as she\nliked in her own rooms and attend prayers and meals only when inclined\nto do so. There, as always, since Edward's death, her life was a\nsolitary one, and in the cold season she would have her fire of logs and\nsit before it as in the old days in the castle, brooding ever on her\nhappy and unhappy past and on the awful future, the years and centuries\nof suffering and purification.\n\nIt was chiefly this thought of the solitariness of that future state,\nthat companionless way, centuries long, that daunted her. Here in this\nearthly state, darkened as it was, there were yet two souls she could\nand constantly did hold communion with--Editha still on earth, though\nnot with her, and Edward in heaven; but in that dreadful desert to which\nshe would be banished there would be a great gulf set between her soul\nand theirs.\n\nBut perhaps there would be others she had known, whose lives had been\ninterwoven with hers, she would be allowed to commune with in that same\nplace. Edgar of a certainty would be there, although Glastonbury had\nbuilt him a chapel and put him in a silver tomb and had begun to call\nhim Saint Edgar. Would he find her and seek to have speech with her? It\nwas anguish to her even to think of such an encounter. She would say, Do\nnot come to me, for rather would I be alone in this dreadful solitude\nfor a thousand years than have you, Edgar, for company. For I have not\nnow one thought or memory of you in my soul that is not bitter. It is\ntrue that I once loved you: even before I saw your face I loved you, and\nsaid in my heart that we two were destined to be one. And my love\nincreased when we were united, and you gave me my heart's desire--the\npower I loved, and glory in the sight of the world. And although in my\nheart I laughed at your pretended zeal for a pure religion while you\nwere gratifying your lower desires and chasing after fair women all over\nthe land, I admired and gloried in your nobler qualities, your activity\nand vigilance in keeping the peace within your borders, and in making\nEngland master of the seas, so that the pirate kings of the North\nventured not to approach our shores. But on your own gross appetites you\nwould put no restraint, but gave yourself up to wine and gluttony and\nmade a companion of Death, even in the flower of your age you were\nplaying with Death, and when you had lived but half your years you rode\naway with Death and left me alone; you, Edgar, the mighty hunter and\nslayer of wolves, you rode away and left me to the wolves, alone, in a\ndark forest. Therefore the guilt of Edward's death is yours more than\nmine, though my soul is stained red with his blood, seeing that you left\nme to fight alone, and in my madness, not knowing what I did, I stained\nmyself with this crime.\n\nBut what you have done to me is of little moment, seeing that mine is\nbut one soul of the many thousands that were given into your keeping,\nand your crime in wasting your life for the sake of base pleasures was\ncommitted against an entire nation, and not of the living only but also\nthe great and glorious dead of the race of Cerdic--of the men who have\nlaboured these many centuries, shedding their blood on a hundred\nstricken fields, to build up this kingdom of England; and when their\nmighty work was completed it was given into your hands to keep and\nguard. And you died and abandoned it; Death, your playmate, has taken\nyou away, and Edgar's peace is no more. Now your ships are scattered or\nsunk in the sea, now the invaders are again on your coasts as in the old\ndreadful days, burning and slaying, and want is everywhere and fear is\nin all hearts throughout the land. And the king, your son, who inherited\nyour beautiful face and nought beside except your vices and whatever was\nleast worthy of a king, he too is now taking his pleasure, even as you\ntook yours, in a gay bejewelled dress, with some shameless woman at his\nside and a wine-cup in his hand. O unhappy mother that I am, that I must\ncurse the day a son was born to me! O grief immitigable that it was my\ndeed, my dreadful deed, that raised him to the throne--the throne that\nwas Alfred's and Edmund's and Athelstan's!\n\nThese were the thoughts that were her only company as she sat brooding\nbefore her winter fire, day after day, and winter following winter,\nwhile the years deepened the lines of anguish on her face and whitened\nthe hair that was once red gold.\n\nBut in the summer time she was less unhappy, for then she could spend\nthe long hours out of doors under the sky in the large shaded gardens of\nthe convent with the stream for boundary on the lower side. This stream\nhad now become more to her than in the old days when, languishing in\nsolitude, she had made it a companion and confidant. For now it had\nbecome associated in her mind with the image of the maid Editha, and\nwhen she sat again at the old spot on the bank gazing on the swift\ncrystal current, then dipping her hand in it and putting the wetted hand\nto her lips, the stream and Editha were one.\n\nThen one day she was missed, and for a long time they sought for her all\nthrough the building and in the grounds without finding her. Then the\nseekers heard a loud cry, and saw one of the nuns running towards the\nconvent door, with her hands pressed to her face as if to shut out some\ndreadful sight; and when they called to her she pointed back towards the\nstream and ran on to the house. Then all the sisters who were out in the\ngrounds hurried down to the stream to the spot where Elfrida was\naccustomed to sit, and were horrified to see her lying drowned in the\nwater.\n\nIt was a hot, dry summer and the stream was low, and in stooping to dip\nher hand in the water she had lost her balance and fallen in, and\nalthough the water was but three feet deep she had in her feebleness\nbeen unable to save herself. She was lying on her back on the clearly\nseen bed of many-coloured pebbles, her head pointing downstream, and the\nswift fretting current had carried away her hood and pulled out her long\nabundant silver-white hair, and the current played with her hair, now\npulling it straight out, then spreading it wide over the surface, mixing\nits silvery threads with the hair-like green blades of the floating\nwater-grass. And the dead face was like marble; but the wide-open eyes\nthat had never wholly lost their brilliance and the beautiful lungwort\nblue colour were like living eyes--living and gazing through the\ncrystal-clear running water at the group of nuns staring down with\nhorror-struck faces at her.\n\nThus ended Elfrida's darkened life; nor did it seem an unfit end; for it\nwas as if she had fallen into the arms of the maiden who had in her\nthoughts become one with the stream--the saintly Editha through whose\nsacrifice and intercession she had been saved from death everlasting.\n\n\n\n\nAN OLD THORN\n\n\n[Illustration: HAWTHORN AND IVY NEAR THE GREAT RIDGE WOOD.]\n\n\n\n\nI\n\n\nThe little village of Ingden lies in a hollow of the South Wiltshire\nDowns, the most isolated of the villages in that lonely district. Its\none short street is crossed at right angles in the middle part by the\nSalisbury road, and standing just at that point, the church on one hand,\nthe old inn on the other, you can follow it with the eye for a distance\nof nearly three miles. First it goes winding up the low down under which\nthe village stands, then vanishes over the brow to reappear again a mile\nand a half further away as a white band on the vast green slope of the\nsucceeding down, which rises to a height of over 600 feet. On the summit\nit vanishes once more, but those who use it know it for a laborious road\ncrossing several high ridges before dropping down into the valley road\nleading to Salisbury.