The Gold Sickle Part 8

"No, mother; they were lodged in jail at Vannes, all except two of their soldiers whom the magistrates charged to declare to the Roman general that no provisions whatever were to be furnished him, and that his officers were to be as hostages."

"It would have been better to give the officers a thorough caning and drive them in disgrace out of the town," replied Mamm' Margarid. "That is the way thieves are treated, and these Romans tried to rob us."

"You are right, Margarid," said Joel; "they came to rob us--to starve us! to carry away our harvests and our cattle!" And Joel, now in a towering rage, added: "By the vengeance of Hesus! To think of their taking our fine turn-out of six young oxen with skins slick as wolves!

Our four yokes of black bulls that have such a beautiful white star in the center of their foreheads!"

"And our beautiful white heifers with yellow heads!" said Mamm' Margarid shrugging her shoulders and never quitting her distaff, "our sheep whose fleece is so nice and thick.... Come, a good caning for these Romans!"

"And the powerful horses of the stock of your magnificent stallion Tom-Bras," put in the traveler. "They will, after all, have to draw your harvest to Touraine, and will then serve to replace the worn-out horses of the Roman cavalry.... True, to them, the labor will not be excessive ... because you will now probably discover that it is not far from Touraine to Britanny."

"Well may you mock, friend," said Joel. "You were right, and I confess myself to have been wrong. Oh! If only the provinces of Gaul had from the start confederated themselves against the first a.s.sault of the Romans! If united they had put forth but one-half the efforts that they put forth separately--we would not now be exposed to the insolent demands and to the threats of these heathens! Well may you mock!"

"No, Joel, I will mock no longer," gravely answered the traveler. "The danger is near; the hostile camp lies only a twelve day's march from here; the refusal of the magistrates of Vannes and the imprisonment of the Roman officers--all that means speedy war--a merciless war, as only the Romans know how to wage! If we are vanquished it means to us death on the battle field, or slavery far away! The slave merchants follow the tracks of the Roman army; they are greedy after prey. Whatever survives, whether whole or wounded--men, young women, girls, children--all are sold at auction like cattle for the benefit of the vanquisher, and are forthwith consigned by the thousands to Italy or to Southern Gaul where the Romans are settled! Arrived at their destination, the male slaves of robust frame are often forced to fight ferocious animals in the circus for the amus.e.m.e.nt of their masters; the young women and girls, even the children are subjected to monstrous debaucheries. Such is war with the Romans if vanquished!" cried the stranger. "Will you allow yourselves to be vanquished? Will you submit to such disgrace? Will you deliver to them your wives, your sisters, your daughters and children, ye Gauls of Britanny?"

Hardly had the traveler uttered these words when the whole family of Joel--men, women, young girls, children--all down to the dwarfy Stumpy, rose to their feet and with their eyes shooting fire, their cheeks inflamed, cried tumultuously, waving their arms:

"War! War! War!"

Joel's large battle mastiff, fired by these cries, rose on his hind legs and laid his fore-paws on the breast of his master, who, while caressing his enormous head said:

"Yes, old Deber-Trud, like our tribe you will hunt the Romans.... The quarry shall be for you.... Your jaws shall be red with blood!... Wow!

Wow, Deber-Trud! At the Romans! At the Romans!"

Hearing the well-known war-cry, the mastiff responded with furious barks, displaying fangs as redoubtable as a lion's. Hearing Deber-Trud, the outside watch-dogs, as well as those locked up in the kennels, answered him. Frightful was the war-cry raised by the pack.

"A good omen, friend Joel," observed the traveler. "Your dogs bark death to the enemy."

"Yes, yes; death to the enemy!" cried the brenn. "Thanks be to the G.o.ds, in our Breton Gaul, on the day of peril, the watch-dog becomes a war-dog! the draw-horse becomes a war-horse! the ox of the field a war-ox! the harvest carts chariots of war! the laborer a warrior! even our peaceful and fruitful earth turns to war and devours the stranger!

at every step he finds a grave in our fathomless marshes, and his vessels vanish in the whirlpools of our bays which are more terrible in their calm than in the tempest of their fury!"

