{"collection":"myth-cosmogony","full_text_available":true,"graph_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/api/page/gutenberg_75341/graph","html_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/page/gutenberg_75341","id":"gutenberg_75341","license":"Public Domain (US)","rights_basis":"gutenberg_metadata_copyright_false","source":"gutenberg","source_url":"https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/75341","summary":null,"tags":["Category: British Literature","Category: Mythology, Legends & Folklore","Category: Novels","Dragons -- Fiction","London (England) -- Fiction","Prehistoric peoples -- Fiction","Satire"],"text":"[Illustration: Thia and Thol--B.C. 39,000.]\n\n\n\n\n  THE\n  DREADFUL DRAGON\n  OF\n  HAY HILL\n\n  MAX BEERBOHM\n\n  [Illustration]\n\n  LONDON: WILLIAM HEINEMANN LTD.\n\n\n\n\n  _First published in \u201cA Variety of Things\u201d_ (_Volume ten\n  of the Limited Edition of Max Beerbohm\u2019s Works_).\n\n  _First published separately in book form, November, 1928._\n\n  _New impression, January, 1929._\n\n  _Printed in Great Britain_\n\n\n\n\nTHE DREADFUL DRAGON OF HAY HILL\n\n\nIn the faint early dawn of a day in the midst of a golden summer, a\ncolumn of smoke was seen rising from Hay Hill, rising thickly, not\nwithout sparks in it. Danger to the lives of the dressmakers in Dover\nStreet was not apprehended. The fire-brigade was not called out. The\nfire-brigade had not been called into existence. Dover Street had not\nyet been built. I tell of a time that was thirty-nine thousand years\nbefore the birth of Christ.\n\nTo imagine Hay Hill as it then was, you must forget much of what,\nas you approach it from Berkeley Square or from Piccadilly, it is\nnow. You knew it in better days, as I did?--days when its seemly old\nGeorgian charm had not vanished under the superimposition of two vast\nhigh barracks for the wealthier sort of bachelors to live in? You\nremember how, in frosty weather, the horse of your hansom used to skate\nhopelessly down the slope of it and collapse, pitching you out, at the\nfoot of it? Such memories will not serve. They are far too recent. You\nmust imagine just a green hill with some trees and bushes on it. You\nmust imagine it far higher than it is nowadays, tapering to a summit\nnot yet planed off for the purpose of Dover Street; and steeper; and\nwith two caves aloft in it; and bright, bright green.\n\nAnd conceive that its smiling wildness made no contrast with aught that\nwas around. Berkeley Square smiled wildly too. Berkeley Square had no\nsquareness. It was but a green valley that went, uninterrupted by any\nPiccadilly, into the Green Park. And through the midst of it a clear\nstream went babbling and meandering, making all manner of queer twists\nand turns on its off-hand way to the marshlands of Pimlico down yonder.\nModern engineers have driven this stream ignominiously underground; but\nat that time there it still was, visible, playful, fringed with reeds,\ndarted about in by small fishes, licensed to reflect sky. And it had\ntributaries! The landscape that I speak of, the great rolling landscape\nthat comprised all Mayfair, was everywhere intersected by tiny brooks,\nwhose waters, for what they were worth, sooner or later trickled\nbrightly into that main stream. Here and there, quite fortuitously,\nin groups or singly, stood willows and silver birches, full of that\nwistful grace which we regard as peculiarly modern. But not till the\nlandscape reached Hyde Park did trees exert a strong influence over\nit. Then they exerted a very strong influence indeed. They hemmed the\nwhole thing in. Hyde Park, which was a dense and immemorial forest,\ndid not pause where the Marble Arch is, but swept on to envelop all\nPaddington and Marylebone and most of Bloomsbury, and then, skirting\nSoho, over-ran everything from Covent Garden to Fetter Lane, and in\na rush southward was brought up sharp only by the edge of the sheer\ncliffs that banked this part of the Thames.\n\nThe Thames, wherever it was not thus sharply opposed, was as tyrannous\nas the very forest. It knew no mercy for the lowly. Westminster, like\nPimlico, was a mere swamp, miasmal, malarial, frequented by frogs\nonly, whose croaks, no other sound intervening, made hideous to the\near a district now nobly and forever resonant with the silver voices\nof choristers and the golden voices of senators. Westminster is firm\nunderfoot nowadays; yet, even so, as you come away from it up the Duke\nof York\u2019s steps, you feel that you are mounting into a drier, brisker\nair; and this sensation is powerfully repeated when anon you climb St.\nJames\u2019s Street. Not lower, you feel, not lower than Piccadilly would\nyou have your home. And this, it would seem, was just what the average\nman felt forty-one thousand years ago. Nature had placed in the steep\nchalky slopes from the marshes a fair number of commodious caves; but\nthese were almost always vacant. Only on the higher levels did human\ncreatures abound.\n\nAnd scant enough, by our present standards, that abundance was. In\nall the space which the forest had left free--not merely all Mayfair,\nremember: all Soho, too, and all that lies between them--the\npopulation was hardly more than three hundred souls. So low a figure\nis hard to grasp. So few people, in a place so teeming now, are almost\nbeneath our notice. Almost, but not quite. What there was of them was\nnot bad.\n\nNature, as a Roman truly said, does not work by leaps. What we call\nEvolution is a quite exasperatingly slow process. We should like to\ncompare favourably with even the latest of our predecessors. We wince\nwhenever we read a declaration by some eminent biologist that the skull\nof the prehistoric man whose bones have just been unearthed in this or\nthat district differs but slightly from the skull of the average man in\nthe twentieth century. I hate having to tell you that the persons in\nthis narrative had well-shaped heads, and that if their jaws were more\nprominent, their teeth sharper, their backs less upright, their arms\nlonger and hairier, and their feet suppler than our own, the difference\nin each case was so faint as to be almost negligible.\n\nOf course they were a simpler folk than we are. They knew far less than\nwe know. They did not, for example, know they were living thirty-nine\nthousand years before Christ; and \u2018protopalaeolithic\u2019 was a term they\n_never_ used. They regarded themselves as very modern and very greatly\nenlightened. They marvelled at their ingenuities in the use of flint\nand stone. They held that their ancestors had been crude in thought and\nin mode of life, but not unblest with a certain vigour and nobility\nof character which they themselves lacked. They thought that their\ndescendants would be a rather feeble, peevish race, yet that somehow in\nthe far future, a state of general goodness and felicity would set in,\nto abide forever. But I seem to be failing in my effort to stress the\ndifference between these people and ourselves. Let us hold fast to the\npleasing fact that they really were less well-educated.\n\nThey could neither read nor write, and were so weak in their arithmetic\nthat not a shepherd among them could count his sheep correctly, nor a\ngoat-herd his goats. And their pitiful geography! Glancing northward\nabove their forest, they saw the mountainous gaunt region that is\nHampstead, that is Highgate; southward, across the river and its wide\nfens, the ridges of a nameless Surrey; but as to how the land lay\nbeyond those barriers they had only the haziest notion. That there was\nland they knew. For, though they themselves never ventured further\nthan the edge of the marshes, or than the fringe of the tangled forest\nthat bounded the rest of their domain, certain other people were more\nventuresome: often enough it would happen that some stranger, some\ndark-haired and dark-eyed nomad, passed this way, blinking from the\nforest or soaked from the river; and glad always was such an one to\nrest awhile here, and tell to his good hosts tales of the outlying\nworld. Tales very marvellous to the dwellers in this sleek safe\nhomeland!--tales of rugged places where no men are, or few, and these\nin peril by night and by day; tales of the lion, a creature with yellow\neyes and a great mop of yellow hair to his head, a swift and strong\ncreature, without pity; and of the tusked mastodon, taller than the\noldest oak, and shaking the ground he walks on; and of the winged\ndragon, that huge beast, poising so high in the air that he looks no\nbigger than a hawk, yet reaching his prey on earth as instantly as a\nhawk his; and of the huge crawling dragon, that breathes fire through\nhis nostrils and scorches black the grass as he goes hunting, hunting;\nof the elephant, who fears nothing but mastodons and dragons; of the\nhyena and the tiger, and of beasts beside whom these seem not dreadful.\n\nWide-eyed, open-mouthed, the homelanders would sit listening. \u2018O\nwanderer,\u2019 would say one, \u2018tell us more of the mastodon, that is taller\nthan the oldest oak.\u2019 And another would say, \u2018Make again for us, O\nwanderer, the noise that a lion makes.\u2019 And another, \u2018Tell us more of\nthe dragon that scorches black the grass as he goes hunting, hunting.\u2019\nAnd another, \u2018O you that have so much wandered, surely you will abide\nhere always? Here is not hardship nor danger. We go not in fear of\nthe beasts whose roast flesh you have tasted and have praised. Rather\ngo they in great fear of us. The savoury deer flees from us, and has\nswifter feet than we have, yet escapes not the point of the thrown\nspear, and falls, and is ours. The hare is not often luckier, such is\nour skill. Our goats and our sheep would flee from us, but dare not,\nfearing the teeth of certain dogs who love us. We slay what we will for\nfood. For us all there is plenty in all seasons. You have drunk of the\nwater of our stream. Is it not fresh and cold? Have you cracked in your\nwanderings better nuts than ours? or bitten juicier apples? Surely you\nwill abide here always.\u2019\n\nAnd to the wanderer it would seem no bad thing that he should do so.\nYet he did not so. When the sun had sunk and risen a few times he would\nstretch his arms, maybe gazing round at the landscape with a rather\nsardonic smile, and be gone through the forest or across the water. And\nthe homelanders, nettled, would shrug their shoulders, and thank their\ngods for having rid them of a fool.\n\nTheir gods were many, including the sun and moon, their clear stream,\napple-trees and cherry-trees and fig-trees and trees that gave nuts,\nrose-bushes in summer, rain, and also fire--fire, the god that\nthemselves had learnt to make from flint, fire that made meat itself\ngodlike. But they prayed to no god, not being aware that they needed\nanything. And they had no priesthood. When a youth lost his heart to a\nmaid he approached her, and laid his hands gently upon her shoulders,\nand then, if she did not turn away from him, he put his hands about her\nwaist and lifted her three times from the ground. This sufficed: they\nwere now man and wife, and lived happily, or not so, ever after. Nor\nwas it needful that the rite should be only thus. If a maid lost her\nheart to a youth, the laid hands could be hers, and the shoulders his,\nand if he turned not away from her, if thrice he lifted her from the\nground, this too was wedlock.\n\nIf there were no good cave for them to take as their own, bride and\nbridegroom built them a hut of clay and wattles. Such huts were already\nnumerous, dotted about in all directions. Elder folk thought them very\nugly, and said that they spoilt the landscape. Yet what was to be done?\nIt is well that a people should multiply. Though these homelanders now\ndeemed themselves very many indeed (their number, you see, being so\nmuch higher than they ever could count up to, even incorrectly), yet\nnot even the eldest of them denied that there was plenty of room and\nplenty of food for more. And plenty of employment, you ask? They did\nnot worry about that. The more babies there were, the more children\nand grown folk would there be anon to take turns in minding the ample\nflocks and herds, and the more leisure for all to walk or sit around,\ntalking about the weather or about one another. They made no fetish of\nemployment.\n\nI have said that they were not bad. Had you heard them talked about by\none another, you might rather doubt this estimate. You would have heard\nlittle good of any one. No family seemed to approve of its neighbours.\nEven between brothers and sisters mutual trust was rare. Even husbands\nand wives bickered. To strangers, as you have seen, these people could\nbe charming. I do not say they were ever violent among themselves. That\nwas not their way. But they lacked kindness.\n\nHappiness is said to beget kindness. Were these people not happy? They\ndeemed themselves so. Nay, there was to come a time when, looking\nback, they felt that they had been marvellously happy. This time began\non the day in whose dawn smoke was seen rising from Hay Hill.\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nThe title of my tale has enabled you to guess the source of that smoke:\nthe nostrils of some dreadful dragon. But had you been the little girl\nnamed Thia, by whom first that smoke was seen, you would not have come\nupon the truth so quickly.\n\nThia had slept out under the stars, and, waking as they faded, had\nrisen, brushed the dew from her arms and legs, shaken it off her little\ngoatskin tunic, and gone with no glance around or upward to look for\nmushrooms. Presently, as there seemed to be no mushrooms this morning\nanywhere, she let her eyes rove from the ground (ground that is now\nLord Lansdowne\u2019s courtyard) and, looking up, saw the thick smoke above\nthe hill. She saw that it came from the cave where dwelt the widow Gra\nwith her four children. How could Gra, how could any one, want a fire\njust now? Thia\u2019s dark eyes filled with wonder. On wintry nights it was\nproper that there should be a fire at the mouth of every cave, proper\nthat in wintry dawns these should still be smouldering. But--such smoke\nas this on such a morning! Heavier, thicker smoke than Thia had ever\nseen in all the ten years of her existence! Of course fire was a god.\nBut surely he would not have us worship him to-day? Why then had Gra\nlit him? Thia gave it up, and moved away with eyes downcast in renewed\nhope of mushrooms.\n\nShe had not gone far before she stared back again, hearing a piteous\nshrill scream from the hill. She saw a little boy flying headlong down\nthe slope--Thol, the little red-haired boy who lived in the other cave\nup there. Thol slipped, tumbled head over heels, rolled, picked himself\nup, saw Thia, and rushed weeping towards her.\n\n\u2018What ails you, O child?