\n\nWhen, standing in the village street, your eye travels up that white\nband, you can distinctly make out even at that distance a small,\nsolitary tree standing near the summit--an old thorn with an ivy growing\non it. My walks were often that way, and invariably on coming to that\npoint I would turn twenty yards aside from the road to spend half an\nhour seated on the turf near or under the old tree. These half-hours\nwere always grateful; and conscious that the tree drew me to it I\nquestioned myself as to the reason. It was, I told myself, nothing but\nmental curiosity: my interest was a purely scientific one. For how comes\nit, I asked, that a thorn can grow to a tree and live to a great age in\nsuch a situation, on a vast, naked down, where for many centuries,\nperhaps for thousands of years, the herbage has been so closely fed by\nsheep as to have the appearance of a carpet, or newly mown lawn? The\nseed is carried and scattered everywhere by the birds, but no sooner\ndoes it germinate and send up a shoot than it is eaten down to the\nroots; for there is no scent that attracts a sheep more, no flavour it\nhas greater taste for, than that of any forest seedling springing up\namidst the minute herbaceous plants which carpet the downs. The thorn,\nlike other organisms, has its own unconscious intelligence and cunning,\nby means of which it endeavours to save itself and fulfil its life. It\nopens its first tender leaves under the herbage, and at the same time\nthrusts up a vertical spine to wound the nibbling mouth; and no sooner\nhas it got a leaf or two and a spine than it spreads its roots all\nround, and from each of them springs a fresh shoot, leaves and\nprotecting spine, to increase the chances of preservation. In vain! the\ncunning animal finds a way to defeat all this strategy, and after the\nleaves have been bitten off again and again, the infant plant gives up\nthe struggle and dies in the ground. Yet we see that from time to time\none survives--one perhaps in a million; but how--whether by a quicker\ngrowth or a harder or more poisonous thorn, an unpalatable leaf, or some\nother secret agency--we cannot guess. First as a diminutive scrubby\nshrub, with numerous iron-hard stems, with few and small leaves but many\nthorns, it keeps its poor flowerless frustrate life for perhaps half a\ncentury or longer, without growing more than a couple of feet high; and\nthen, as by a miracle, it will spring up until its top shoots are out of\nreach of the browsing sheep, and in the end it becomes a tree with\nspreading branches and fully developed leaves, and flowers and fruit in\ntheir season.\n\nOne day I was visited by an artist from a distance who, when shown the\nthorn, pronounced it a fine subject for his pencil, and while he made\nhis picture we talked about the hawthorn generally as compared with\nother trees, and agreed that, except in its blossoming time when it is\nmerely pretty, it is the most engaging and perhaps the most beautiful of\nour native trees. We said that it was the most _individual_ of trees,\nthat its variety was infinite, for you never find two alike, whether\ngrowing in a forest, in groups, or masses, or alone. We were almost\nlyrical in its praises. But the solitary thorn was always best, he said,\nand this one was perhaps the best of all he had seen: strange and at the\nsame time decorative in its form, beautiful too in its appearance of\ngreat age with unimpaired vigour and something more in its\nexpression--that elusive something which we find in some trees and don't\nknow how to explain.\n\nAh, yes, thought I, it was this appeal to the aesthetic faculty which\nattracted me from the first, and not, as I had imagined, the mere\ncuriosity of the naturalist interested mainly and always in the _habits_\nof living things, plant or animal.\n\nCertainly the thorn had strangeness. Its appearance as to height was\ndeceptive; one would have guessed it eighteen feet; measuring it I was\nsurprised to find it only ten. It has four separate boles, springing\nfrom one root, leaning a little away from each other, the thickest just\na foot in circumference. The branches are few, beginning at about five\nfeet from the ground, the foliage thin, the leaves throughout the summer\nstained with grey, rust-red, and purple colour. Though so small and\nexposed to the full fury of every wind that blows over that vast naked\ndown, it has yet an ivy growing on it--the strangest of the many strange\nivy-plants I have seen. It comes out of the ground as two ivy trunks on\nopposite sides of the stoutest bole, but at a height of four feet from\nthe surface the two join and ascend the tree as one round iron-coloured\nand iron-hard stem, which goes curving and winding snakewise among the\nbranches as if with the object of roping them to save them from being\ntorn off by the winds. Finally, rising to the top, the long serpent stem\nopens out in a flat disc-shaped mass of close-packed branchlets and\ntwigs densely set with small round leaves, dark dull green and tough as\nparchment. One could only suppose that thorn and ivy had been partners\nfrom the beginning of life, and that the union was equally advantageous\nto both.\n\nThe small ivy disc or platform on top of the tree was a favourite stand\nand look-out for the downland birds. I seldom visited the spot without\ndisturbing some of them, now a little company of missel-thrushes, now a\ncrowd of starlings, then perhaps a dozen rooks, crowded together,\nlooking very big and conspicuous on their little platform.\n\nBeing curious to find out something about the age of the tree, I\ndetermined to put the question to my old friend Malachi, aged\neighty-nine, who was born and had always lived in the parish and had\nknown the downs and probably every tree growing on them for miles around\nfrom his earliest years. It was my custom to drop in of an evening and\nsit with him, listening to his endless reminiscences of his young days.\nThat evening I spoke of the thorn, describing its position and\nappearance, thinking that perhaps he had forgotten it. How long, I asked\nhim, had the thorn been there?\n\nHe was one of those men, usually of the labouring class, to be met with\nin such lonely, out-of-the-world places as the Wiltshire Downs, whose\neyes never look old however many their years may be, and are more like\nthe eyes of a bird or animal than a human being, for they gaze at you\nand through you when you speak without appearing to know what you say.\nSo it was on this occasion; he looked straight at me with no sign of\nunderstanding, no change in his clear grey eyes, and answered nothing.\nBut I would not be put off, and when, raising my voice, I repeated the\nquestion, he replied, after another interval of silence, that the thorn\n\"was never any different.\" 'Twas just the same, ivy and all, when he\nwere a small boy. It looked just so old; why, he remembered his old\nfather saying the same thing--'twas the same when he were a boy, and\n'twas the same in his father's time. Then anxious to escape from the\nsubject he began talking of something else.\n\nIt struck me that after all the most interesting thing about the thorn\nwas its appearance of great age, and this aspect I had now been told had\ncontinued for at least a century, probably for a much longer time. It\nproduced a reverent feeling in me such as we experience at the sight of\nsome ancient stone monument. But the tree was alive, and because of its\nlife the feeling was perhaps stronger than in the case of a granite\ncross or cromlech or other memorial of antiquity.