"Joel," now said Julyan, who had left the body of his friend, "I promised Armel to meet him to-morrow yonder--Such a death would be pleasant to me.... To die fighting the Romans is a duty.... What shall I do?"

"Ask to-morrow one of the druids of Karnak."

"And our sister Hena," said Albinik the mariner to his mother. "It is nearly a year I have not seen her.... She is surely still the pearl of the Isle of Sen? My wife Meroe charged me to remember her to Hena."

"You will see her to-morrow," answered Mamm' Margarid; and laying down her distaff she arose. It was the signal for the family to retire. Mamm'

Margarid looked around and said:

"Let us retire, my children; it is late; to-morrow at break of day we must begin our war preparations;" and turning to the traveler:

"May the G.o.ds grant you a good rest and pleasant dreams!"

CHAPTER VIII.

FAREWELL!

Agreeable to his promise, Joel pushed off his boat early the next morning, accompanied by his son Albinik the mariner, and took the unknown traveler to the island of Kellor, seeing he did not dare to land at the sacred precincts of the Isle of Sen. The brenn's guest said a few words in a low voice to the ewagh who mounts perpetual guard in the island's house. He seemed to be struck with respect and answered that Talyessin, the oldest of the living druids, who then was at the Isle of Sen together with his wife Auria, expected a traveler since the previous evening.

Before leaving Joel, the stranger said to his host: "I hope neither you nor your family will forget your resolution of yesterday. This day a call to arms will resound from one end of Breton Gaul to the other."

"You may rest a.s.sured that I and the rest of my tribe will be the first to respond to the call."

"I believe you. The issue now is whether Gaul shall fall into slavery or shall rise again to the height of her one-time power and glory."

"But should I not, at this moment when I am to leave you, know the name of the brave man who sat at my hearth? The name of the wise man who speaks with so much soundness and loves his country so warmly?"

"Joel, my name shall be 'Soldier' so long as Gaul is not free; and if we ever meet again, I shall call myself 'Your Friend,' seeing that I am that."

Saying these words the unknown traveler stepped into the ewagh's boat that was to take him from Kellor to the Isle of Sen. Before the boat, which was under charge of the ewagh, put off, Joel asked the latter whether he would be permitted to wait at the house for his daughter Hena, who was to come on that day to visit the family. The ewagh informed him that his daughter would not start for the sh.o.r.e until evening. Sorry at not being able to take Hena with him, the brenn re-entered his boat and returned alone with Albinik.

Towards noon, Julyan went to consult the druids of the forest of Karnak upon whether he should take the immediate and voluntary death which would be a pleasure to him, seeing he was to rejoin Armel, or seek death in battle against the Romans. The druids answered him that having sworn to Armel upon his brotherhood faith to die with him, he should be faithful to his promise, and that the ewaghs would bring the body of Armel with the usual ceremonies in order to place it upon the pyre where Julyan would find his place at moon-rise. Happy at being able so soon to join his friend, Julyan was about to leave Karnak, when he saw the stranger, who had been the guest of Joel and who now returned from the Isle of Sen, approaching through the forest in the company of Talyessin.

The latter said a few words to the other druids, who forthwith surrounded the traveler with great eagerness and marks of respect. The younger ones of the druids received him as a brother, the elder ones as a son.

Recognizing Julyan, the traveler said to him:

"As you are to return to the brenn of the tribe, wait a little; I shall give you a letter for him."

Julyan yielded to the wish of the stranger, who withdrew accompanied by Talyessin and other druids. He returned shortly and handed to Julyan a little scroll of yellow tanned skin, saying:

"This is for Joel.... This evening, Julyan, when the moon rises we shall see each other again.... Hesus loves those who, like you, are brave and faithful in their friends.h.i.+p."