\u2019 asked Thia, than whom Thol was indeed a year\nyounger and much smaller.\n\n\u2018O!\u2019 was all that the child vouchsafed between his sobs, \u2018O!\u2019\n\nThia thought ill of tears. Scorn for Thol fought the maternal instinct\nin her. But scorn had the worst of it. She put her arms about Thol.\nQuaveringly he told her what he had just seen, and what he believed it\nto be, and how it lay there asleep, with just its head and tail outside\nGra\u2019s cave, snoring. Then he broke down utterly. Thia looked at the\nhill. Maternal instinct was now worsted by wonder and curiosity and the\ndesire to be very brave--to show how much braver than boys girls are.\nThia went to the hill, shaking off Thol\u2019s wild clutches and leaving him\nbehind. Thia went up the hill quickly but warily, on tiptoe, wide-eyed,\nwith her tongue out upon her underlip. She took a sidelong course, and\nshe noticed a sort of black path through the grass, winding from the\nmouth of Gra\u2019s cave, down one side of the hill, and away, away till it\nwas lost in the white mists over the marshes. She climbed nearly level\nwith the cave\u2019s mouth, and then, peering through a bush which hid her,\nsaw what lay behind the veil of smoke.\n\nMuch worse the sleeping thing was than she had feared it would be, much\nhuger and more hideous. Its face was as long as a man\u2019s body, and lay\nflat out along the ground. Had Thia ever seen a crocodile\u2019s face, that\nis of what she would have been reminded--a crocodile, but with great\npricked-up ears, and snuffling forth fiery murk in deep, rhythmic,\nluxurious exhalations. The tip of the creature\u2019s tail, sticking out\nfrom the further side of the cave\u2019s mouth, looked to her very like an\narrow-head of flint--green flint! She could awfully imagine the rest of\nthe beast, curled around in the wide deep cave. And she shuddered with\na great hatred, and tears started to her eyes, as she thought of Gra\nand of those others.\n\nWhen she reached the valley, it was clear to Thol that she had been\ncrying. And she, resenting his scrutiny, made haste to say, \u2018I wept for\nGra and for her children; but you, O child, because you are a coward.\u2019\n\nAt these words the boy made within him a great resolve. This was, that\nhe would slay the dragon.\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nHow? He had not thought of that. When? Not to-day, he felt, nor\nto-morrow. But some day, somehow. He knew himself to be small, even for\nhis age, and the dragon big for whatever its age might be. He knew he\nwas not very clever; he was sure the dragon was very clever indeed. So\nhe said nothing to Thia of his great resolve that she should be sorry.\n\nMeanwhile, the sun had risen over the hills beyond the water, and the\nbirds been interrupted in their songs by the bleating of penned sheep.\nThis sound recalled Thol from his dreams of future glory.\n\nFor he was a shepherd\u2019s lad. It was the custom that children, as they\nceased to toddle, should begin to join in whatever work their parents\nwere by way of doing for the common good. Indeed it was felt that work\nwas especially a thing for the young. Thol had no parents to help;\nfor his mother had died in giving him birth; and one day, when he was\nbut seven years old, his father, who was a shepherd, had been attacked\nand killed by an angry ram. In the sleek safe homeland this death\nby violence had made a very painful impression. There was a general\ndesire to hush it up, to forget it. Thol was a reminder of it. Thol was\nignored, as much as possible. He was allowed to have the cave that had\nbeen his father\u2019s, but even the widow Gra, in the cave so near to his,\ndisregarded him, and forbade her children to play with him. However,\nthere dwelt hard by in the valley a certain shepherd, named Brud, and\nhe, being childless, saw use for Thol as helping-boy, and to that use\nput him. Every morning, it was Thol\u2019s first duty to wake his master. It\nwas easy for Thol himself to wake early, for his cave faced eastwards.\nTo-day in his great excitement about the dragon he had forgotten his\nduty to Brud. He went running now to perform it.\n\nBrud and his dog, awakened, came out and listened to Thol\u2019s tale.\nTruthfulness was regarded by all the homelanders as a very important\nthing, especially for the young. Brud took his staff, and \u2018Now, O\nThol,\u2019 he said, \u2018will I beat you for saying the thing that is not.\u2019 But\nthe boy protested that there was indeed a dragon in Gra\u2019s cave; so Brud\nsaid sagely, \u2018Choose then one of two things: either to run hence into\nGra\u2019s cave, or to be beaten.\u2019 Thol so unhesitatingly chose to be beaten\nthat it was clear he did believe his own story. Thia, moreover, came\nrunning up to say that there truly was a dragon. So Brud did not beat\nThol very much, and went away with his dog towards the hill, curious to\nknow what really was amiss up there.\n\nPerhaps Thia was already sorry she had called Thol a coward, for,\nthough he was now crying again loudly, she did but try to comfort\nhim. His response to her effort was not worthy of a future hero: he\ncomplained through his tears that she had not been beaten, too, for\nsaying there was a dragon. Thia\u2019s eyes flashed fiercely. She told Thol\nhe was ugly and puny and freckle-faced, and that nobody loved him. All\nthis was true, and it came with the more crushing force from pretty\nThia, whom every one petted.\n\nNo one ever made Thia work, though she was strong and agile, and did\nwondrously well whatever task she might do for the fun of it. She\ncould milk a goat, or light a fire, or drive a flock of geese, or find\nmushrooms if there were any, as quickly and surely as though she had\npractised hard for years. But the homelanders preferred to see her go\nflitting freely all the day long, dancing and carolling, with flowers\nin her hair.\n\nThia\u2019s hair was as dark as her eyes. Thia was no daughter of the\nhomeland. She was the daughter of two wanderers who, seven years ago,\nhad sojourned here for a few days. Their child had then attained just\nthat age which was always a crisis in the lives of wanderers\u2019 children:\nshe had grown enough to be heavy in her parents\u2019 arms, and not enough\nto foot it beside them. So they had left her here, promising the\nhomelanders that in time they would come back for her; and she, who had\nhad no home, had one now. Although (a relic, this, of primitive days)\nno homelander ever on any account went near to the mouth of another\u2019s\ndwelling, Thia would go near and go in, and be always welcome. The\nhomelanders seldom praised one another\u2019s children; but about Thia there\nwas no cause for jealousy: they all praised her strange beauty, her\nfearless and bright ways. And withal she was very good. You must not\nblame her for lack of filial sense. How should she love parents whom\nshe did not remember? She was full of love for the homelanders; and\nnaturally she hated the thought they hated: that some day two wanderers\nmight come and whisk her away.[A] She loved this people and this place\nthe more deeply perhaps because she was not of them. Forget the harsh\nthings she has just said to Thol. He surely was to blame. And belike\nshe would even have begged his pardon had she not been preoccupied with\nthoughts for the whole homeland, with great fears of what the dreadful\ndragon might be going to do when he woke up.\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nAnd a wonder it was that he did not wake forthwith, so loud a bellow\nof terror did Brud and his dog utter at the glimpse they had of him.\nThe glimpse sufficed them: both bounded to the foot of the hill with\nincredible speed, still howling. From the mouths of caves and huts\npeople darted and stood agape. Responsive sheep, goats, geese, what\nnot, made great noises of their own. Brud stood waving his arms wildly\ntowards the hill. People stared from him to the column of smoke, and\nfrom it to him. They were still heavy with sleep. Unusual behaviour at\nany time annoyed them; they deeply resented behaviour so unusual as\nthis so early in the morning. Little by little, disapproval merged into\nanxiety. Brud became the centre of a circle. But he did not radiate\nconviction. A dragon? A dragon in the homeland? Brud must be mad!\n\nBrud called Thol to witness. Thol, afraid that if he told the truth he\nwould be beaten by everybody but Brud, said nothing. Favourite Thia was\nnot so reticent. She described clearly the dragon\u2019s head and tail and\nthe black path through the grass. Something like panic passed around\nthe circle; not actual panic, for--surely Thia\u2019s bright dark eyes had\ndeceived her. A dragon was one thing, the homeland another: there\ncouldn\u2019t possibly be a dragon in the homeland. Mainly that they might\nset Thia\u2019s mind at rest, a few people went to reconnoitre. Presently,\nwith palsied lips, they were admitting that there could be, and was, a\ndragon in the homeland.\n\nThey ran stuttering the news in all directions, ran knowing it to be\ntrue, yet themselves hardly believing it, ran hoping others would\ninvestigate it and prove it a baseless rumour, ran gibbering it to\nthe very confines of the homeland. Slowly, incredulously, people from\nall quarters made their way to the place where so many were already\ngathered. The whole population was at length concentrated in what is\nBerkeley Square. Up the sky the sun climbed steadily. Surely, thought\nthe homelanders, a good sign? This god of theirs could not look so calm\nand bright if there were really a dragon among his chosen people? Bold\nadventurers went scouting hopefully up the hill, only to return with\nhorror in their eyes, and with the same old awful report upon their\nlips. Before noon the whole throng was convinced. Eld is notoriously\nirreceptive of new ideas; but even the oldest inhabitant stood\nconvinced now.\n\nSilence reigned, broken only by the bleatings, cacklings, quackings, of\nanimals unreleased from their pens or coops, far and near. Up, straight\nup through the windless air went the column of smoke steadfastly,\nhorribly, up higher than the eyes of the homelanders could follow it.\n\nWhat was to be done? Could nothing be done? Could not some one, at any\nrate, say something? People who did not know each other, or had for\nyears not been on speaking terms, found themselves eagerly conversing,\nin face of the common peril. Solemn parties were formed to go and view\nthe dragon\u2019s track, its odious scorched track from the marshes. People\nremembered having been told by wanderers that when a dragon swam a\nriver he held high his head, lest his flames should be quenched. The\nriver that had been crossed last night by this monster was a great god.\nWhy had he not drowned the monster? Well, fire was a great god also,\nand he deigned to dwell in dragons. One god would not destroy another.\nBut again, would even a small god deign to dwell in a dragon? The\nhomelanders revised their theology. Fire was not a god at all.\n\nThen, why, asked some, had the river not done his duty? The more rigid\nlogicians answered that neither was the river a god. But this doctrine\nwas not well received. People felt they had gone quite far enough as it\nwas. Besides, now was a time rather for action than for thought. Some\nof those who were skilled in hunting went to fetch their arrows and\nspears, formed a sort of army, and marched round and round the lower\nslopes of the hill in readiness to withstand and slay the dragon so\nsoon as he should come down into the open. At first this had a cheering\nand heartening effect (on all but Thol, whose personal aspiration\nyou remember). But soon there recurred to the minds of many, and were\nrepeated broadcast, other words that had been spoken by wanderers. \u2018So\nhard,\u2019 had said one, \u2018are the scales of a crawling dragon that no spear\ncan prick him, howsoever sharp and heavy and strongly hurled.\u2019 And\nanother had grimly said, \u2018Young is that dragon who is not older than\nthe oldest man.\u2019 And another, \u2018A crawling dragon is not baulked but by\nthe swiftness of men\u2019s heels.\u2019\n\nAll this was most depressing. Confidence in the spearmen was badly\nshaken. The applause for them whenever they passed by was quieter,\nbetokening rather pity than hope. Nay, there were people who now\ndeprecated any attempt to kill the dragon. The dragon, they argued,\nmust not be angered. If he were not mistreated he might do no harm. He\nhad a right to exist. He had visited Gra\u2019s cave in a friendly spirit,\nbut Gra had tried to mistreat him, and the result should be a lesson to\nthem all.\n\nOthers said, more acceptably, \u2018Let us think not of the dragon. What the\nspearmen can do, that will they do. Let this day be as other days, and\neach man to the task that is his.\u2019 Brud was one of those who hurried\naway gladly. Nor was Thol loth to follow. The chance that the dragon\nmight come out in his absence did not worry a boy so unprepared to-day\nfor single combat; and if other hands than his were to succeed in\nslaying the dragon, he would liefer not have the bitterness of looking\non.\n\nThia also detached herself from the throng. Many voices of men and\nwomen and children called after her, bidding her stay. \u2018I would find me\nsome task,\u2019 she answered.\n\n\u2018O Thia,\u2019 said one, \u2018find only flowers for your hair. And sing to us,\ndance for us. Let this day be as other days.\u2019 And so pleaded many\nvoices.\n\nBut Thia answered them, \u2018My heart is too sad. We are all in peril.\nFor myself I am not afraid. But how should I dance, who love you? Not\nagain, O dear ones, shall I dance, until the dragon be slain or gone\nback across the water. Neither shall I put flowers in my hair nor\nsing.\u2019\n\nShe went her way, and was presently guiding a flock of geese to a pond\nthat does not exist now.\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nShe sat watching the geese gravely, fondly, as they swam and dived and\ncackled. She was filled with a sense of duty to them. They too were\nhomelanders and dear ones. She wished that all the others could be so\nunknowing and so happy.\n\nA breeze sprang up, swaying the column of smoke and driving it across\nthe valley, on which it cast a long, wide, dark shadow.\n\nThia felt very old. She remembered a happy and careless child who\nwoke--how long ago!--and went looking for mushrooms. And this memory\ngave her another feeling. You see, she had eaten nothing all day.\n\nNear the pond was a cherry-tree. She looked at it. She tried not to.\nThis was no day for eating. The sight of the red cherries jarred on\nher. They were so very red. She went to the tree unwillingly. She\nhoped no one would see her. In your impatience at the general slowness\nof man\u2019s evolution, you will be glad to learn that Thia, climbing that\ntree and swinging among the branches, had notably more of assurance and\nnimble ease than any modern child would have in like case. It was only\nher mind that misgave her.