\n\nSitting by the thorn one day it occurred to me that, growing at this\nspot close to the road and near the summit of that vast down, numberless\npersons travelling to and from Salisbury must have turned aside to rest\non the turf in the shade after that laborious ascent or before beginning\nthe long descent to the valley below. Travellers of all conditions, on\nfoot or horseback, in carts and carriages, merchants, bagmen, farmers,\ndrovers, gipsies, tramps and vagrants of all descriptions, and from time\nto time troops of soldiers. Yet never one of them had injured the tree\nin any way! I could not remember ever finding a tree growing alone by\nthe roadside in a lonely place which had not the marks of many old and\nnew wounds inflicted on its trunk with knives, hatchets, and other\nimplements. Here not a mark, not a scratch had been made on any one of\nits four trunks or on the ivy stem by any thoughtless or mischievous\nperson, nor had any branch been cut or broken off. Why had they one and\nall respected this tree?\n\nIt was another subject to talk to Malachi about, and to him I went after\ntea and found him with three of his neighbours sitting by the fire and\ntalking; for though it was summer the old man always had a fire in the\nevening.\n\nThey welcomed and made room for me, but I had no sooner broached the\nsubject in my mind than they all fell into silence, then after a brief\ninterval the three callers began to discuss some little village matter.\nI was not going to be put off in that way, and, leaving them out, went\non talking to Malachi about the tree. Presently one by one the three\nvisitors got up and, remarking that it was time to be going, they took\ntheir departure.\n\nThe old man could not escape nor avoid listening, and in the end had to\nsay something. He said he didn't know nothing about all them tramps and\ngipsies and other sorts of men who had sat by the tree; all he knowed\nwas that the old thorn had been a good thorn to him--first and last. He\nremembered once when he was a young man, not yet twenty, he went to do\nsome work at a village five miles away, and being winter time he left\nearly, about four o'clock, to walk home over the downs. He had just got\nmarried, and had promised his wife to be home for tea at six o'clock.\nBut a thick fog came up over the downs, and soon as it got dark he lost\nhimself. 'Twas the darkest, thickest night he had ever been out in; and\nwhenever he came against a bank or other obstruction he would get down\non his hands and knees and feel it up and down to get its shape and find\nout what it was, for he knew all the marks on his native downs; 'twas\nall in vain--nothing could he recognise. In this way he wandered about\nfor hours, and was in despair of getting home that night, when all at\nonce there came a sense of relief, a feeling that it was all right, that\nsomething was guiding him.\n\nI remarked that I knew what that meant: he had lost his sense of\ndirection and had now all at once recovered it; such a thing had often\nhappened; I once had such an experience myself.\n\nNo, it was not that, he returned. He had not gone a dozen steps from the\nmoment that sense of confidence came to him, before he ran into a tree,\nand feeling the trunk with his hands he recognised it as the old thorn\nand knew where he was. In a couple of minutes he was on the road, and in\nless than an hour, just about midnight, he was safe at home.\n\nNo more could I get out of him, at all events on that occasion; nor did\nI ever succeed in extracting any further personal experience in spite of\nhis having let out that the thorn had been a good thorn to him, first\nand last. I had, however, heard enough to satisfy me that I had at\nlength discovered the real secret of the tree's fascination. I recalled\nother trees which had similarly affected me, and how, long years ago,\nwhen a good deal of my time was spent on horseback, whenever I found\nmyself in a certain district I would go miles out of my way just to look\nat a solitary old tree growing in a lonely place, and to sit for an hour\nto refresh myself, body and soul, in its shade. I had indeed all along\nsuspected the thorn of being one of this order of mysterious trees; and\nfrom other experiences I had met with, one some years ago in a village\nin this same county of Wilts, I had formed the opinion that in many\npersons the sense of a strange intelligence and possibility of power in\nsuch trees is not a mere transitory state but an enduring influence\nwhich profoundly affects their whole lives.\n\nDetermined to find out something more, I went to other villagers, mostly\nwomen, who are more easily disarmed and made to believe that you too\nknow and are of the same mind with them, being under the same mysterious\npower and spell. In this way, laying many a subtle snare, I succeeded in\neliciting a good deal of information. It was, however, mostly of a kind\nwhich could not profitably be used in any inquiry into the subject; it\nsimply went to show that the feeling existed and was strong in many of\nthe villagers. During this inquiry I picked up several anecdotes about a\nperson who lived in Ingden close upon three generations ago, and was\nable to piece them together so as to make a consistent narrative of his\nlife. This was Johnnie Budd, a farm labourer, who came to his end in\n1821, a year or so before my old friend Malachi was born. It is going\nvery far back, but there were circumstances in his life which made a\ndeep impression on the mind of that little community, and the story had\nlived on through all these years.\n\n\n\n\nII\n\n\nJohnnie had fallen on hard times when in an exceptionally severe winter\nseason he with others had been thrown out of employment at the farm\nwhere he worked; then with a wife and three small children to keep he\nhad in his desperation procured food for them one dark night in an\nadjacent field. But alas! one of the little ones playing in the road\nwith some of her companions, who were all very hungry, let it out that\nshe wasn't hungry, that for three days she had had as much nice meat as\nshe wanted to eat! Play over, the hungry little ones flew home to tell\ntheir parents the wonderful news--why didn't they have nice meat like\nTilly Budd, instead of a piece of rye bread without even dripping on it,\nwhen they were so hungry? Much talk followed, and spread from cottage to\ncottage until it reached the constable's ears, and he, already informed\nof the loss of a wether taken from its fold close by, went straight to\nJohnnie and charged him with the offence. Johnnie lost his head, and\ndropping on his knees confessed his guilt and begged his old friend\nLampard to have mercy on him and to overlook it for the sake of his wife\nand children.\n\nIt was his first offence, but when he was taken from the lock-up at the\ntop of the village street to be conveyed to Salisbury, his friends and\nneighbours who had gathered at the spot to witness his removal shook\ntheir heads and doubted that Ingden would ever see him again. The\nconfession had made the case so simple a one that he had at once been\ncommitted to take his trial at the Salisbury Assizes, and as the time\nwas near the constable had been ordered to convey the prisoner to the\ntown himself. Accordingly he engaged old Joe Blaskett, called Daddy in\nthe village, to take them in his pony cart. Daddy did not want the job,\nbut was talked or bullied into it, and there he now sat in his cart,\nwaiting in glum silence for his passengers; a bent old man of eighty,\nwith a lean, grey, bitter face, in his rusty cloak, his old rabbit-skin\ncap drawn down over his ears, his white disorderly beard scattered over\nhis chest. The constable Lampard was a big, powerful man, with a great\nround, good-natured face, but just now he had a strong sense of\nresponsibility, and to make sure of not losing his prisoner he\nhandcuffed him before bringing him out and helping him to take his seat\non the bottom of the cart. Then he got up himself to his seat by the\ndriver's side; the last good-bye was spoken, the weeping wife being\ngently led away by her friends, and the cart rattled away down the\nstreet. Turning into the Salisbury road it was soon out of sight over\nthe near down, but half an hour later it emerged once more into sight\nbeyond the great dip, and the villagers who had remained standing about\nat the same spot watched it crawling like a beetle up the long white\nroad on the slope of the vast down beyond.