Upon arriving at the brenn's house, Julyan learned that the former was on the field gathering in the wheat. He went after him and delivered to Joel the writing sent by the stranger. It said:

"Friend Joel, in the name of Gaul now in danger, this is what the druids expect of you: Command all the members of your family who are at work on the fields to cry out to those of the tribe working not far from them: The mistletoe and the new year! _Let every man, woman and child, all without exception, meet this evening in the forest of Karnak at the rise of the moon._ Let those of the tribe who will have heard these words in turn repeat them aloud to those of the other tribes who may also be at work on the fields, so that the call being repeated from mouth to mouth, from one to another, from village to village, from town to town, from Vannes to Auray, notify all the tribes to convene this evening at the forest of Karnak."

Joel did as ordered by the stranger in the name of the druids of Karnak.

The call was carried from mouth to mouth, from the nearest to the most distant tribes; all were notified to meet that evening in the forest of Karnak when the moon rose.

While some of the brenn's family were hurriedly gathering in the wheat harvest that still remained heaped on the fields, in order to deposit a portion of it in cellars that the laborers were digging on dry ground, the women, the girls and even the children, all working under the direction of Margarid, were as busily engaged disposing of salted meats into baskets, flour into bags, hydromel and wine into pouches; others were filling coffers with lint and balsam for wounds; others were adjusting broad and strong tent cloths over the chariots. In all wars considered dangerous, the tribes threatened by the enemy, instead of waiting for, usually went out to meet him. The houses were abandoned; the field oxen were hitched to the war-chariots, all of which contained the women, the children, the clothes and the provisions of the combatants. The horses, ridden by the full grown men of the tribe, const.i.tuted the cavalry. The young men, being more agile, went on foot as an armed escort. The grain was hidden away; the cattle, let loose, pastured where they pleased and returned instinctively every evening to their usual stables. Generally, the wolves and bears devoured a part.

The fields remained untended and scarcity followed. Often the combatants who went to war in defence of their country, encouraged by the presence of their wives and children, and having nothing to expect from the enemy but disgrace, slavery or death, drove back the invader beyond their frontiers, and returned home to repair the disasters of the fields.

Knowing that his daughter was due at the house, Joel returned home towards sun-down. He also expected to be able to take a hand in the preparations for the war.

Hena, the virgin of the Isle of Sen, soon arrived. When her father, mother and other relatives saw her enter it seemed to them never before had she been so beautiful. Never before did her father feel so proud of his daughter. The long black tunic that she wore was held around her waist by a bra.s.s belt, from which, on one side, hung a little gold sickle, and on the other a crescent in the shape of the waning moon.

Hena had dressed herself with special care in honor of the celebration of her birthday. A necklace and gold bracelets inlaid with garnets ornamented her arms and neck, whiter than the driven snow. When she took off her caped cloak it was noticed that she wore, as ever at religious ceremonies, a crown of green oak leaves on her blonde hair, plaited in braids over her chaste and mild forehead. The blue of the sea, when lying calmly under a clear sky, was not purer than the blue of Hena's eyes.

The brenn stretched out his arms to his daughter. She ran into them joyously and offered him her forehead, as she also did her mother. The children of the family loved Hena dearly and contested with each other the privilege of being the first to kiss her hands--sought with greed by all the little innocent mouths. Even old Deber-Trud gamboled and barked with joy at the arrival of his young mistress.

Albinik the mariner was the first to whom Hena offered her forehead to kiss after her father and mother; she had not seen her brother for a long time. Next came the turn of Guilhern and Mikael and then the swarm of children, whom, stooping to them, Hena, sought to hold all together in one embrace. The young priestess then tenderly greeted Henory, her brother Guilhern's wife, and expressed her regret at not seeing Albinik's wife Meroe. Nor were the other relatives forgotten; all, down to Stumpy, otherwise everyone's b.u.t.t, had a kind word from her.

The general exchange of greetings being over, and happy at finding herself among her own, in the house where she was born eighteen years before, Hena sat down at her mother's feet on the same stool that she used to occupy when a child. When she saw her child seated at her feet, Mamm' Margarid called the maid's attention to the disorder that reigned in the house due to the preparations for war, and she said sadly:

"We should have celebrated this day of your birth with joy and tranquility, dear child! Instead, you now find confusion and alarm in our house that soon will be deserted.... War threatens."