\n\nAshamed of herself, ashamed of feeling so much younger and stronger\nnow, she dropped to the ground and wondered how she was to atone. She\nchose the obvious course. She ran around the homeland urging every one\nto eat something. All were grateful for the suggestion. The length of\ntheir fast is the measure of the shock they had received that day,\nand of the strain imposed on them. Eating had ever been a thing they\nexcelled in. Most of them were far too fat. Thia\u2019s suggestion was acted\non with all speed. Great quantities of cold meat were consumed. And\nthis was well. The night in store was to make special demands on the\nnerves of the homelanders.\n\nAs the sun drew near down to the west, the breeze dropped with it,\nand the smoke was again an upright column, reddened now by the sun.\nLater, while afterglow faded into twilight, to some of the homelanders\nit seemed that the base of the column was less steady, was moving.\nThey were right. The time of their testing was at hand. The dragon was\ncoming down the hill.\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nThe spearmen opened out their ranks quickly and hovered in skirmishing\norder. The dragon\u2019s pace was no quicker than that of a man strolling.\nHis gait was at once ponderous and sinuous. The great body rocked on\nthe four thick leglets that moved in a somehow light and stealthy\nfashion. They ended, these leglets, in webbed feet with talons. The\nlong neck was craned straight forward, flush with the ground, but the\ntail, which was longer still, swung its barbed tip slowly from side to\nside, and sometimes rose, threshing the air. Neck, body and tail were\nsurmounted by a ridge of upstanding spurs. In fact, the dragon was\njust what I have called him: dreadful.\n\nSpears flew in the twilight. Ringing noises testified that many of them\nhit the mark. They rang as they glanced off the scales that completely\nsheathed the brute, who, now and again, coiled his neck round to have\na look at them, as though they rather interested and amused him. One\nof them struck him full on the brow (if brow it can be called) without\ngiving him an instant\u2019s pause.\n\nAnon, however, he halted, rearing his neck straight up, turning his\nhead slowly this way and that, and seemed to take, between his great\npuffs of fiery smoke, a general survey of the valley. Twilight was not\nfading into darkness, for a young moon rode the sky, preserving a good\nview for, and of, the dragon. Most of the homelanders had with one\naccord retired to the further side of the valley, across the dividing\nstream. Only the spearmen remained on the dragon\u2019s side, and some sheep\nthat were in a fold there. One of the spearmen, taking aim, ventured\nrather near to the dragon--so near that the dragon\u2019s neck, shooting\ndown, all but covered the distance. The clash of the dragon\u2019s jaws\nresounded. The spearman had escaped only by a hair\u2019s breadth. The\nhomelanders made a faint noise, something between a sigh and a groan.\n\nThe dragon looked at them for a long time. He seemed to be in no hurry.\nHe glanced at the moon, as though saying, \u2018The night is young.\u2019 He\nglanced at the sheepfold and slowly went to it. Wanderers had often\nsaid of dragons that they devoured no kind of beast in any land that\nhad human creatures in it. What would this dragon do? The huddled\nsheep bleated piteously at him. He reared his neck high and examined\nthem from that altitude. Suddenly a swoop and a clash. The neck was\ninstantly erect again, with a ripple down it. The head turned slowly\ntowards the homelanders, then slowly away again. The mind was seemingly\ndivided. There was a pause. This ended in another swoop, clash, recoil\nand ripple. Another dubious pause; and now, neck to ground, the dragon\nheaded amain for the homelanders.\n\nThey drew back, they scattered. Some rushed they knew not whither for\nrefuge, wailing wildly; others swarmed up the trunks of high trees\n(swiftlier, yes, than we could). Across the stream stepped the dragon\nwith a sort of cumbrous daintiness, and straightway, at his full speed,\nwhich was that of a man walking quickly, gave chase. If you care for\nthe topographical side of history, you should walk out of Berkeley\nSquare by way of Charles Street, into Curzon Street, past Chesterfield\nHouse, up Park Lane, along Oxford Street, down South Molton Street and\nback into Berkeley Square by way of Bruton Street. This, roughly, was\nthe dragon\u2019s line of route. He did not go exactly straight along it.\nHe often swerved and zigzagged; and he made in the course of the night\nmany long pauses. He would thrust his head into the mouth of some cave\nor hut, on the chance that some one had been so foolish as to hide\nthere; or he would crane his neck up among the lower branches of a tall\ntree, scorching these with his breath, and peering up into the higher\nbranches, where refugees might or might not be; or he would just\nstay prone somewhere, doing nothing. For the rest, he pursued whom he\nsaw. High speed he never achieved; but he had cunning, and had power\nto bewilder with fear. Before the night was out he was back again in\nhis cave upon the hill. And the sleepless homelanders, forgathering\nin the dawn to hear and tell what things had befallen, gradually knew\nthemselves to be the fewer by five souls.\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nIt is often said that no ills are so hard to suffer as to anticipate.\nI do not know that this is true. But it does seem to be a fact that\npeople comport themselves better under the incidence of an ill\nthan under the menace of it; better also in their fear of an ill\u2019s\nrecurrence than when the ill is first feared. Some of the homelanders,\nyou will have felt, had been rather ridiculous on the first day of\nthe dragon\u2019s presence among them. They had not been so in the watches\nof the night. Even Brud and his dog had shown signs of courage and\nendurance. Even Thol had not cried much. Thia had behaved perfectly.\nBut this is no more than you would expect of Thia. The point is that\nafter their panic at the dragon\u2019s first quick onset, the generality of\nthe homelanders had behaved well. And now, haggard though they were in\nthe dawn, wan, dishevelled, they were not without a certain collective\ndignity.\n\nWhen everything had been told and heard, they stood for a while in\nsilent mourning. The sun rose from the hills over the water, and with\na common impulse they knelt to this great god, beseeching him that\nhe would straightway call the dragon back beyond those hills, never\nto return. Then they looked up at the cave. To-day the dragon was\nwholly inside, his smoke rolling up from within the cave\u2019s mouth. Long\nlooked the homelanders for that glimmer of nether fire which would\nshow that he was indeed moving forth. There was nothing for them to\nsee but the black smoke. \u2018Peradventure,\u2019 said one, \u2018the sun is not a\ngod.\u2019 \u2018Nay,\u2019 said another, \u2018rather may it be that he is so great a god\nthat we cannot know his purposes, nor he be turned aside from them\nby our small woes.\u2019 This was accounted a strange but a wise saying.\n\u2018Nevertheless,\u2019 said the sayer, \u2018it is well that we should ask help of\nhim in woes that to us are not small.\u2019 So again the homelanders prayed,\nand though their prayer was still unanswered they felt themselves\nsomehow strengthened.\n\nIt was agreed that they should disperse to their dwellings, eat, and\npresently reassemble in formal council.\n\nAnd here I should mention Shib; for he was destined to be important in\nthis council, though he was but a youth, and on his cheeks and chin the\ndown had but begun to lengthen. I may as well also mention Veo, his\nbrother, elder than him by one year. They were the sons of Oc and Loga,\nwith whom they lived in a cave near the valley. Veo had large eyes\nwhich seemed to see nothing, but saw much. Shib had small eyes which\nseemed to see much, and saw it. Shib\u2019s parents thought him very clever,\nas indeed he was. They thought Veo a fool; but Mr. Roger Fry, had he\nseen the mural drawings in their cave, would have assured them that he\nwas a master.\n\nSaid Veo to Shib, as they followed their parents to the cave, \u2018Though I\nprayed that he might not, I am glad that the dragon abides with us. His\nsmoke is as the trunk of a great tree whose branches are the sky. When\nhe comes crawling down the hill he is more beautiful than Thia dancing.\u2019\n\nShib\u2019s ideas about beauty were academic. Thia dancing, with a rose-bush\non one side of her and a sunset on the other, was beautiful. The dragon\nwas ugly. But Shib was not going to waste breath in argument with his\nabsurd brother. What mattered was not that the dragon was ugly, but\nthat the dragon was a public nuisance, to be abated if it could not be\nsuppressed. The spearmen had failed to suppress it, and would continue\nto fail. But Shib thought he saw a way to abatement. He had carefully\nwatched throughout the night the dragon\u2019s demeanour. He had noted how,\ndespite so many wanderers\u2019 clear testimony as to the taste of all\ndragons, this creature had seemed to palter in choice between the\npenned sheep near to him and the mobile people across the stream; noted\nthat despite the great talons on his feet he did not attempt to climb\nany of the trees; noted the long rests he took here and there. On these\nobservations Shib had formed a theory, and on this theory a scheme. And\nduring the family meal in the cave he recited the speech he was going\nto make at the council. His parents were filled with admiration. Veo,\nhowever, did not listen to a word. Nor did he even attend the council.\nHe stayed in the cave, making with a charred stick, on all vacant\nspaces, stark but spirited pictures of the dragon.\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nI will not report in even an abridged form the early proceedings of the\ncouncil. For they were tedious. The speakers were many, halting, and\nnot to the point. Shib, when his chance at length came, shone. He had\na dry, unattractive manner; but he had something to say, he said it\nclearly and tersely, and so he held his audience.\n\nHaving stated the facts he had noted, he claimed no certainty for the\ndeduction he had made from them. He did not say, \u2018Know then surely, O\nhomelanders, that this is a slothful dragon.\u2019 Nor, for the matter of\nthat, did he say he had furnished a working hypothesis, or a hypothesis\nthat squared with the known facts, or a hypothesis that held the field.\nSuch phrases, alas, were impossible in the simple and barbarous tongue\nof the homelanders. But \u2018May it not be,\u2019 Shib did say, \u2018that this is\na slothful dragon?\u2019 There was a murmur of meditative assent. \u2018Hearken\nthen,\u2019 said Shib, \u2018to my counsel. Let the spearmen go slay two deer.\nLet the shepherds go slay two sheep, and the goat-herds two goats. Also\nlet there be slain three geese and as many ducks. Or ever the sun leave\nus, and the dragon wake from his sleep, let us take all these up and\nlay them at the mouth of the cave that was Gra\u2019s cave. Thus it may be\nthat this night shall not be as the last was, but we all asleep and\nsafe. And if so it betide us, let us make to the dragon other such\nofferings to-morrow, and on all days that are to come.\u2019\n\nThere was prompt and unanimous agreement that this plan should be\ntried. The spearmen went hunting. Presently they returned with a buck\nand a roe. By this time the other animals prescribed had been slain\nin due number. It remained that the feast should be borne noiselessly\nup the hill and spread before the slumbering dragon. The homelanders\nsurprised one another, surprised even themselves, by their zeal for a\nshare of this task. Why should any one of them be wanting to do work\nthat others could do? and willing to take a risk that others would\ntake? Really they did not know. It was a strange foible. But there\nit was. A child can carry the largest of ducks; but as many as four\nmen were lending a hand in porterage of a duck to-day. Not one of the\nporters enjoyed this work. But somehow they all wanted to do it, and\ndid it with energy and good humour.\n\nVery soon, up yonder on the flat shelf of ground in front of the cave\u2019s\nmouth, lay temptingly ranged in a semicircular pattern two goats,\nthree ducks, two deer, three geese and two sheep. All had been done\nthat was to be done. The homelanders suddenly began to feel the effects\nof their sleepless night. They would have denied that they were sleepy,\nbut they felt a desire to lie down and think. The valley soon had a\ncoverlet of sleeping figures, prone and supine. But, as you know, the\nmind has a way of waking us when it should; and the homelanders were\nall wide awake when the shadows began to lengthen.\n\nVery still the air was; and very still stood those men and women and\nchildren, on the other side of the dividing stream. The sun, setting\nred behind them, sent their shadows across the stream, on and on\nslowly, to the very foot of the hill up to which they were so intently\nlooking. The column of smoke, little by little, lost its flush. But\nanon it showed fitful glimpses of a brighter red at the base of it,\nmaking known that the dragon\u2019s head was not inside the cave. And\nnow it seemed to the homelanders, in these long moments, that their\nhearts ceased beating, and all hope died in them. Suddenly--clash! the\ndragon\u2019s jaws echoed all over the valley; and then what silence!\n\nThrough the veil of smoke, dimly, it was seen that the red glow rose,\npaused, fell--clash! again.\n\nTwelve was a number that the homelanders could count up to quite\ncorrectly. Yet even after the twelfth clash they stood silent and\nstill. Not till the red glow faded away into the cave did they feel\nsure that to-night all was well with them.\n\nThen indeed a great deep sigh went up from the throng. There were\npeople who laughed for joy; others who wept for the same reason.\nNone was happier than Thia. She was on the very point of singing and\ndancing, but remembered her promise, and the exact wording of it, just\nin time. In all the valley there was but one person whose heart did not\nrejoice. This was Veo. He had come out late in the afternoon, to await,\nimpatiently, the dragon\u2019s reappearance. He had particularly wanted to\nstudy the action of the hind-legs, which he felt he had not caught\nrightly. Besides, he had wanted to see the whole magnificent creature\nagain, just for the sight of it. Veo was very angry. Nobody, however,\nheeded him. Everybody heeded the more practical brother. It was a great\nevening for Oc and Loga. They were sorry there was a dragon in the\nhomeland, but even more (for parents will be parents) were they proud\nof their boy\u2019s success. The feelings of Thol, too, were not unmixed.