\n\nJohnnie was now lying coiled up on his rug, his face hidden between his\narms, abandoned to grief, sobbing aloud. Lampard, sitting athwart the\nseat so as to keep an eye on him, burst out at last: \"Be a man, Johnnie,\nand stop your crying! 'Tis making things no better by taking on like\nthat. What do you say, Daddy?\"\n\n\"I say nought,\" snapped the old man, and for a while they proceeded in\nsilence except for those heartrending sobs. As they approached the old\nthorn tree, near the top of the long slope, Johnnie grew more and more\nagitated, his whole frame shaking with his sobbing. Again the constable\nrebuked him, telling him that 'twas a shame for a man to go on like\nthat. Then with an effort he restrained his sobs, and lifting a red,\nswollen, tear-stained face he stammered out: \"Master Lampard, did I ever\nask 'ee a favour in my life?\"\n\n\"What be after now?\" said the other suspiciously. \"Well, no, Johnnie,\nnot as I remember.\"\n\n\"An' do 'ee think I'll ever come back home again, Master Lampard?\"\n\n\"Maybe no, maybe yes; 'tis not for me to say.\"\n\n\"But 'ee knows 'tis a hanging matter?\"\n\n\"'Tis that for sure. But you be a young man with a wife and childer, and\nhave never done no wrong before--not that I ever heard say. Maybe the\njudge'll recommend you to mercy. What do you say, Daddy?\"\n\nThe old man only made some inarticulate sounds in his beard, without\nturning his head.\n\n\"But, Master Lampard, suppose I don't swing, they'll send I over the\nwater and I'll never see the wife and children no more.\"\n\n\"Maybe so; I'm thinking that's how 'twill be.\"\n\n\"Then will 'ee do me a kindness? 'Tis the only one I ever asked 'ee, and\nthere'll be no chance to ask 'ee another.\"\n\n\"I can't say, Johnnie, not till I know what 'tis you want.\"\n\n\"'Tis only this, Master Lampard. When we git to th' old thorn let me out\no' the cart and let me stand under it one minnit and no more.\"\n\n\"Be you wanting to hang yourself before the trial then?\" said the\nconstable, trying to make a joke of it.\n\n\"I couldn't do that,\" said Johnnie, simply, \"seeing my hands be fast and\nyou'd be standing by.\"\n\n\"No, no, Johnnie, 'tis nought but just foolishness. What do you say,\nDaddy?\"\n\nThe old man turned round with a look of sudden rage in his grey face\nwhich startled Lampard; but he said nothing, he only opened and shut his\nmouth two or three times without a sound.\n\nMeanwhile the pony had been going slower and slower for the last thirty\nor forty yards, and now when they were abreast of the tree stood still.\n\n\"What be stopping for?\" cried Lampard. \"Get on--get on, or we'll never\nget to Salisbury this day.\"\n\nThen at length old Blaskett found a voice.\n\n\"Does thee know what thee's saying, Master Lampard, or be thee a\nstranger in this parish?\"\n\n\"What d'ye mean, Daddy? I be no stranger; I've a-known this parish and\nknown 'ee these nine years.\"\n\n\"Thee asked why I stopped when 'twas the pony stopped, knowing where\nwe'd got to. But thee's not born here or thee'd a-known what a hoss\nknows. An' since 'ee asks what I says, I say this, 'twill not hurt 'ee\nto let Johnnie Budd stand one minute by the tree.\"\n\nFeeling insulted and puzzled the constable was about to assert his\nauthority when he was arrested by Johnnie's cry, \"Oh, Master Lampard,\n'tis my last hope!\" and by the sight of the agony of suspense on his\nswollen face. After a short hesitation he swung himself out over the\nside of the cart, and letting down the tailboard laid rough hands on\nJohnnie and half helped, half dragged him out.\n\nThey were quickly by the tree, where Johnnie stood silent with downcast\neyes a few moments; then dropping upon his knees leant his face against\nthe bark, his eyes closed, his lips murmuring.\n\n\"Time's up!\" cried Lampard presently, and taking him by the collar\npulled him to his feet; in a couple of minutes more they were in the\ncart and on their way.\n\nIt was grey weather, very cold, with an east wind blowing, but for the\nrest of that dreary thirteen-miles journey Johnnie was very quiet and\nsubmissive and shed no more tears.\n\n\n\n\nIII\n\n\nWhat had been his motive in wishing to stand by the tree? What did he\nexpect when he said it was his last hope? During the way up the long,\nlaborious slope, an incident of his early years in connection with the\ntree had been in his mind, and had wrought on him until it culminated in\nthat passionate outburst and his strange request. It was when he was a\nboy, not quite ten years old, that, one afternoon in the summer time, he\nwent with other children to look for wild raspberries on the summit of\nthe great down. Johnnie, being the eldest, was the leader of the little\nband. On the way back from the brambly place where the fruit grew, on\napproaching the thorn, they spied a number of rooks sitting on it, and\nit came into Johnnie's mind that it would be great fun to play at crows\nby sitting on the branches as near the top as they could get. Running\non, with cries that sent the rooks cawing away, they began swarming up\nthe trunks, but in the midst of their frolic, when they were all\nstruggling for the best places on the branches, they were startled by a\nshout, and looking up to the top of the down, saw a man on horseback\ncoming towards them at a gallop, shaking a whip in anger as he rode.\nInstantly they began scrambling down, falling over each other in their\nhaste, then, picking themselves up, set off down the slope as fast as\nthey could run. Johnnie was foremost, while close behind him came Marty,\nwho was nearly the same age and, though a girl, almost as swift-footed,\nbut before going fifty yards she struck her foot against an ant-hill and\nwas thrown violently, face down, on the turf. Johnnie turned at her cry\nand flew back to help her up, but the shock of the fall, and her extreme\nterror, had deprived her for the moment of all strength, and while he\nstruggled to raise her, the smaller children, one by one, overtook and\npassed them, and in another moment the man was off his horse, standing\nover them.\n\n\"Do you want a good thrashing?\" he said, grasping Johnnie by the collar.\n\n\"Oh, sir; please don't hit me!\" answered Johnnie; then looking up he was\nastonished to see that his captor was not the stern old farmer, the\ntenant of the down, he had taken him for, but a stranger and a\nstrange-looking man, in a dark grey cloak with a red collar. He had a\npointed beard and long black hair and dark eyes that were not evil yet\nfrightened Johnnie, when he caught them gazing down on him.\n\n\"No, I'll not thrash you,\" said he, \"because you stayed to help the\nlittle maiden, but I'll tell you something for your good about the tree\nyou and your little mates have been climbing, bruising the bark with\nyour heels and breaking off leaves and twigs. Do you know, boy, that if\nyou hurt it, it will hurt you? It stands fast here with its roots in the\nground and you--you can go away from it, you think. 'Tis not so;\nsomething will come out of it and follow you wherever you go and hurt\nand break you at last. But if you make it a friend and care for it, it\nwill care for you and give you happiness and deliver you from evil.