\nThough none of the homelanders, except Thia, had ever shown him any\nkindness, he regretted the dragon, and was very glad that the dragon\nwas not coming out to-night; but he was even gladder that the dragon\nhad not been slain by the spearmen nor called back across the water by\nthe sun. It was true that if either of these things had happened he\ncould have gone to sleep comfortably in his own cave, and that he dared\nnot sleep there now, and saw no prospect of sleeping there at all until\nhe had slain the dragon. But he bethought him of the many empty caves\non the way down to the marshes. And he moved into that less fashionable\nquarter--sulkily indeed, but without tears, and sustained by a great\nfaith in the future.\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nOn the morning of next day the homelanders prayed again to the sun that\nhe would call the dragon away from them. He did not so. Therefore they\nbesought him that he would forbid the dragon to come further than the\ncave\u2019s mouth, and would cause him to be well-pleased with a feast like\nyesterday\u2019s.\n\nSuch a feast, in the afternoon, was duly laid at the cave\u2019s mouth; and\nagain, when the sun was setting, the dragon did not come down the hill,\nbut ate aloft there, and at the twelfth clash drew back his glowing\njaws into the cave.\n\nDay followed day, each with the same ritual and result.\n\nShib did not join in the prayers. He regarded them as inefficacious,\nand also as rather a slight to himself. The homelanders, be it said,\nintended no slight. They thought Shib wonderfully clever, and were\nmost grateful to him; but it never occurred to them to rank him among\ngods.\n\nVeo always prayed heartily that the dragon should be called away\nforthwith. He wanted to see the dragon by daylight. But he did not pray\nthat the dragon should not come forth in the evening. Better a twilit\ndragon than none at all.\n\nLittle Thol, though he prayed earnestly enough that the dragon should\nstay at home by night, never prayed for him to leave the homeland. He\nprayed that he himself might grow up very quickly, and be very big and\nvery strong and very clever and very brave.\n\nFor the rest, the homelanders were all orthodox in their devotions.\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nThe young moon had grown old, had dwindled, and disappeared. The sound\nof the clashed jaws ceased to be a novelty. The vesperal gatherings in\nthe valley became smaller. The great column of smoke, by day and by\nnight, was for the homelanders a grim reminder of what had happened,\nand of what would happen again if once they failed to fulfil the needs\nof their uninvited guest. They were resolved that they would not fail.\nIn this resolution they had a sombre sense of security. But there came,\nbefore the leaves of the trees were yellow, an evening when the dragon\nleft untasted the feast spread for him, and crawled down the hill. He\nwas half-way down before any one noticed his coming. And on that night,\na longer night than the other, he made a wider journey around the\nhomeland, and took a heavier toll of lives.\n\nThenceforth always, at sunset, guards were posted to watch the hill and\nto give, if need were, the alarm. Nor did even this measure suffice. In\nthe dawn of a day in winter, when snow was lying thick on the homeland,\na goat-herd observed with wonder a wide pathway through the snow from\nthe dragon\u2019s cave; and presently he saw afar on the level ground the\ndragon himself, with his head inside the mouth of a lonely hut that\nwas the home of a young man recently wedded. From the hut\u2019s mouth\ncrept forth clouds of smoke, and, as the dragon withdrew his head, the\ngoat-herd, finding voice, raised such a cry as instantly woke many\nsleepers. That day lived long in the memory of the homelanders. The\ndragon was very active. He did not plod through the snow. He walked\nat his full speed upon the ground, the snow melting before him at the\napproach of his fiery breath. It was the homelanders that plodded. Some\nof them stumbled head foremost into snowdrifts and did not escape their\npursuer. There was nothing slothful in the dragon\u2019s conduct that day.\nHour after hour in the keen frosty air he went his way, and not before\nnightfall did he go home.\n\nThus was inaugurated what we may call the Time of Greater Stress. No\none could know at what hour of night or day the dragon might again raid\nthe homeland. Relays of guards had to watch the hill always. No one,\nlying down to sleep, knew that the dragon might not forthcome before\nsunrise; no one, throughout the day, knew that the brute might not\nbe forthcoming at any moment. True, he forthcame seldom. The daily\nofferings of slain beasts and birds sufficed him, mostly. But he was\nnever to be depended on--never.\n\nShib\u2019s name somewhat fell in the general esteem. Nor was it raised\nagain by the execution of a scheme that he conceived. The roe and buck\nstuffed with poisonous herbs were swallowed by the dragon duly, but\nthe column of smoke from the cave\u2019s mouth did not cease that evening,\nas had been hoped. And on the following afternoon--a sign that the\nstratagem had not been unnoticed--one of the men who were placing the\nfood in front of the cave perished miserably in the dragon\u2019s jaws.\n\nOther devices of Shib\u2019s failed likewise. The homelanders had to accept\nthe dragon as a permanent factor in their lives. Year by year, night\nand day, rose the sinister column of smoke, dense, incessant. Happy\nthose tiny children who knew not what a homeland without a dragon was\nlike! So, at least, thought the elders.\n\nAnd yet, were these elders so much less happy than they had erst been?\nWere they not--could they but have known it--happier? Did not the\ndanger in which they lived make them more appreciative of life? Surely\nthey had a zest that in the halcyon days was not theirs? Certainly they\nwere quicker-witted. They spoke less slowly, their eyes were brighter,\nall their limbs nimbler. Perhaps this was partly because they ate less\nmeat. The dragon\u2019s diet made it necessary that they should somewhat\nrestrict their own, all the year round. The dragon, without knowing it,\nwas a good physician to them.\n\nWithout being a moralist or a preacher, he had also improved their\ncharacters. Quarrels had become rare. Ill-natured gossip was frowned\non. Suspicions throve not. Manners had unstiffened. The homelanders\nnow liked one another. They had been drawn charmingly together in\nbrotherhood and sisterhood. You would have been surprised at the change\nin them.\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nBut for his bright red hair, perhaps you would not have recognised Thol\nat all. He was a great gawky youth now. Spiritually, however, he had\nchanged little. He was still intent on slaying the dragon.\n\nIn the preceding years he had thought of little else than this, and as\nhe never had said a word about it he was not accounted good company.\nNor had he any desire to shine--in any light but that of a hero. The\nhomelanders would have been cordial enough to him, throughout those\nyears, if he had wished them to be so. But he never was able to forget\nhow cold and unkind they had been to him in his early childhood. It was\nnot for their sake that he had so constantly nursed and brooded over\nhis great wish. It was for his own sake only.\n\nAn unsympathetic character? Stay!--let me tell you that since the dawn\nof his adolescence another sake had come in to join his own: Thia\u2019s\nsake.\n\nFrom the moment when she, in childhood, had called him a coward, it\nalways had been Thia especially that he wished to impress. But in\nrecent times his feeling had changed. How should such a lout as he ever\nhope to impress Thia, who was a goddess? Thol hoped only to make Thia\nhappy, to see her go dancing and singing once more, with flowers in her\nhair. Thol did not even dare hope that Thia would thank him. Thol was\nnot an unsympathetic character at all.\n\nAs for Thia, she was more fascinating than ever. Do not be misled by\nher seeming to Thol a goddess. Remember that the homelanders worshipped\ncherry-trees and rain and fire and running water and all such things.\nThere was nothing of the statuesque Hellenic ideal about Thia. She had\nnot grown tall, she was as lissom and almost as slight as ever; and\nher alien dark hair had not lost its wildness: on windy days it flew\nout far behind her, like a thunder cloud, and on calm days hid her as\nin a bush. She had never changed the task that she chose on the day of\nthe dragon\u2019s advent. She was still a goose-girl. But perhaps she was\nconscious now that the waddling gait of her geese made the grace of her\nown gait the lovelier by its contrast. Certainly she was familiar with\nher face. She had often leaned over clear pools to study it--to see\nwhat the homelanders saw in it. She was very glad of her own charms\nbecause they were so dear to all those beloved people. But sometimes\nher charms also saddened her. She had had many suitors--youths of her\nown age, and elder men too. Even Veo, thinking her almost as beautiful\nas the dragon, had laid his hands upon her shoulders, in the ritual\nmode. Even the intellectual Shib had done so. And even from such elders\nas these it was dreadful to turn away. Nor was Thia a girl of merely\nbenevolent nature: she had warm desires, and among the younger suitors\nmore than one had much pleased her fancy. But stronger than any other\nsentiment in her was her love for the homeland. Not until the dragon\nwere slain or were gone away across the waters would Thia be wife of\nany man.\n\nSo far as she knew, she had sentenced herself to perpetual maidenhood.\nEven had she been aware of Thol\u2019s inflexible determination, she would\nhardly have become hopeful. Determination is one thing, doing is\nanother.\n\nThe truth of that old adage sometimes forced itself on poor Thol\nhimself, as he sat watching the sheep that he herded near his cave on\nthe way to the marshes; and at such time his sadness was so great that\nit affected even his sheep, causing them to look askance at him and\nbleat piteously, and making drearier a neighbourhood that was in itself\ndreary.\n\nBut, one day in the eighteenth summer of his years, Thol ceased to\ndespond. There came, wet from the river and mossy from the marshes, an\naged wanderer. He turned his dark eyes on Thol and said with a smile,\npointing towards the thick smoke on the hill, \u2018A dragon is here now?\u2019\n\n\u2018Yea, O wanderer,\u2019 Thol answered.\n\n\u2018There was none aforetime,\u2019 said the old man. \u2018A dragon was what your\nfolk needed.\u2019\n\n\u2018They need him not. But tell me, O you that have so much wandered, and\nhave seen many dragons, tell me how a dragon may be slain!\u2019\n\n\u2018Mind your sheep, young shepherd. Let the dragon be. Let not your sheep\nmourn you.\u2019\n\n\u2018They shall not. I shall slay the dragon. Only tell me how! Surely\nthere is a way?\u2019\n\n\u2018It is a way that would lead you into his jaws, O fool, and not hurt\nhim. Only through the roof of his mouth can a dragon be pierced and\nwounded. He opens not his jaws save when they are falling upon his\nprey. Do they not fall swiftly, O fool?\u2019\n\n\u2018O wanderer, yea. But\u2019----\n\n\u2018Could you deftly spear the roof of that great mouth, O prey, in that\nlittle time?\u2019\n\n\u2018Yea, surely, if so the dragon would perish.\u2019\n\nThe old man laughed. \u2018So would the dragon perish, truly; but so only.\nSo would be heard what few ears have heard--the cry that a dragon\nutters as he is slain. But so only.\u2019 And he went his way northward.\n\nFrom that day on, Thol did not watch his sheep very much. They, on\nthe other hand, spent most of their time in watching him. They rather\nthought he was mad, standing in that odd attitude and ever lunging his\ncrook up at one of the nodding boughs of that ash tree.\n\nTwice in the course of the autumn the dragon came down the hill; but\nwhen the watchman sounded the alarm Thol did not go forth to meet him.\nHe was not what his flock thought him.\n\nHe had now exchanged his crook for a spear--a straight well-seasoned\nsapling of oak, with a long sharp head of flint. With this, day by\nday, hour after hour, he lunged up at the boughs of fruit-trees. His\nflock, deploring what seemed to them mania, could not but admire his\nprogressive skill. Rarely did he fail now in piercing whatever plum or\napple he aimed at.\n\nWhen winter made bare the branches, it was at the branches that Thol\naimed his thrusts. His accuracy was unerring now. But he had yet to\nacquire the trick of combining the act of transfixion with the act of\nleaping aside. Else would he perish even in victory.\n\nSpring came. As usual, her first care was to put blossoms along the\nbranches of such almond trees as were nearest to the marshes.\n\nThe ever side-leaping Thol pricked off any little single blossom that\nhe chose.\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nSpring was still active in the homeland when, one day, a little while\nbefore sunset, the watchers of the hill blew their horns. There came\nfrom all quarters the usual concourse of young and old, to watch the\ndirection of the dragon and to keep out of it. Down came the familiar\ngreat beast, the never-ageing dragon, picking his way into the green\nvalley. And he saw an unwonted sight there. He saw somebody standing\nquite still on the nearer bank of the stream; a red-haired young\nperson, holding a spear. About this young person he formed a theory\nwhich had long been held by certain sheep.\n\nLittle wonder that the homelanders also formed that theory! Little\nwonder that they needed no further proof of it when, deaf to the cries\nof entreaty that they uttered through the evening air, Thol stood his\nground!\n\nSlowly, as though to give the wretched young lunatic a chance, the\ndragon advanced.\n\nBut quickly, very terribly and quickly, when he was within striking\ndistance, he reared his neck up. An instant later there rang through\nthe valley--there seemed to rend the valley--a single screech, unlike\nanything that its hearers had ever heard.\n\nThose who dared to look saw the vast length of the dragon, neck on\ngrass, coiling slowly round. The tip of the tail met the head and\nparted from it. Presently the vast length was straight, motionless.\n\nYet even of those who had dared look none dared believe that the dragon\nwas indeed dead.\n\nBut for its death-cry, Thol himself would hardly have believed.