\"\n\nThen touching Johnnie's cheeks with his gloved hand he got on his horse\nand rode away, and no sooner was he gone than Marty started up, and hand\nin hand the two children set off at a run down the long slope.\n\nJohnnie's playtime was nearly over then, for by and by he was taken as\nfarmer's boy at one of the village farms. When he was nineteen years\nold, one Sunday evening, when standing in the road with other young\npeople of the village, youths and girls, it was powerfully borne on his\nmind that his old playmate Marty was not only the prettiest and best\ngirl in the place, but that she had something which set her apart and\nfar, far above all other women. For now, after having known her\nintimately from his first years, he had suddenly fallen in love with\nher, a feeling which caused him to shiver in a kind of ecstasy, yet made\nhim miserable, since it had purged his sight and made him see, too, how\nfar apart they were and how hopeless his case. It was true they had been\ncomrades from childhood, fond of each other, but she had grown and\ndeveloped until she had become that most bright and lovely being, while\nhe had remained the same slow-witted, awkward, almost inarticulate\nJohnnie he had always been. This feeling preyed on his poor mind, and\nwhen he joined the evening gathering in the village street he noted\nbitterly how contemptuously he was left out of the conversation by the\nothers, how incapable he was of keeping pace with them in their laughing\ntalk and banter. And, worst of all, how Marty was the leading spirit,\nbandying words and bestowing smiles and pleasantries all round, but\nnever a word or a smile for him. He could not endure it, and so instead\nof smartening himself up after work and going for company to the village\nstreet, he would walk down the secluded lane near the farm to spend the\nhour before supper and bedtime sitting on a gate, brooding on his\nmisery; and if by chance he met Marty in the village he would try to\navoid her, and was silent and uncomfortable in her presence.\n\nAfter work, one hot summer evening, Johnnie was walking along the road\nnear the farm in his working clothes, clay-coloured boots, and old dusty\nhat, when who should he see but Marty coming towards him, looking very\nsweet and fresh in her light-coloured print gown. He looked to this side\nand that for some friendly gap or opening in the hedge so as to take\nhimself out of the road, but there was no way of escape at that spot,\nand he had to pass her, and so casting down his eyes he walked on,\nwishing he could sink into the earth out of her sight. But she would not\nallow him to pass; she put herself directly in his way and spoke.\n\n\"What's the matter with 'ee, Johnnie, that 'ee don't want to meet me and\nhardly say a word when I speak to 'ee?\"\n\nHe could not find a word in reply; he stood still, his face crimson, his\neyes on the ground.\n\n\"Johnnie, dear, what is it?\" she asked, coming closer and putting her\nhand on his arm.\n\nThen he looked up, and seeing the sweet compassion in her eyes, he could\nno longer keep the secret of his pain from her.\n\n\"'Tis 'ee, Marty,\" he said. \"Thee'll never want I--there's others 'ee'll\nlike better. 'Tisn't for I to say a word about that, I'm thinking, for I\nbe--just nothing. An'--an'--I be going away from the village, Marty, and\nI'll never come back no more.\"\n\n\"Oh, Johnnie, don't 'ee say it! Would 'ee go and break my heart? Don't\n'ee know I've always loved 'ee since we were little mites together?\"\n\nAnd thus it came about that Johnnie, most miserable of men, was all at\nonce made happy beyond his wildest dreams. And he proved himself worthy\nof her; from that time there was not a more diligent and sober young\nlabourer in the village, nor one of a more cheerful disposition, nor\nmore careful of his personal appearance when, the day's work done, the\nyoung people had their hour of social intercourse and courting. Yet he\nwas able to put by a portion of his weekly wages of six shillings to buy\nsticks, so that when spring came round again he was able to marry and\ntake Marty to live with him in his own cottage.\n\nOne Sunday afternoon, shortly after this happy event, they went out for\na walk on the high down.\n\n\"Oh, Johnnie, 'tis a long time since we were here together, not since we\nused to come and play and look for cowslips when we were little.\"\n\nJohnnie laughed with pure joy and said they would just be children and\nplay again, now they were alone and out of sight of the village; and\nwhen she smiled up at him he rejoiced to think that his union with this\nperfect girl was producing a happy effect on his poor brains, making him\nas bright and ready with a good reply as any one. And in their happiness\nthey played at being children just as in the old days they had played at\nbeing grown-ups. Casting themselves down on the green, elastic,\nflower-sprinkled turf, they rolled one after the other down the smooth\nslopes of the terrace, the old \"shepherd's steps,\" and by and by\nJohnnie, coming upon a patch of creeping thyme, rubbed his hands in the\npale purple flowers, then rubbed her face to make it fragrant.\n\n\"Oh, 'tis sweet!\" she cried. \"Did 'ee ever see so many little flowers on\nthe down?--'tis as if they came out just for us.\" Then, indicating the\ntiny milkwort faintly sprinkling the turf all about them, \"Oh, the\nlittle blue darlings! Did 'ee ever see such a dear blue?\"\n\n\"Oh, aye, a prettier blue nor that,\" said Johnnie. \"'Tis just here,\nMarty,\" and pressing her down he kissed her on the eyelids a dozen\ntimes.\n\n\"You silly Johnnie!\"\n\n\"Be I silly, Marty? but I love the red too,\" and with that he kissed her\non the mouth. \"And, Marty, I do love the red on the breasties too--won't\n'ee let me have just one kiss there?\"\n\nAnd she, to please him, opened her dress a little way, but blushingly,\nthough she was his wife and nobody was there to see, but it seemed\nstrange to her out of doors with the sun overhead. Oh, 'twas all\ndelicious! Never was earth so heavenly sweet as on that wide green down,\nsprinkled with innumerable little flowers, under the wide blue sky and\nthe all-illuminating sun that shone into their hearts!\n\nAt length, rising to her knees and looking up the green slope, she cried\nout: \"Oh, Johnnie, there's the old thorn tree! Do 'ee remember when we\nplayed at crows on it and had such a fright? 'Twas the last time we came\nhere together. Come, let's go to the old tree and see how it looks now.\"\n\nJohnnie all at once became grave, and said No, he wouldn't go to it for\nanything. She was curious and made him tell her the reason. He had never\nforgotten that day and the fear that came into his mind on account of\nthe words the strange man had spoken. She didn't know what the words\nwere; she had been too frightened to listen, and so he had to tell her.\n\n\"Then, 'tis a wishing-tree for sure,\" Marty exclaimed. When he asked her\nwhat a wishing-tree was, she could only say that her old grandmother,\nnow dead, had told her. 'Tis a tree that knows us and can do us good and\nharm, but will do good only to some; but they must go to it and ask for\nits protection, and they must offer it something as well as pray to it.\nIt must be something bright--a little jewel or coloured bead is best,\nand if you haven't got such a thing, a bright-coloured ribbon, or strip\nof scarlet cloth or silk thread--which you must tie to one of the twigs.\n\n\"But we hurted the tree, Marty, and 'twill do no good to we.\"\n\nThey were both grave now; then a hopeful thought came to her aid. They\nhad not hurt the tree intentionally; the tree knew that--it knew more\nthan any human being. They might go and stand side by side under its\nbranches and ask it to forgive them, and grant them all their desires.