\n\nThe second firm believer was Thia. Thia, with swift conviction, plucked\nsome flowers and put them loosely into her hair. Thia, singing as well\nas though she had never ceased to sing, and dancing as prettily as\nthough she had for years been practising her steps, went singing and\ndancing towards the stream. Lightly she lept the stream, and then very\nseriously and quietly walked to the spot where Thol stood. She looked\nup at him, and then, without a word, raised her arms and put her hands\nupon his shoulders. He, who had slain the dragon, trembled.\n\n\u2018O Thol,\u2019 she said gently, \u2018you turn not away from me, but neither do\nyou raise me from the ground.\u2019\n\nThen Thol raised Thia thrice from the ground.\n\nAnd he said, \u2018Let our home be the cave that was my father\u2019s.\u2019\n\nHand in hand, man and wife, they went up the hill, and round to the\neastern side of its summit. But when they came to the mouth of the old\ncave there, he paused and let go her hand.\n\n\u2018O Thia,\u2019 he said wonderingly, \u2018is it indeed true that you love me?\u2019\n\n\u2018O Thol,\u2019 she answered, \u2018it is most true.\u2019\n\n\u2018O Thia,\u2019 he said, \u2018love me always!\u2019\n\n\u2018I have long ceased to love you, O Thol,\u2019 she said, five years later,\nin a low voice. But I see that I have outstripped my narrative. I must\nhark back.\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nThe sun had already risen far when Thol and Thia were wakened by a\ncontinuous great hum as of many voices. When they looked forth and\ndown from the mouth of their high home, it seemed to them that all the\nhomelanders were there beneath them, gazing up.\n\nAnd this was indeed so. Earlier in the morning, by force of habit, all\nthe homelanders had gone to what we call Berkeley Square, the place\nwhere for so many years they had daily besought the sun to call the\ndragon away across the waters. There, where lay the great smokeless and\nharmless carcass, was no need for prayers now; and with one accord the\nthrong had moved from the western to the eastern foot of the hill, and\nstayed there gazing in reverence up to the home of a god greater than\nthe sun.\n\nWhen at length the god showed himself, there arose from the throng a\ngreat roar of adoration. The throng went down on its knees to him,\nflung up its arms to him, half-closed its eyes so as not to be blinded\nby the sight of him. His little mortal mate, knowing not that he was a\ngod, thinking only that he was a brave man and her own, was astonished\nat the doings of her dear ones. The god himself, sharing her ignorance,\nwas deeply embarrassed, and he blushed to the roots of his hair.\n\n\u2018Laugh, O Thol,\u2019 she whispered to him. \u2018It were well for them that you\nshould laugh.\u2019 But he never had laughed in all his life, and was much\ntoo uncomfortable to begin doing so just now. He backed into the cave.\nThe religious throng heaved a deep moan of disappointment as he did so.\nThia urged him to come forth and laugh as she herself was doing. \u2018Nay,\u2019\nhe said, \u2018but do you, whom they love, dance a little for them and sing.\nThen will they go away happy.\u2019\n\nIt seemed to Thia that really this was the next best plan, and so,\nstill laughing, she turned round and danced and sang with great\nanimation and good-will. The audience, however, was cold. It gave her\nits attention, but even this, she began to feel, was not its kind\nattention. Indeed, the audience was jarred. After a while--for Thia\u2019s\npride forbade her to stop her performance--the audience began to drift\naway.\n\nThere were tears in her eyes when she danced back into the cave. But\nthese she brushed away, these she forgot instantly in her lover\u2019s\npresence.\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nLove is not all. \u2018I must go drive my geese,\u2019 said the bride.\n\n\u2018And I my sheep,\u2019 said the bridegroom.\n\n\u2018There is good grass, O Thol, round my geese\u2019s pond. Let your sheep\ngraze there always. Thus shall not our work sever us.\u2019\n\nAs they went forth, some children were coming up the hill, carrying\nburdens. The burdens were cold roast flesh, dried figs, and a gourd\nof water, sent by some elders as a votive offering to the god. The\nchildren knelt at sight of the god and then ran shyly away, leaving\ntheir gifts on the ground. The god and his mate feasted gladly. Then\nthey embraced and parted, making tryst at the pond.\n\nWhen Thia approached the pond, she did not wonder that Thol was already\nthere, for sheep go quicker than geese. But--where were his sheep?\n\u2018Have they all strayed?\u2019 she cried out to him.\n\nHe came to meet her, looking rather foolish.\n\n\u2018O Thia,\u2019 he explained, \u2018as I went to the fold, many men and women\nwere around it. I asked them what they did there. They knelt and made\nanswer, \u201cWe were gazing at the sheep that had been the god\u2019s.\u201d When I\nmade to unpen the flock, there was a great moaning. There was gnashing\nof teeth, O Thia, and tearing of hair. It was said by all that the god\nmust herd sheep nevermore.\u2019\n\n\u2018And you, beloved, what said you?\u2019\n\n\u2018I said nothing, O Thia, amid all that wailing. I knew not what to say.\u2019\n\nThia laughed long but tenderly. \u2018And your sheep, beloved, what said\nthey?\u2019\n\n\u2018How should I know?\u2019 asked Thol.\n\n\u2018And you left them there? Do you not love them?\u2019\n\n\u2018I have never loved them.\u2019\n\n\u2018But they were your task?\u2019\n\n\u2018O Thia, the dragon was my task.\u2019\n\nShe stroked his arm. \u2018The dragon is dead, O Thol. You have slain the\ndragon, O my brave dear one. That task is done. You must find some\nother. All men must work. Since you loved not your sheep, you shall\nlove my geese, and I will teach you to drive them with me.\u2019\n\n\u2018That,\u2019 said Thol, \u2018would not be a man\u2019s work, O Thia.\u2019\n\n\u2018But they say you are a god! And I think a god may do as he will.\u2019\n\nHer flock had swum out into the pond. She called it back to her, and\nheaded it away towards some willows. From one of these she plucked for\nThol a long twig such as she herself carried, and, having stripped it\nof its leaves, gave it to him and began to teach him her art.\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nThere was, as Thia had known there must be, a great concourse of people\naround and about the dragon.\n\nThere was a long line of children riding on its back; there were\ninfants in arms being urged by their mothers never to forget that they\nhad seen it; there were many young men and women trying to rip off\nsome of its scales, as reminders; and there were elders exchanging\nreminiscences of its earliest raids and correcting one another on\nvarious points. And the whole crowd of holiday-makers was so intent\nthat the gradual approach of that earnest worker, Thol, was not noticed\nuntil he came quite near.\n\nVery gradual, very tortuous and irregular, his approach was. Thia,\njust now, was letting him shift for himself, offering no hints at\nall. For the homelanders\u2019 sake, she wished him to be seen at his\nworst. It was ill that they should worship a false god. To her, he was\nsomething better than a real god. But this was another matter. To the\nhomelanders, he ought to seem no more than a man who had done a great\ndeed and set a high example. And for his own sake, and so for hers--for\nhow could his not be hers?--she wished him to have no more honour than\nwas his due. Splendid man though he was, and only a year younger than\nherself, he was yet a child; and children, thought Thia--though she was\nconscious that she herself, for all the petting she had received, was\nrather perfect--are easily spoilt. Altogether, the goose-girl\u2019s motives\nwere as pure as her perception was keen. Admirable, too, were her\ntactics; and they should have succeeded. Yet they failed. In the eyes\nof the homelanders the goose-god lost not a jot of his divinity.\n\nNo hint of disillusion was in the moans evoked by the sight of him.\nGrief, shame, horror at his condescension, and a deep wrath against the\nwhilom darling Thia, were all that was felt by the kneeling and swaying\ncrowd.\n\nThia knew it. She was greatly disappointed. Indeed, she was near to\nshedding tears again. Pride saved her from that. Besides, she was\nangry, and not only angry but amused. And in a clear voice that was\naudible above the collective moaning, \u2018Have patience, O homelanders,\u2019\nshe cried. \u2018He is new to his work. He will grow in skill. These geese\nwill find that he is no fool. And it may be that hereafter, if you are\nall very good, I will teach him to sing and dance for you, with flowers\nin his bright red hair.\u2019\n\nHaving thus spoken, she ran to overtake her husband, and soon, guiding\nthe flock in good order, went her way with him back to the pond.\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nThere was a general desire that the dragon should not be buried\nanywhere within the confines of the homeland. Shib conceived that if\nthe trunks of felled trees were used as rollers the carcass might be\ntransported to the swamps and be sunk there. By its vast weight the\ncarcass frustrated this scheme. A long deep trench must be dug beside\nit. All the able-bodied men of the homeland offered their services, and\nof course Shib was a most efficient director of the work.\n\nYou will be glad to hear that Shib was a more sympathetic character\nthan he once was. The public spirit that had always been his was\nunmarred now by vanity and personal ambition. He was a quiet,\ndisinterested, indefatigable worker for the common weal, burning always\nwith that hard, gem-like flame which Mr. Pater discerned in the breasts\nof our own Civil Servants. He had forgotten, or he remembered without\nbitterness, the time when he was a popular hero. Thol\u2019s great deed was\na source of genuine pleasure to him. Nay (for he had long ago outgrown\nhis callow atheism), he accepted Thol as a god, though he was too\ncautious to rate him higher than the sun.\n\nThus he was much shocked when Thol came wishing to help in the labour.\nRising, at Thol\u2019s earnest entreaty, from his knees, he ventured to\nspeak firmly to the god--reverently but very firmly pointing out to\nhim that the labourers, if their religious feelings were flouted,\nwould probably cease work; and he hinted that he himself would have\nto consider whether he could retain his post. So Thol went back to\nthe goose-pond and was so much chidden by Thia for his weakness that\nhe almost wished she believed him to be a god. Of course he was not a\ngod. Of course Thia was right. Still, Shib was known to be a very wise\nman. It was strange that Shib should be mistaken. Inwardly, he could\nnot agree with Thia that Shib was a fool. And I think she must have\nsuspected him of this reservation, for she looked at him with much\ntrouble in her eyes and was for a while silent, and then, fondlingly,\nmade him promise that he never would trust any one\u2019s thoughts but hers.\n\nThree days later the great trench was finished; and down into it, by\nleverage of many stakes heftily wielded in unison, was heaved the\ndragon (and there, to this day, deep down under the eastern side of the\ngarden and road-way of Berkeley Square, is the dragon\u2019s skeleton--an\noccult memorial of Thol\u2019s deed). Down into the trench, with a great\nthud that for a moment shook the ground, fell Thol\u2019s victim. Presently\nthe trench brimmed with earth, and this earth was stamped firm by\nexultant feet, and more earth was added to it and stamped on till only\na long brown path, that would soon be green and unnoticeable, marked\nthe place of sepulture.\n\nThe great occasion lacked only the god\u2019s presence. Of course the god\nhad been invited. Shib, heading a deputation on the banks of the\ngoose-pond, had besought him that he would deign to throw the first\nclod of earth upon the dragon; and he had diplomatically added that\nall the homelanders were hoping that Thia might be induced to sing and\ndance on the grave as soon as it had been filled. But Thia had answered\nthat she could not give her husband leave, inasmuch as he had been idle\nat his work that day; he would like very much to come; but it was for\nthat very reason that she would not let him: he must be punished. As\nfor herself, she too would very much like to come, but she must stay\nand keep him to his work. Thol saying nothing, the deputation had\nthen withdrawn, not without many obeisances, which Thia, with as many\ncurtseys, roguishly took to herself.\n\nHowever, even without the light of the god\u2019s countenance on it, the\nfestival was a great and glorious one. Perhaps indeed the revellers\nenjoyed themselves more than would have been possible in the glare\nof that awful luminary. The revels lasted throughout the night, and\nthroughout the next day, and did not cease even then. Dazed with\nsleepiness and heavy with surfeits of meat, the homelanders continued\nto caper around bonfires and to clap one another on the back; and only\nbecause they had not the secret of fermented liquor were there no\nregrettable scenes of intoxication. The revels had become a habit. It\nseemed as though they would never cease. But human strength is finite.\n\nThia would have liked to be in the midst of the great to-do. It was\nwell that the homelanders should rejoice. And the homelanders were as\ndear to her as ever, though she had so much offended them for Thol\u2019s\nsake and theirs. Thol\u2019s nature was not social, as hers was; but she\nknew that even he would have liked to have glimpses of the fun. It\ngrieved her to keep him aloof with her among the geese. She sang and\ndanced round him and petted him and made much of him, all day long.\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nThe autumn was rainy; and the winter was rainy too; and thus the\nbrown path over the dragon\u2019s grave vanished even before spring came.\nGreen also was the grass that had for so many years been black above\nand around the mouth of the dragon\u2019s cave. Valley and hill smiled as\nblandly at each other as though they had never seen a dragon.\n\nLittle by little, likewise, the souls of the homelanders had reverted,\nas we should say, to type. There were no signs now of that mutual\ngood-will which had been implanted in them by the common peril and had\noverflowed so wildly at the time when the peril ended. Mistrustfulness\nhad revived, and surliness with it, and quickness to take offence,\nand a dull eagerness to retaliate on the offender. The shortcomings of\nothers were once more the main preoccupation of the average homelander.\nNext to these, the weather was once more the favourite topic of\nconversation, especially if the weather were bad; but even if it\nwere good, the prospect of bad weather was dwelt on with a more than\nsufficient emphasis. Work, of course, had to be done; but as little\nof it was done as might be, and that glumly, and not well. Meals were\nhabitually larger than appetites. Eyes were duller, complexions less\nclear, chests narrower, stomachs more obtrusive, arms and legs less\nwell-developed, than they had been under the dragon\u2019s auspices. And\nprayers, of course, were not said now.