\nBut they must not go empty-handed, they must have some bright thing with\nthem when making their prayer. Then she had a fresh inspiration. She\nwould take a lock of her own bright hair, and braid it with some of his,\nand tie it with a piece of scarlet thread.\n\nJohnnie was pleased with this idea, and they agreed to take another\nSunday afternoon walk and carry out their plan.\n\nThe projected walk was never taken, for by and by Marty's mother fell\nill, and Marty had to be with her, nursing her night and day. And months\nwent by, and at length, when her mother died, she was not in a fit\ncondition to go long walks and climb those long, steep slopes. After the\nchild was born, it was harder than ever to leave the house, and Johnnie,\ntoo, had so much work at the farm that he had little inclination to go\nout on Sundays. They ceased to speak of the tree, and their\nlong-projected pilgrimage was impracticable until they could see better\ndays. But the wished time never came, for, after the first child, Marty\nwas never strong. Then a second child came, then a third; and so five\nyears went by, of toil and suffering and love, and the tree, with all\ntheir hopes and fears and intentions regarding it, was less and less in\ntheir minds, and was all but forgotten. Only Johnnie, when at long\nintervals his master sent him to Salisbury with the cart, remembered it\nall only too well when, coming to the top of the down, he saw the old\nthorn directly before him. Passing it, he would turn his face away not\nto see it too closely, or, perhaps, to avoid being recognised by it.\nThen came the time of their extreme poverty, when there was no work at\nthe farm and no one of their own people to help tide them over a season\nof scarcity, for the old people were dead or in the workhouse or so poor\nas to want help themselves. It was then that, in his misery at the sight\nof his ailing anxious wife--the dear Marty of the beautiful vanished\ndays--and his three little hungry children, that he went out into the\nfield one dark night to get them food.\n\nThe whole sad history was in his mind as they slowly crawled up the\nhill, until it came to him that perhaps all their sufferings and this\ngreat disaster had been caused by the tree--by that something from the\ntree which had followed him, never resting in its mysterious enmity\nuntil it broke him. Was it too late to repair that terrible mistake? A\ngleam of hope shone on his darkened mind, and he made his passionate\nappeal to the constable. He had no offering--his hands were powerless\nnow; but at least he could stand by it and touch it with his body and\nface and pray for its forgiveness, and for deliverance from the doom\nwhich threatened him. The constable had compassionately, or from some\nsecret motive, granted his request; but alas! if in very truth the power\nhe had come to believe in resided in the tree, he was too late in\nseeking it.\n\nThe trial was soon over; by pleading guilty Johnnie had made it a very\nsimple matter for the court. The main thing was to sentence him. By an\nunhappy chance the judge was in one of his occasional bad moods; he had\nbeen entertained too well by one of the local magnates on the previous\nevening and had sat late, drinking too much wine, with the result that\nhe had a bad liver, with a mind to match it. He was only too ready to\nseize the first opportunity that offered--and poor Johnnie's case was\nthe first that morning--of exercising the awful power a barbarous law\nhad put into his hands. When the prisoner's defender declared that this\nwas a case which called loudly for mercy, the judge interrupted him to\nsay that he was taking too much upon himself, that he was, in fact,\ninstructing the judge in his duties, which was a piece of presumption on\nhis part. The other was quick to make a humble apology and to bring his\nperfunctory address to a conclusion. The judge, in addressing the\nprisoner, said he had been unable to discover any extenuating\ncircumstances in the case. The fact that he had a wife and family\ndependent on him only added to his turpitude, since it proved that no\nconsideration could serve to deter him from a criminal act. Furthermore,\nin dealing with this case, he must take into account the prevalence of\nthis particular form of crime; he would venture to say that it had been\nencouraged by an extreme leniency in many cases on the part of those\nwhose sacred duty it was to administer the law of the land. A sterner\nand healthier spirit was called for at the present juncture. The time\nhad come to make an example, and a more suitable case than the one now\nbefore him could not have been found for such a purpose. He would\naccordingly hold out no hope of a reprieve, but would counsel prisoner\nto make the best use of the short time remaining to him.\n\nJohnnie standing in the dock appeared to the spectators to be in a\nhalf-dazed condition--as dull and spiritless a clodhopper as they had\never beheld. The judge and barristers, in their wigs and robes and\ngowns, were unlike any human beings he had ever looked on. He might have\nbeen transported to some other world, so strange did the whole scene\nappear to him. He only knew, or surmised, that all these important\npeople were occupied in doing him to death, but the process, the meaning\nof their fine phrases, he could not follow. He looked at them, his\nglazed eyes travelling from face to face, to be fixed finally on the\njudge, in a vacant stare; but he scarcely saw them, he was all the time\ngazing on, and his mind occupied with, other forms and scenes invisible\nto the court. His village, his Marty, his dear little playmate of long\nago, the sweet girl he had won, the wife and mother of his children,\nwith her white, terrified face, clinging to him and crying in anguish:\n\"Oh, Johnnie, what will they do to 'ee?\" And all the time, with it all,\nhe saw the vast green slope of the down, with the Salisbury road lying\nlike a narrow white band across it, and close to it, near the summit,\nthe solitary old tree.\n\nDuring the delivery of the sentence, and when he was led from the dock\nand conveyed back to the prison, that image or vision was still present.\nHe sat staring at the wall of his cell as he had stared at the judge,\nthe fatal tree still before him. Never before had he seen it in that\nvivid way in which it appeared to him now, standing alone on the vast\ngreen down, under the wide sky, its four separate boles leaning a little\nway from each other, like the middle ribs of an open fan, holding up the\nwidespread branches, the thin, open foliage, the green leaves stained\nwith rusty brown and purple; and the ivy, rising like a slender black\nserpent of immense length, springing from the roots, winding upwards,\nand in and out, among the grey branches, binding them together, and\nresting its round, dark cluster of massed leaves on the topmost boughs.\nThat green disc was the ivy-serpent's flat head and was the head of the\nwhole tree, and there it had its eyes, which gazed for ever over the\nwide downs, watching all living things, cattle and sheep and birds and\nmen in their comings and goings; and although fast-rooted in the earth,\nfollowing them, too, in all their ways, even as it had followed him, to\nbreak him at last.\n\n\n\n\nPOSTSCRIPT\n\n\n\n\nI\n\nDEAD MAN'S PLACK\n\n\nOne of my literary friends, who has looked at the Dead Man's Plack in\nmanuscript, has said by way of criticism that Elfrida's character is\nveiled. I am not to blame for that; for have I not already said, by\nimplication at all events, in the Preamble, that my knowledge of her\ncomes from outside. Something, or, more likely, _Somebody_, gave me her\nhistory, and it has occurred to me that this same Somebody was no such\nobscurity as, let us say, the Monk John of Glastonbury, who told the\nexcavators just where to look for the buried chapel of Edgar, king and\n_saint_. I suspect that my informant was some one who knew more about\nElfrida than any mere looker-on, monk or nun, and gossip-gatherer of her\nown distant day; and this suspicion or surmise was suggested by the\nfollowing incident:\n\nAfter haunting Dead Man's Plack, where I had my vision, I rambled in and\nabout Wherwell on account of its association, and in one of the cottages\nin the village I became acquainted with an elderly widow, a woman in\nfeeble health, but singularly attractive in her person and manner.\nIndeed, before making her acquaintance I had been informed by some of\nher relations and others in the place that she was not only the best\nperson to seek information from, but was also the sweetest person in the\nvillage. She was a native born; her family had lived there for\ngenerations, and she was of that best South Hampshire type with an oval\nface, olive-brown skin, black eyes and hair, and that soft melancholy\nexpression in the eyes common in Spanish women and not uncommon in the\ndark-skinned Hampshire women. She had been taught at the village school,\nand having attracted the attention and interest of the great lady of the\nplace on account of her intelligence and pleasing manners, she was taken\nwhen quite young as lady's-maid, and in this employment continued for\nmany years until her marriage to a villager.\n\nOne day, conversing with her, I said I had heard that the village was\nhaunted by the ghost of a woman: was that true?\n\nYes, it was true, she returned.\n\nDid she _know_ that it was true? Had she actually seen the ghost?\n\nYes, she had seen it once. One day, when she was lady's-maid, she was in\nher bedroom, dressing or doing something, with another maid. The door\nwas closed, and they were in a merry mood, talking and laughing, when\nsuddenly they both at the same moment saw a woman with a still, white\nface walking through the room. She was in the middle of the room when\nthey caught sight of her, and they both screamed and covered their faces\nwith their hands. So great was her terror that she almost fainted; then\nin a few moments when they looked the apparition had vanished. As to the\nhabit she was wearing, neither of them could say afterwards what it was\nlike: only the white, still face remained fixed in their memory, but the\nfigure was a dark one, like a dark shadow moving rapidly through the\nroom.\n\nIf Elfrida then, albeit still in purgatory, is able to re-visit this\nscene of her early life and the site of that tragedy in the forest, it\ndoes not seem to me altogether improbable that she herself made the\nrevelation I have written. And if this be so, it would account for the\n_veiled_ character conveyed in the narrative. For even after ten\ncenturies it may well be that all the coverings have not yet been\nremoved, that although she has been dropping them one by one for ages,\nshe has not yet come to the end of them. Until the very last covering,\nor veil, or mist is removed, it would be impossible for her to be\nabsolutely sincere, to reveal her inmost soul with all that is most\ndreadful in it. But when that time comes, from the very moment of its\ncoming she would cease automatically to be an exiled and tormented\nspirit.\n\nIf, then, Elfrida is herself responsible for the narrative, it is only\nnatural that she does not appear in it quite as black as she has been\npainted. For the monkish chronicler was, we know, the Father of Lies,\nand so indeed in a measure are all historians and biographers, since\nthey cannot see into hearts and motives or know all the circumstances of\nthe case. And in this case they were painting the picture of their hated\nenemy and no doubt were not sparing in the use of the black pigment.\n\nTo know all is to forgive all, is a good saying, and enables us to see\nwhy even the worst among us can always find it possible to forgive\nhimself.\n\n\n\n\nII\n\nAN OLD THORN\n\n\nI was pleased at this opportunity of rescuing this story from a far-back\nnumber of the _English Review_, in which it first appeared, and putting\nit in a book. It may be a shock to the reader to be brought down from a\nstory of a great king and queen of England in the tenth century to the\nobscure annals of a yokel and his wife who lived in a Wiltshire village\nonly a century ago; or even less, since my poor yokel was hanged for\nsheep-stealing in 1821. But it is, I think, worth preserving, since it\nis the only narrative I know of dealing with that rare and curious\nsubject, the survival of tree-worship in our own country. That, however,\nwas not the reason of my being pleased.\n\nIt was just when I had finished writing the story of Elfrida that I\nhappened to see in my morning paper a highly eulogistical paragraph\nabout one of our long-dead and, I imagine, forgotten worthies. The\noccasion of the paragraph doesn't matter. The man eulogised was Mr.\nJustice Park--Sir James Allan Park, a highly successful barrister, who\nwas judge from 1816 to his death in 1838. \"As judge, though not eminent,\nhe was sound, fair and sensible, a little irascible, but highly\nesteemed.\" He was also the author of a religious work. And that is all\nthe particular Liar who wrote his biography in the D.N.B. can tell us\nabout him.\n\nIt was the newspaper paragraph which reminded me that I had written\nabout this same judge, giving my estimate of his character in my book,\n_A Shepherd's Life_, also that I was _thinking_ about Park, the sound\nand fair and sensible judge, when I wrote \"An Old Thorn.\" Here then,\nwith apologies to the reader for quoting from my own book, I reproduce\nwhat I wrote in 1905.\n\n\"From these memories of the old villagers I turn to the newspapers of\nthe day to make a few citations.\n\n\"The law as it was did not distinguish between a case of the kind just\nrelated, of the starving, sorely-tempted Shergold, and that of the\nsystematic thief: sheep-stealing was a capital offence and the man must\nbe hanged, unless recommended to mercy, and we know what was meant by\n'mercy' in those days. That so barbarous a law existed within memory of\npeople to be found living in most villages appears almost incredible to\nus; but despite the recommendations to 'mercy' usual in a large majority\nof cases, the law of that time was not more horrible than the temper of\nthe men who administered it. There are good and bad among all, and in\nall professions, but there is also a black spot in most, possibly all\nhearts, which may be developed to almost any extent, to change the\njustest, wisest, most moral men into 'human devils.' In reading the old\nreports and the expressions used by the judges in their summings-up and\nsentences, it is impossible not to believe that the awful power they\npossessed, and its constant exercise, had not only produced the\ninevitable hardening effect, but had made them cruel in the true sense\nof the word. Their pleasure in passing dreadful sentences was very\nthinly disguised by certain lofty conventional phrases as to the\nnecessity of upholding the law, morality, and religion; they were,\nindeed, as familiar with the name of the Deity as any ranter in a\nconventicle, and the 'enormity of the crime' was an expression as\nconstantly used in the case of the theft of a loaf of bread, or of an\nold coat left hanging on a hedge, by some ill-clad, half-starved wretch,\nas in cases of burglary, arson, rape, and murder.