\n\nThia in her childhood had thought the homelanders perfect; and thus\nafter the coming of the dragon she had observed no improvement in\nthem. But now, with maturer vision, she did see that they were growing\nless worthy of high esteem. This grieved her. She believed that she\nloved the homelanders as much as ever, she told herself truly enough\nthat it was much her own fault that they had ceased to love her. In\npoint of fact, their coldness to her, in course of time, cooled her\nfeeling for them: she was human. What she did love as much as ever was\nthe homeland. What grieved her was that the homeland should have an\nimperfect population.\n\nShe talked constantly to Thol about her sorrow. He was not a very apt\nauditor. Being a native of the homeland, he could not see it, as she\ncould, from without. It was not to him an idea, as it was to Thia\u2019s\ndeep alien eyes. It was just the homeland. As for the homelanders\nthemselves, he had never, as you may remember, loved them; but he liked\nthem quite well now. He supposed he really was not a god; but it no\nlonger embarrassed him to be thought so; indeed it pleased him to be\nthought so. The homelanders no longer knelt when he passed by. He had\nasked them not to, and they reverently obeyed his wish. He supposed\nThia was right in saying that they were less good than in the days of\nthe dragon; but in those days he had hardly known them. He was glad to\nknow them better now. His nature had, in fact, become more expansive.\nHe wished Thia were not so troubled about the homeland. He wished she\nwould think more gently of the homelanders, and think less about them,\nand talk less to him about them.\n\nSometimes she even tried to enlist his help. \u2018To me,\u2019 she would say,\n\u2018they would not hearken. But you, O Thol, whom in their folly they\nstill believe to be a god, could give light to them and shame them back\nto goodness and strength, and so to happiness. I would teach you what\nwords to say.\u2019 But Thol, even though he was to be spared the throes of\ncomposition, would look so blankly wretched that Thia\u2019s evangelical\nardour was quenched in laughter. He did not know why she was laughing,\nand he hoped it was not at him that she was laughing: after all, he had\nslain the dragon. Nevertheless, her gaiety was a relief to him.\n\nBut her ardour was always flaming up again.\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nShe had very soon exempted him from that task which failed to cure the\nhomelanders of their delusion about him. She agreed that goose-driving\nwas not a man\u2019s work. As he did not wish to be a shepherd again, and as\nit was needful for his own good that he should be set to some sort of\nwork, she urged him to be a goat-herd. Goats, she said, were less dull\nthan sheep; fiercer; more like dragons. So, beside the goose-pond, he\nherded goats; but without the enthusiasm that she had hoped for.\n\nOne day, about a year after their marriage, he even suggested that\nhe should have a lad to help him. She said, with a curl of the lip,\nthat she had not known he was old and feeble. He replied, seriously,\nthat he was younger than she; and as for feebleness, he asked her to\nremember that he, not she, had slain the dragon. He then walked away,\nleaving his goats to their own devices, and his wife to hers, and spent\nthe rest of the day in company that was more appreciative of him. He\nreturned of course before sundown, fearful of a lecture. Thia, who had\nalready driven his goats into their pen, did but smile demurely, saying\nthat she would always be glad to do his work for him, and that she was\ntrustier than any lad.\n\nBut, as time went on, her temper was not always so sweet. Indeed, it\nceased to be sweet. In his steady, rather bovine way, he loved her as\nmuch as ever; but his love of being with her was less great, and his\npleasure in the society of others was greater, than of yore. Perhaps\nif Thia had borne a child, she might have been less troubled about\nthe welfare of the homelanders. But this diversion and solace was not\ngranted. Thia\u2019s maternal instinct had to spend itself on a community\nwhich she could not help and did not now genuinely love, and on a\nhusband who did not understand her simplest thoughts and was moreover\ngrowing fat. Her disposition suffered under the strain. One day, when\nshe was talking to him about the homeland, she paused with sudden\nsuspicion and asked him what she had said last; and he could make no\nanswer; and she asked him to tell her what he had been thinking about;\nand he said that he had been thinking about his having slain the\ndragon; and she, instead of chiding him tenderly, as she would have\ndone in the old days, screamed. She screamed that she would go mad\nif ever again he spoke to her of that old dragon. She flung her arms\nout towards the hills across the waters and said, with no lowering of\nher voice, that every day, out yonder, men were slaying dragons and\nthinking nothing of it, and doing their work, and not growing fat. He\nasked her whether she meant that he himself was growing fat. \u2018Yea,\u2019 she\nanswered. He said that then indeed she was mad. Away he strode, nor\ndid he return at sundown; and it was late in the night before the god\nretired from a cheery party of worshippers and went up to the cave,\nwhere Thia, faintly visible in the moonlight, lay sleeping, with a look\nof deep disdain on her face.\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nSometimes Thia wondered whether in her childhood the characters and\nways of the homelanders had been as they were now. She hated to think\nthat they had not been perfect in those days; but she reasoned that\nthey could not have been: before the coming of the dragon they must\nhave been as they were now, and the only difference was that they had\nthen loved her. Thus even the memory of her bright careless early years\nwas embittered to her.\n\nIn point of fact, the homelanders had not been exactly as they now\nwere. The sudden cessation of the strain imposed on them by the\ndragon\u2019s presence, and of the comparative hardships also imposed by\nit, had caused a reaction so strong as to restore to them in a rather\naccentuated form what faults had originally been theirs. Human nature\nhad grown rather more human than ever. Labour was a less than ever\nalluring thing. Responsibilities had a greater irksomeness. Freedom was\nall. And, as having special measure of vital force, especially were\nyouths and maidens intent on making the most of their freedom. Their\nfreedom was their religion; and, as every religion needs rites, they\nritualistically danced. They danced much during the day, and then much\nby moonlight or starlight or firelight, in a grim and purposeful, an\nangular and indeflexible manner, making it very clear that they were\nnot to be trifled with.\n\nThia, when first she saw them engaged thus, had been very glad; she\nimagined that they must be doing something useful. When she realised\nthat they were dancing, she drew a deep breath. She remembered how she\nherself had danced--danced thoughtlessly and anyhow, from her heart,\nwith every scrap of her body. She blushed at the recollection. She did\nnot wonder that the homelanders had resented her dance on the morning\nafter her marriage. She wondered that they had encouraged her to dance\nwhen she was a child. And she felt that there must, after all, be in\nthese young people a deep fund of earnestness, auguring well for their\nfuture.\n\nTime had not confirmed this notion. The young people danced through the\npassing seasons and the passing years with ever greater assiduity and\nsolemnity; but other forms of seriousness were not manifested by them.\nFew of them seemed to find time even for falling in love and marrying.\nThey all, however, called one another \u2018beloved,\u2019 and had a kind of\nmutual good-will which their elders, among themselves, would have done\nwell to emulate. And for those elders they had a tolerant feeling which\nought to have been, yet was not, fully reciprocated.\n\nThol within five years of the dragon\u2019s death, Thol with his immense\nred beard and his stately deportment, was of course very definitely an\nelder; and still more so was that wife of his, that rather beautiful\ndark woman, Thia, whose face was so set and stern that she looked\nalmost as though she--she!--were dancing. Thol was liked by the young\npeople. They made much of him. They did not at all object to his being\nrather pompous: after all, he had slain that dragon, and they thought\nit quite natural that their parents should imagine he was a god. They\nliked him to be pompous. They humoured him. They enjoyed drawing him\nout. Among the youths there were several who, in the hours not devoted\nto earnest dancing and cursory guardianship of flocks, made pictures\nupon white stones or upon slabs of chalk. They liked especially to\nmake pictures of Thol, because he was so ready to pose for them, and\nbecause he stood so still for them. They drew in a manner of their\nown, a manner, which made the veins of poor old Veo stand out upon his\nforehead, and moved him to declare that they would die young and would\ndie in shame and in agony. Thol, however, was no critic. He was glad to\nbe portrayed in any manner. And it much pleased him to have the colour\nof his mane and beard praised constantly by the young artists. He had\nsupposed the colour was wrong. Thia had been wont to laugh at it, in\nher laughing days. Thia had never called him beautiful, in her praising\ndays. It gladdened him that there were now many young women--Afa, for\ninstance, and Ola, and Ispa, and Moa--who called him, to his face,\n\u2018terribly\u2019 beautiful.\n\nThol\u2019s face, which Thia had admired for its steadfast look, and later\nhad begun to like less for its heavy look, had now a look that was\nrather fatuous. Afa and the others did not at all object to this. They\nliked it; they encouraged it by asking him to dance with them. He did\nnot, as they supposed, think that he was too old to dance: he only\nthought that he might not dance well and might lose his power over\nthem. He believed that they loved him. How should they not? Thia,\nthough she never told him so now, loved him with her whole heart, of\ncourse, and, for all the harsh words she spoke at times, thought that\nno man was his equal. How should not these much gentler young women not\nhave given their hearts to him? He felt that he himself could love one\nof them, if he were not Thia\u2019s husband. They were not beautiful, as\nThia was; and they were not wise, as she was; but he felt that if he\nhad never seen Thia he might love one of them, or even all of them.\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nFor lack of a calendar, the homelanders had not the habit of keeping\nanniversaries. They never knew on what day of the year a thing had\nhappened--did not even know that there was a year. But they knew the\nfour seasons. They remembered that the apple-trees had been in blossom\nwhen Thol slew the dragon, and that since then the apple-trees had\nblossomed four times. And it seemed good to them that at the close of\na day when those blossoms were again on those branches, a feast should\nbe held in that part of the valley where the great deed had been done.\nShib, who organised the feast, was anxious that it should be preceded\nby a hymn in praise of the slayer god. He thought this would have a\ngood effect on the rising generation. But Thol opposed the idea, and\nit was dropped. Shib had also been anxious that Thia should attend the\nfeast, sitting at Thol\u2019s right hand and signifying to the young the\nblessedness of the married state. Thol promised that he would beg her\nto come; and he did so, as a matter of form, frequently. But Thia of\ncourse did not grace the convivial scene.\n\nIt was at a late hour of the moonlit night that Thol, flushed with\nadulation, withdrew from the revels, amidst entreaties that he should\nremain. He was still wearing the chaplet of flowers that Afa had\nwoven for him. Afa herself was clinging to one of his arms, Moa to\nthe other, as he went round to the eastern spur of the hill; and Ola\nand Ispa and many others were footing around lightly and lingeringly,\nappealingly. It was rather the thought of Thia\u2019s love for him than of\nhis for her that withheld him from kissing these attendants before he\nbade them good-night. For his own sake he wished, as he climbed the\nhill, that they would not stand cooing so many farewells up to him so\nloudly. Thia might not understand how true he was to her. He hoped she\nwas sleeping. But she was awake. Nor was he reassured by the laughter\nwith which, after a moment, she greeted him. She was looking at his\nhead. He became suddenly aware that he had not shed that chaplet. He\nsnatched it off. She laughed the more, but with no kindness in the\nsound of her laughter.\n\n\u2018O Thia,\u2019 he said, after a search for words, \u2018be not wroth against\nthose maidens! I love none of them.\u2019\n\n\u2018Is that not cruel of you, O Thol? Do they not love you?\u2019\n\n\u2018Though they love me, O Thia, I swear to you that I love not them.\u2019\n\n\u2018Why should you not?\u2019 she laughed. \u2018Are you so foolish that you think I\nshould be sorry?\u2019\n\n\u2018O Thia,\u2019 he rebuked her, \u2018you speak empty words. You speak as though\nyou did not love me.\u2019\n\n\u2018I have long ceased to love you, O Thol,\u2019 she said in a low voice.\n\nHe stared at her blankly in the moonlight. His slow mind strove hard.\n\u2018But you are my wife,\u2019 he said at last. \u2018I am your husband. O Thia, is\nit indeed true that you have ceased to love me?\u2019\n\n\u2018O Thol, it is most true.\u2019\n\nThen, by stress of the great anger that rose in him, his mind worked\nmore quickly--or rather his tongue was loosened. He told Thia that\nshe had never loved him. She denied this coldly. He said that she had\nnever understood him. She denied this warmly. He reminded her that even\nwhen she was a little girl she had once called him a coward; and this\ntoo she denied; but he maintained that it was so; and she reminded him\nthat after he had been beaten by his master for seeing the dragon he\nsaid that she too ought to have been beaten for seeing the dragon;\nand he denied this; but she persisted that it was so; and he then said\nthat she ought to have been beaten; and she replied that she could be\nnow, and she challenged him to beat her; but he did not accept her\nchallenge; and this, she said, proved that he was a coward; and he\nasked her to repeat this, and she repeated it, and he then reminded her\nthat he had slain the dragon; and she, stamping her foot, said she only\nwished the dragon had slain him; and she made a face at him, and rushed\nout of the cave, and if there had been a door she would have slammed\nit; and really he was quite glad that she had gone; and after she had\nrun far she lay down upon the grass and slept till dawn, and then,\nrising and brushing the dew off her arms and legs, went in search of\nsome lonely spot where she should build her a hut of clay and wattles.