\n\n\"It is surprising to find how very few the real crimes were in those\ndays, despite the misery of the people; that nearly all the 'crimes' for\nwhich men were sentenced to the gallows and to transportation for life,\nor for long terms, were offences which would now be sufficiently\npunished by a few weeks', or even a few days', imprisonment. Thus in\nApril, 1825, I note that Mr. Justice Park commented on the heavy\nappearance of the calendar. It was not so much the number (170) of the\noffenders that excited his concern as it was the nature of the crimes\nwith which they were charged. The worst crime in this instance was\nsheep-stealing!\n\n\"Again, this same Mr. Justice Park, at the Spring Assizes at Salisbury,\n1827, said that though the calendar was a heavy one, he was happy to\nfind, on looking at the depositions of the principal cases, that they\nwere not of a very serious character. Nevertheless he passed sentence of\ndeath on twenty-eight persons, among them being one for stealing half a\ncrown!\n\n\"Of the twenty-eight all but three were eventually reprieved, one of the\nfated three being a youth of 19, who was charged with stealing a mare\nand pleaded guilty in spite of a warning from the judge not to do so.\nThis irritated the great man who had the power of life and death in his\nhand. In passing sentence the judge 'expatiated on the prevalence of the\ncrime of horse-stealing and the necessity of making an example. The\nenormity of Read's crime rendered him a proper example, and he would\ntherefore hold out no hope of mercy towards him.' As to the plea of\nguilty, he remarked that nowadays too many persons pleaded guilty,\ndeluded with the hope that it would be taken into consideration and they\nwould escape the severer penalty. He was determined to put a stop to\nthat sort of thing; if Read had not pleaded guilty no doubt some\nextenuating circumstance would have come up during the trial and he\nwould have saved his life.\n\n\"There, if ever, spoke the 'human devil' in a black cap!\n\n\"I find another case of a sentence of transportation for life on a youth\nof 18, named Edward Baker, for stealing a pocket-handkerchief. Had he\npleaded guilty it might have been worse for him.\n\n\"At the Salisbury Spring Assizes, 1830, Mr. Justice Gazalee, addressing\nthe grand jury, said that none of the crimes appeared to be marked with\ncircumstances of great moral turpitude. The prisoners numbered 130; he\npassed sentences of death on twenty-nine, life transportations on five,\nfourteen years on five, seven years on eleven, and various terms of hard\nlabour on the others.\" (_A Shepherd's Life_, pp. 241-4.)\n\nJohnnie Budd was done to death before my principal informants, one 89\nyears old, the other 93, were born; but in their early years they knew\nthe widow and her three children, and had known them and their children\nall their lives; thus the whole story of Johnnie and Marty was familiar\nto them. Now, when I thought of Johnnie's case and how he was treated at\nthe trial, as it was told me by these old people, it struck me as so\nlike that of the poor young man Read, who was hanged because he pleaded\nguilty, that I at once came to the belief that it was Mr. Justice Park\nwho had tried him. I have accordingly searched the newspapers of that\nday, but have failed to find Johnnie's case. I can only suppose that\nthis particular case was probably considered too unimportant to be\nreported at large in the newspapers of 1821. He was just one of a number\nconvicted and sentenced to capital punishment.\n\nWhen Johnnie was hanged his poor wife travelled to Salisbury and\nsucceeded in getting permission to take the body back to the village for\nburial. How she in her poverty, with her three little children to keep,\nmanaged it I don't know. Probably some of the other poor villagers who\npitied and perhaps loved her helped her to do it. She did even more: she\nhad a grave-stone set above him with his name and the dates of his birth\nand death cut on it. And there it is now, within a dozen yards of the\nchurch door in the small old churchyard--the smallest village churchyard\nknown to me; and Johnnie's and Marty's children's children are still\nliving in the village.\n\n\nFINIS\n\n\n\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\n\n\n\nTHE WORKS OF W. H. HUDSON\n\n\n\n\nBIRDS OF LA PLATA\n\nWith 22 Coloured Plates by H. Gronvold, specially drawn under\nthe Author's supervision.\n\nThis book contains articles on some 200 birds of La Plata actually known\nto the Author, arranged under species, and characterised by that\nintimate personal touch which constitutes the chief charm of his\nwriting. Originally published in 1888 under the title _Argentine\nOrnithology_, in collaboration with Philip Lutley Sclater, it has now\nbeen thoroughly revised by Mr. Hudson, who has deleted all except his\nown work, and has written a new Introduction of considerable length.\n\nThe coloured plates of this new book have been done by Mr. H. Gronvold,\nunder the most careful supervision of the Author, whose intimate\nknowledge of the birds in their life and true environment has helped the\nartist to give a vivid and faithful presentment of the different\nspecies.\n\nThe illustrations constitute an integral part of the book itself, and\nare not mere decorative additions. This book now forms a companion\nvolume to another work of Mr. Hudson's, _The Naturalist in La Plata_.\n\n\n\n\nA COMPANION VOLUME\n\nTHE NATURALIST IN LA PLATA\n\n\n_The Naturalist in La Plata_ can now be obtained in a new and cheaper\nedition than the original, which was first published in 1892. The\nletterpress and the drawings in the text by J. Smit have been left as\nthey were; the only change is in the form of the book and in the\nsubstitution of new plates for the old ones. This book forms a companion\nvolume to _Birds of La Plata_.\n\n\n\n\nFAR AWAY AND LONG AGO\n\nAn Autobiographical Sketch of the Writer's Boyhood\n\n\"To read his book is to read another chapter in that enormous book which\nis written from time to time by Rousseau and George Sand and Aksakoff\namong other people--a book which we can never read enough of; and\ntherefore we must beg Mr. Hudson not to stop here, but to carry the\nstory on to the farthest possible limits.\"--_Times Literary Supplement._\n\n\"A low-pitched narrative, but once listened to it is as enthralling as\nMr. Hudson found the voice of the golden plover.\"--_Athenaeum._\n\n\"He who does not know the work of W. H. Hudson is missing one of the\nfinest pleasures of contemporary literature.\"--_Daily News._\n\n\"Regarding the author hitherto primarily as a naturalist we rediscover\nhim as an acute psychologist.... For many readers the chief interest of\nthe book will lie in the charming reflective presentment of the thoughts\nof a boy's mind.\"--_Bookman._\n\n\n\n\nBIRDS IN TOWN AND VILLAGE\n\nWith 8 Coloured Plates after E. J. Detmold\n\nHead and Tail Pieces by Herbert Cole\n\n\"Mr. Hudson loves all birds; they are his work, his recreation, his\nlife; he writes about them as no one else can: he sees what others\nmiss.\"--_Manchester Guardian._\n\n\"This book is full of his unsurpassed perception and unique\ncharm.... Some of his best passages about birds are equally delightful\nand vivid sketches of human life.\"--_Times Literary Supplement._\n\n\"Mr. Hudson is more than a naturalist. He is a man of genius who\ntransmutes lead into gold--the lead of knowledge into the gold of\nfeeling.... As you hear the music of his prose ... you recapture\nthe delicious tenderness of childhood with its wistful wonder and\nvision.... Mr. Hudson is a nightingale naturalist with a voice that\nthrobs in waves of magical melody.\"\n\n--James Douglas in _The Star_.","title":"Dead Man's Plack and an Old Thorn","tradition":"myth-cosmogony","translated_text":null,"word_count":35694}