\n\nAnd perhaps it was a sign of her alien blood that the spot chosen by\nher was in what we call Soho. It was the spot on which, many years\nlater, many of my co\u00e6vals were to dine in the little Restaurant du\nBon-Accueil, half-way along Gerrard Street. Gone, as utterly as Thia\u2019s\nhut, is the dear little Restaurant du Bon-Accueil. But again I must\nhark back.\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\n\u2018Very surely,\u2019 thought Thol, some moments after the sun had waked him\nand shown him the empty cave and brought back last night to his memory,\n\u2018I shall find her by the pond.\u2019\n\nThither, with much dignity of gait, but with the promise of forgiveness\non his brow, he presently went. She was not there. There only her geese\nwere.\n\nThese he unpenned and let go into the pond, and then, having freed his\ngoats also, sat down and waited. He waited all day long. She did not\ncome. Nor was she there for him in the cave when he went back to it at\nsunset. Neither was she at the pond next morning. Not even her geese\nwere there now.\n\nThat she had wanted them, and not him, was a bitter thought to Thol.\nHe had not, till now, known how much he loved her. That she had been\nhere this morning, or in the night, made the ground somehow wonderful\nto him. But he frowned away from his brow the promise of forgiveness.\nHe would not forgive Thia now. Still less would he go in quest of her.\nHe freed his goats, guided them to some long grass and, sitting down,\ntried to take an intelligent interest in their doings and a lively\ninterest in their welfare, and not wonder where Thia was.\n\nFor three whole days he tried hard--tried with all that fixity of\npurpose which had enabled him at last to slay the dragon. It was Afa\u2019s\nvisit that unmanned him.\n\nNot she nor any other of those maidens had ever come to him at the pond\nin Thia\u2019s time. If they happened to pass that way, they would gaze\nstraight before them, or up at the sky, greeting neither the husband\nnor the wife, and simpering elaborately, as much as to say, \u2018We are\nunworthy.\u2019 But now it was straight at Thol that the approaching Afa\nsimpered. And she said, \u2018I am come to be the goat-herd\u2019s help!\u2019\n\nHe marvelled that there was a time when he had thought he might have\nloved one of these maidens. He was not even sure that he knew which of\nthem this one was. He was sure only that he despised them all. And this\nsentiment so contorted his mild face that there was nothing for Afa to\ndo but toss her head and laugh and leave him.\n\nPresently the look of great scorn in his face was succeeded by a look\nof even greater love. He arose and went in search of Thia. But he did\nnot in his quest of her throw dignity to the winds. He did not ask\nanybody where he should find her. He walked slowly, as though bent on\nno errand. It was near sunset when at length he espied his lost one\nnear to a lonely pool at the edge of the forest.\n\nShe did not see him. She sat busily plaiting wattles. There was a great\npile of these beside her. And in and around the pool were her geese.\n\nIt was they that saw him first, and at sight of him they began to\nquack, as though in warning. Thia looked up quickly and saw Thol. He\nheld out his arms to her, he strode towards her, calling her name; but\nshe was up, she was gone into the darkness of the forest.\n\nLong he peered into that darkness, and called into it, and even groped\nthrough it, but vainly.\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nFor people who are not accustomed to think, thought is a fatiguing\naffair. Thol, despite his robust body, was tired when he awoke next\nmorning, for he had spent a great part of the night in wondering how to\nwin back his wife. In the days before he slew the dragon he had been a\nconstant thinker. Little by little he was now to regain the habit.\n\nStep by step he reached the premiss that in order to find a means of\nwinning Thia back he must first make clear to himself why she had\nceased to love him. He put together what he could recall of the many\nthings that in the course of time she had said in anger against him.\nAnd he came to the conclusion that he had displeased her most by\ndwelling so much upon his great deed. He would dwell less upon it,\ntry even to forget it. But this would not suffice. How was she to know\nthat he was no longer dwelling as of yore? Perhaps he could do a second\ngreat deed? There seemed to be none to do. He must nevertheless try to\nthink of one--some second great deed that would much please her. It was\nfor the homelanders\u2019 sake that the first one had found favour in her\nsight. And then somehow the homelanders had become less good because\nof it. Thia had often said so. Of course she had never blamed him for\nthat. Still, perhaps she would not have ceased to love him if his deed\nhad not done harm. Was there no deed by which the harm could be undone?\nDay by day, night by night, Thol went on thinking.\n\nAfter the lapse of what we should call a week or so, he began to act\nalso.\n\nHe knew that there could be no great thickness of barrier between the\nback of his cave and the back of the cave that had been the dragon\u2019s;\nfor in his childhood he had often heard through it quite clearly the\nsound of the voices of Gra and her children. To make in it now a\nbreach big enough to crawl through on hands and knees was the first\nstep in the plan that he had formed. With a great sharp stone, hour\nafter hour, daily, he knelt at work. Fortunately--for else must the\nwhole plan have come to naught--the barrier was but of earth, with\nquite small stones in it. Nevertheless, much of strength and patience\nhad been exerted before the first little chink of daylight met Thol\u2019s\neyes.\n\nIt was a glad moment for him when, that same evening, at sunset, at\nlast he was able to crawl through into the western cave; but as he rose\nand gazed around the soot-blackened lair he did not exult. His work\nhad but begun. And his work would never end while he lived. He prayed\nearnestly to the sun that he might live long and always do his work\nrightly. Also he prayed that Thia might soon again love him.\n\nThat night, in his own cave, just as he was falling asleep, he had a\ndoubt which greatly troubled him. He arose and went forth to a place\nwhere some ducks were. One of these he took and slew, and strode\naway with it to the marshes. There he heaved it into the ooze. It was\nquickly sucked down. This was well.\n\nOn the next night he became a woodman; and many were the nights he\nspent in going to and fro in the dark between his cave and the nearest\nmargin of the forest, lopping off great branches and bearing them away\nfor storage, and even uprooting saplings and bearing away these also,\nand, with a flint axe, felling young trees, and chopping them into\nlengths that were portable. He continued this night-work until both\ncaves were neatly stacked with wood enough to serve his purpose for a\nlongish while.\n\nAnd then--for he had thought out everything, with that thoroughness\nwhich is the virtue of slow minds--he wove two thick screens of osiers\nand withes, each screen rather bigger than either end of the tunnel.\nOn the evening when the second of these was finished, he made in the\ndragon\u2019s cave, not far from the left-hand side of the cave\u2019s mouth, a\nthick knee-high heap of branches and logs, some of them dry, others\ngreen. He placed at the other side of the mouth two thick flat stones,\none upon the other.\n\nBack in his own cave, he smeared with sheep\u2019s fat a certain great stick\nof very dry pine-wood.\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nAnd on the following morning history began to repeat itself. With some\nvariations, however. For example, it was not a puny little boy but a\ngreat strong man who, as the sun rose, came rushing with every symptom\nof terror down the western side of the hill. And the man was not really\nfrightened. He only seemed so.\n\nHe careered around the valley, howling now like one distraught.\nResponsive sheep, goats, geese, what not, made great noises of their\nown. From the mouths of caves and huts people darted and stood agape.\nThol waved his arms wildly towards the cave upon the hill. People saw a\ngreat column of smoke climbing up from it into the sky.\n\n\u2018A dragon! Another dragon!\u2019 was Thol\u2019s burthen.\n\nPeople gathered round him in deep wonder and agitation. He told\nthem, in gasps, that he had come down early--very early--to look for\nmushrooms--and had looked back and--seen a dragon crawling up the hill.\nHe said that he had seen it only for a moment or two: it crawled very\nquickly--far more quickly than the old one. He added that it was rather\nsmaller than the old one--smaller and yet far more terrible, though its\nsmoke was less black. Also, that it held high its head, not scorching\nthe grass on its way.\n\nThere was no panic.\n\n\u2018O Thol,\u2019 said one, \u2018we need not fear the dragon, for here are you, to\ncome between us and him.\u2019\n\n\u2018Here by this stream,\u2019 said another, \u2018we shall presently bury him with\ngreat rejoicings, O high god.\u2019\n\nThe crowd went down on its knees, thanking Thol in anticipation. But\nhe, provident plodder, had foreseen what would happen, and had his\nwords ready. \u2018Nay, O homelanders,\u2019 he said, plucking at his great\nbeard, \u2018I am less young than I was. I am heavier, and not so brave.\nPeradventure some younger man will dare meet this dragon for us, some\nday. Meanwhile, let us tempt him with the flesh of beasts, as of yore,\nhoping that so he will come but seldom into our midst.\u2019\n\nIn consternation the crowd rose from its knees, and Thol walked quickly\naway, with a rather shambling gait.\n\nThe awful news spread apace. The valley was soon full. Long and\nearnestly the great throng prayed to the sun that he would call the\ndragon away from them. He did not so. Up, up went the steadfast smoke\nfrom within the cave. Less black it certainly was than that of the\nother dragon, but not less dreadful. Almost as great as the terror\nthat it inspired was the general contempt for Thol. Many quite old\nmen vowed to practise the needful stroke of the spear. All the youths\nvowed likewise--yea, and many of the maidens too. It was well-known,\nof course, that Thol had practised for a long while, and that any\nhaste would be folly; but such knowledge rather heartened than dejected\nthe vowers. Meanwhile, the thing to do was what the craven Thol had\nsuggested before he slunk away: to offer food as of yore. Shib,\nbristling with precedents, organised the labour. Thol had said that\nthe dragon was a smaller one than the other. Perhaps therefore not so\nmuch food would be needed. But it was better to be on the safe side and\noffer the same ration. Up to the little shelf of ground in front of the\ncave\u2019s mouth were borne two goats, three ducks, two deer, three geese\nand two sheep.\n\nAll day long the valley was crowded with gazers, hopers, comforters of\none another, offerers-up of prayers.\n\nAs day drew to its close, the tensity increased. Would this dragon wake\nand eat at sunset, as that other had been wont to do? How soon would\nappear through the smoke that glimpse of nether fire which proclaimed\nthat his head was out of the cave, alert and active? And would that\nglow rise and fall, in the old way, twelve times, with the sound of the\nclashed jaws? What was in store for the homeland to-night?\n\nNone but Thol knew.\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nHe, very wisely, had rested all day in preparation for the tasks of\nevening and night. Two or three times, moving aside the screen that\nkept the smoke out of his cave, he had crawled through the opening and,\ndrawing the other screen across the other side of it, had tended the\nfire. For the rest, he had been all inactive.\n\nAs twilight crept into the cave, he knelt in solemn supplication to the\ndeparting sun. Presently, when darkness had descended, he struck two\nflints, lit one end of his pine-wood staff, moved the screen aside,\ndrew a long deep breath, and crawled swiftly into the other cave.\nSlowly he moved his torch from side to side of the cave\u2019s mouth, along\nthe ground. He was holding it in his left hand, and in his right hand\nwas holding one of the two flat stones. After a pause, still kneeling,\nhe raised high the torch for a moment or two and then sharply lowered\nit in the direction of one of the smoke-clouded animals. At the same\ntime he powerfully clashed the one stone down upon the other. Another\npause, and he repeated these actions exactly, directing the torch\ntowards the next animal. He performed them ten times in all. Then he\nextinguished his torch and crept quickly home, puffing and spluttering\nand snorting, glad to escape into clear air.\n\nWhen he had regained his breath, he crawled back to drag the carcasses\nin. The roe and the buck he left where they were. He had calculated\nthat three nightly journeys to the marshes and back would be all that\nhe could achieve. First he would take the two sheep, one on each\nshoulder; next, the goats; lastly the birds, three necks in either\nhand. The buck and the roe would be too heavy to be carried together;\nand for five journeys there would certainly not be time. It was for\nthis reason that he had described the dragon as smaller than the old\none, and had clashed the stones ten times only.\n\nFrom the valley rose sounds of rejoicing that all was well for the\nhomeland to-night. One by one, Thol transferred the carcasses to his\nown cave. He waited there among them till the dead of night, when all\nfolk would be sleeping. Then, shouldering the two sheep, he sallied\nforth down the hill and away to the marshes.\n\nHe accomplished the whole of his night-work before the stars had begun\nto fade. Then, having replenished and banked the fire, he lay down to\nsleep. Some four hours later he woke to go and tend the fire again, and\nthen again slept.\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nIt was a toilsome, lonesome, monotonous and fuliginous life that\nThol had chosen; but he never faltered in it. Always at nightfall he\nimpersonated the dragon, and in the small hours went his journeys to\nthe marshes; and never once did he let the fire die.\n\nThe afternoons passed very slowly. He wished he could sally forth into\nthe sunshine, like other men. He paced round and round his cave, hour\nafter hour, a strange figure, dark-handed, dark-visaged, dark-bearded.\n\nIn so far as they deigned to remember him at all, the homelanders\nsupposed he had gone away, that first morning, across the waters or\nthrough the forests, to some land where he could look men in the face.\n\nHere he was, however, in their midst, a strenuous and faithful servant.\n\nHe had a stern grim joy in the hardness of his life--save that he could\nnever ask Thia to share it with him. He had not foreseen--it was the\none thing he had not thought out well--how hard the life would be.\nThe great deed by which he had thought to bring Thia back to him must\nforever keep them asunder. Thus he had done an even greater deed than\nhe intended. And his stern grim joy in it was thereby the greater.\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nHad she so wished, Thia might have become very popular and have\nregained something of her past glory. After Thol\u2019s confession of\ncowardice she had instantly risen in the homelanders\u2019 esteem. How very\nright she had been to leave him! Friendly eyes and friendly words\ngreeted her. But when they all knelt praying the sun to call the dragon\naway, she remained upright and mute. And afterwards, when she was asked\nwhy, she said that it was well that the dragon should abide among them,\nfor thus would they all be the better, in heart and deed, and therefore\ntruly the happier, could they but know it. She said that whether or not\nthey could know it, so it was.\n\nThese sayings of hers were taken in bad part, and she was shunned\nbecause of them. This did not mar the joy she had in knowing that all\nwas well once more in the homeland.\n\nShe felt herself not at all unblest in the quiet spinsterly life she\nwas leading, in and out of her trim new hut, with her dear flock of\ngeese about her.\n\nOf Thol, nowadays, she thought more gently. She felt that if he had\nstayed in the homeland she would have gone back to him. It would have\nbeen her bounden duty to be with him and to comfort him in his shame.\nIndeed his shame made him dear to her once more. As the days passed\nshe thought more and more about him. It was strange that he had gone\nfrom the homeland. No homelander ever had gone forth into the perils\nof the lands beyond. If she herself, daughter of wanderers, had roved\naway instead of building this hut to dwell in, she might not have much\nmarvelled at herself, less brave though she was than Thol. And Thol was\nno longer brave. How had he, fearing a dragon smaller than that other,\nconquered his fear of known and unknown things that were worse yet, far\nworse yet?\n\nAnd one evening a strange doubt came to her. Might it not be that Thol\nwas still in the homeland? In one of all these dark forests he might be\nliving, with nuts and berries to support life. Or, she further guessed,\nhe might even be in his own cave, stealing out at night when all but\nthe watchmen on the other side of the hill were sleeping. This notion,\nfoolish though it seemed to her, possessed her mind.\n\nSo soon as silence and sleep had descended on the homeland, Thia\nherself stole out into the clear starlit night. Not far from the\neastern spur of the hill she lay down in a clump of long grass, and\nthence, gazing up, watched the cave\u2019s mouth steadily.\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nSome one presently came forth: and yes, it was Thol. Slowly he came\ndown the hill, with his head bent forward, with his hands up to his\nbowed shoulders, and two burdens at his back--two goats, as Thia saw\nwhen presently Thol turned aside southward. He looked very strange. His\nhair and face seemed to have grown quite dark. And what was he doing\nwith those two goats? Thia lay still, with a fast-beating heart. She\nfelt that her voice would not have come, even had she tried to call to\nhim.\n\nShe watched him out of sight, then rose to her feet and, hesitatingly,\nwent to the foot of the hill, and then, quickly and resolutely, went up\nit and into the cave.\n\nQuick-witted though she was, the sight of three geese and three ducks\nand of two sheep puzzled her deeply; and not less did she wonder at the\nquantity of stacked wood. And what was that fence of osiers against the\nwall? She moved it slightly and saw a great breach in the wall; and\nthrough this some smoke came drifting in. And now her quick wits began\nto work--but in such wise as to make her bewilderment the deeper.\n\nSuddenly, drawing a deep breath, she went down on her hands and knees,\nand crawled rapidly through.\n\nShe was soon back again. Blinking hard and shaking the smoke from\nher nostrils, she went to breathe the clear air at the cave\u2019s mouth.\nBut, good though this air was, she hardly tasted it. She had burst\nout sobbing. She, who never in all her life had shed tears, sobbed\nmuch now. But she remembered that tears make people\u2019s eyes ugly. So\nshe controlled herself and dried her eyes vigorously. She had not\nremembered that the palms of her hands must be all black from her\ncrawl. When she saw them, and knew what her face must be now, she burst\nout laughing. And the sound made her feel very young, for it was long\nsince she had laughed. But, as she wished to please Thol\u2019s eyes, she\nretired to the back of the cave and crouched where she would scarcely\nbe seen by him when he came.\n\nHe came at last, and then, very softly, she cried out to him, \u2018Thol!\u2019\n\nHe, brave though he was, started violently.\n\n\u2018Do not look at me, O Thol! Not yet! For my face is black and would\ndisplease you. Look at me only after you have heard me. O Thol, if they\nsaid now that you were a god, almost would I believe them. But if you\nwere a god your deed would be less great. The wonder is that you are\na man, and were once mine. O Thol, forgive me, keep me here with you,\nneed me!\u2019\n\nBut he slowly answered, \u2018Nay, O Thia, this cave is not now for a woman.\u2019\n\n\u2018Not for a woman that is your wife and lover? Think! Was it not for my\nsake and for love of me that you thought to do what you are doing?\u2019\n\n\u2018Yea, O Thia. Yet, now that I am doing it, itself suffices me. I am\nstrong, and suffer not under the burden of it. The very heaviness of\nit makes me glad. And now your knowledge of it gladdens me, too. But I\nwould not have you bear the least part of it with me. Go to your own\nhome!\u2019\n\n\u2018You speak firmly, O great dragon! Yet will not I obey you. Tell me of\nyour work. Is it to the marshes that you take the beasts and the birds?\u2019\n\n\u2018Yea. Begone, small dear one!\u2019 And he stooped down to take the two\nsheep.\n\n\u2018Once, long ago, you wished that a lad might help you in your hard\nwork. O Thol, I am as I was, trustier than any lad. It were better that\nyou should go twice, not thrice, every night, to the marshes. I will\nalways take the birds.\u2019 And she rose to take them.\n\nBut a thought, a very important thought, came to her, giving her pause.\nAnd she said, \u2018The fire must first be tended.\u2019\n\n\u2018It has no need yet,\u2019 he answered. \u2018I tend it when I come back from the\nlast journey.\u2019\n\n\u2018To-night it shall be tended earlier. And I will so tend it that it\nshall last long.\u2019 She was down on her knees and off into the smoke\nbefore he could stop her. He followed her, protesting that such work\nwas not for her. She did it, nevertheless, very well. And presently,\nside by side, he with two sheep, she with three birds\u2019 necks in either\nfist, they went forth into the starlight, and down away to the marshes.\n\nThere, having duly sunk their burdens, they took each other by the\nhand, and turned homeward. At one of the running brooks on their way\nhome, Thia halted. \u2018Here,\u2019 she said, \u2018will I wash my face well. And do\nyou, too, O Thol, wash yours, so that when we wake in the morning mine\nshall not displease you.\u2019\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nEvery night Thia accompanied Thol on one of the two journeys; and\nduring the other she would go to the forest and gather wood, so that\nthere should always be plenty of fuel in hand. She was sorry to have\nhad to abandon her geese, for she felt they would not be as happy with\nany one as they had been with her. Nothing else whatever was there\nto mar her joy in the life that she and Thol were leading together,\nand in the good that they were doing. It amused her to know that the\nhomelanders would think she had wandered away--she who was serving them\nso well. Its very secrecy made her life the more joyous.\n\nDaily she prayed to the sun and other gods that she and Thol might live\nto be very old and might never fail in their work.\n\nBut the sun and those others were not good listeners.\n\nAs the nights lengthened and the leaves began to fall, the mists over\nthe marshes and around them grew ever thicker. It was not easy to find\nthe way through them; and they were very cold, and had a savour that\nwas bitter to the tongue and to the nostrils. And one morning Thia,\nwhen she woke, was shivering from head to foot, though she was in\nThol\u2019s arms. She slipped away from him without waking him, and went not\nmerely to tend the fire but also to warm herself at it. All through the\nmorning she was shivering; and in the evening her hands became hot, as\ndid her face and all her body. She felt very weak. She could laugh no\nmore now at Thol\u2019s disquietude. She lay down, but could not lie very\nstill. At about the time when they were wont to sally forth, she rose\nup, feeling that even though she might not be able to carry the birds\nto-night the journey would freshen her. She soon found that she was too\nweak even to stand. Thol was loth to leave her; but she insisted that\nthe work must be done. Again and again, next day and during the next\nnight, she implored him that if she died he would not mourn her very\nmuch and would not once falter in the work. He promised that he would\nnot falter. Other days and nights passed. It seemed to Thol that Thia\nhad ceased to know him. She did not even follow him with her eyes now.\nOne morning, at daybreak, soon after his return from the third journey,\nshe seemed, by her gaze, to know him. But presently she died in his\narms.\n\nOn that night he went to the forest and dug a grave for his wife. Then,\nreturning to the cave, he took her in his arms, and carried her away,\nand buried her.\n\nIn the time that followed, he was not altogether lonely. He felt by day\nthat somehow she was in the cave with him still, and by night he felt\nthat she walked with him. He never faltered in the work.\n\nHe faltered not much even when the marshes did to him as they had done\nto Thia. Shivering in every limb, or hot and aching, and very weak, he\nyet forced himself to tend the fire and at nightfall to brandish the\ntorch and clash the stones and drag in the beasts and birds. It irked\nhim that he was not strong enough to carry even one sheep away. Surely,\nhe would be strong again soon? For Thia\u2019s sake, and for the homeland\u2019s,\nhe wished ardently to live. But there came an evening when the watchers\nin the valley saw no rising and falling, heard no clashing, of the\ndragon\u2019s jaws.\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nWould the dragon come forth to-night? The valley on the further side of\nthe stream was now thickly crowded. On the nearer side were many single\nadventurers, with spears. Their prowess and skill were not tested. The\ndragon came not forth.\n\nIn the dawn it was noted that his smoke was far less thick than it was\nwont to be. Soon it ceased altogether. What had happened? Perchance the\ndragon was ailing? But even an ailing dragon would breathe. A great\nglad surmise tremulously formed itself. Was the dragon dead?\n\nThe surmise quickly became a firm belief--so firm that, in spite of\nprotests from the precise Shib, songs of thanksgiving were heartily\nsung before the cave was approached and examined.\n\nPeople were much puzzled. The dead man lying at the cave\u2019s mouth,\ngrasping in one hand a flat stone and in the other a charred staff,\nwas not quickly recognised as Thol, so black were his hair and skin;\nnor was he at once known to have been the dragon. The quantities of\nstacked wood, the tunnel into the cave where Thol had lived, did not\nquickly divulge their meaning. Only after long arguments and many\nconjectures did the homelanders understand the trick that had been\nplayed on them. Why, with what evil intent, it had been played, they\nwere almost too angry to discuss at present. But certain words of\nThia\u2019s were remembered; and it was felt that she herself perhaps had\nput the trick into Thol\u2019s mind and that this was why she had fled the\nhomeland. She had better not set foot in it again.\n\nBefore the sun sank, Thol was buried without honour, and far from Thia.\n\nAnd before the sun sank many other times the homelanders were as they\nhad been before the coming of the true dragon, and as they had been\nagain before the false one was among them.\n\n\nFINIS\n\n\n\n\nAnd thus--does our tale end unhappily? I think not. After all, the\nhomelanders at large are rather shadowy to us. Oc and Loga, Shib and\nVeo, Afa and her like, and all those others, all those nameless others,\ndo not mean much to us. It is Thol and Thia that we care about. For\ntheir sake we wish that the good they did could have been lasting. But\nit is not in the nature of things that anything--except the nature\nof things--should last. Saints and wise statesmen can do much. Their\nreward is in the doing of it. They are lucky if they do not live long\nenough to see the undoing. It should suffice us that Thol and Thia\ntogether in their last days knew a happiness greater than they had ever\nknown--Thol a greater happiness than in the days of his glory, and Thia\nthan in the days of hers.\n\n\n  PRINTED IN GREAT BRITAIN BY THE WHITEFRIARS PRESS, LTD.,\n  LONDON AND TONBRIDGE.\n\n\n\n\nFOOTNOTE:\n\n[A] Lest the reader assume that in the course of this narrative one or\nboth of Thia\u2019s parents will return to claim her, let me at once state\nthat within a few months of her being left in the homeland her father\nwas killed by a lion, and her mother by a lioness, in what has since\nbecome Shropshire.\n\n\n\n\nTRANSCRIBER\u2019S NOTES:\n\n\n  Italicized text is surrounded by underscores: _italics_.\n\n  Obvious typographical errors have been corrected.\n\n  Inconsistencies in hyphenation have been standardized.\n\n  Archaic or variant spelling has been retained.\n\n  New original cover art included with this eBook is granted to the\n    public domain.","title":"The dreadful dragon of Hay Hill","tradition":"myth-cosmogony","translated_text":null,"word_count":21207}