Masters of the Guild Part 8

Hee-o, wee-o, hear the wild bees hummin', See the blackc.o.c.k by the burnie drummin',-- Wattle-weaving sit we snug and couthie,-- Hee-o, wee-o, birdling in our boothie!

Hush thee, my baby O! dark is the night-- Cuddle by kiln-ring where fire burns bright.

Trampling our turf-roof wild cattle we hear-- Cave-folk in winter have nothing to fear.

Kling-klang, ding-dong, hear the hammers clinking-- Stone pots, iron kettles, copper cups for drinkin'!

Elf-shots for bowmen plough a mighty furrow-- Hee-o, wee-o, foxling in our burrow!

Hush thee, my baby! The Beltane's aglow, Making the deasil the wiseacres go.

Brewing our heather-wine, dancing in round-- Earth-folk are we, by her spells are we bound.

Hee-o, wee-o, hear the pipes a-croonin', Like the dragon's beetle-wings a-droonin', Dyeea guard us from the Sword-man's quellin',-- Hee-o, wee-o, bairnie in our dwellin'!

Hush thee, my baby O! hear the dogs bark, Herdin' the lammies home out o' the dark.

Cradled and christened frae goblin's despite, House-folk we hear the kirk bells through the night.

Hee-o, wee-o! hear the cricket chirrin', Hear auld Bawthrens by the ingle purrin',-- Christ us keep while daddie's gone a-huntin'!

Hee-o, wee-o, bonnie Babie Buntin'!

The winds and the waters our Father shall praise, The birds, beasts and fishes shall tell o' His ways.

By seash.o.r.e and mountain, by forest and ling, O come all ye people, and praise ye our King!

VII

THE WOLVES OF OSSORY

Philosophers generally incline to the opinion that the werewolf has no tail. Therefore, this being the sign--"

"Nennius positively states that in certain Irish families, the power to change at will into a wolf--"

"And who knows how numerous may be these abominable wizards?"

Padraig, the scribe, sat listening intently while the company around the guest-house fire discoursed in monk-Latin of werewolves in Ireland. "In saecula saeculorum"--"ab incunabilis horrendum"--"quocunque nomine notandum"--"coram diabolo"--the sonorous many-syllabled phrases clattered like the noise of rooks in treetops. It was January, the "wolf-month" of old English shepherds. Meadows ran floods of icy half-melted snow; mountain winds were screaming about the cloisters, and for two days travelers had been weather-bound at the Abbey.

Some time before, there had been rumors of wolves infesting the hills and displaying in their forays an all but human boldness and cunning. Then other tales began to be whispered. The peasantry huddled early about their turf-fires, and the shepherds of the Abbey sought counsel from their superior. They got small comfort from the Abbot, who curtly ordered them to attend to their duty and avoid vain babblings.

All the same, among the ma.n.u.script volumes in the nest-egg of a library the monks possessed, there were chronicles that mentioned the werewolf.

Marie de France in her "Lays" included the Breton romance of Bisclaveret, the loup-garou. The nerves of the weaker ones began to play them tricks.

It was less and less easy to keep unbroken the orderly round of monastic life.

This little religious community, toiling earnestly and faithfully under wise direction, might in time bring some comfort and prosperity into a desolate land. Ireland had once been known as the Isle of Saints. Now, despoiled by warring kings, pagan Danes and finally the Norman adventurers under Strongbow, the people were in some districts hardly more than heathen. This Abbey, set by Henry Plantagenet in a remote valley, was like a fort on the frontier of Christendom. The people were sullen, suspicious, ignorant, and piteously poor. To deal with them demanded all that a man had of courage, faith and wisdom. And now came these rumors of men-wolves.

When the floods had gone down and the guests departed, Brother Basil in the scriptorium found Padraig diligently at work on a new design for the border of the ma.n.u.script he was illuminating. The central figure was that of a wolf crouching under a thorn-bush to slip out of the s.h.a.ggy skin which disguised his human form. Under his feet lay a child unconscious. At a distance could be seen the distracted mother, and other wolves pursued terrified people flying to shelter. Once, before he came to the Abbey, Padraig had been chased by wolves, and had spent the night in a tree. He drew his wolf with a lifelike accuracy, inspired by the memory of those long, cold hours under a winter moon.

Instead of pausing with a word of criticism or suggestion, as usual, Brother Basil took up the drawing and put it in his scrip. All that he said was, "Find another design, Padraig, my son."

To others Padraig might seem an unruly spirit, neither to command nor to coax, but the word of Brother Basil was his law and his gospel. He began to draw new figures on fresh parchment, but he could not quite put out of his mind the unlooked-for fate of his wolf. Current gossip often gave hints for the work of the illuminators, and he knew the work had been good.

It was plain enough that Brother Basil was in one of his absent-minded fits. There was no beguiling him into talk at such times. If any of those under his direction presumed upon his mood to do careless or ill-judged work, they found his eye as keen and his word as ready as usual. But his mind--his real self--was not there. Padraig wondered whether this could have any connection with the unlucky picture.

Next day there was deeper concern in the scriptorium. Brother Basil was not present at all. The work went on under Brother Mark, the librarian, but the heart of it was not the same. The untiring patience, brilliant imagination and high ideals of the man who was not only their master but their friend, had made him the soul of the little group of artists. He could not be away for a morning without every one feeling the difference.

At times he had gone afield for a day or even longer, searching for balsams, pigments, minerals and other things needed for the work, but he had nearly always taken Padraig with him. This time he had gone alone.

Padraig was as curious as a squirrel and as determined as a mink, and he wished very much to know what this meant. He did not exactly believe the werewolf story, although it had so impressed him that he could not help making the picture; but he did not like to think of it in connection with the mysterious absence of Brother Basil. A priest of the Church might be able to defy a loup-garou, but if the wolves were real ones they might not know him from any ordinary man.

There is no land so full of fairy-lore and half-forgotten legends as Ireland. Princes in their painted halls and slaves in their mud cabins listened to the shanachies or wandering story-tellers, with wonder, terror and delight. Cluricaunes, banshees, giants, witches, monsters, pookas and the little red-capped people of the fairy rings, were known to the dwellers in many a wattled hut where Padraig had slept. Old people who spoke no language but their own luminous Irish winged his young imagination with tales far more marvelous than those of Nennius, the monk of Bangor.

Still, Padraig had never himself seen any of these extraordinary beings.

He also suspected that Brother Basil would not vouch for the truth of everything in the Latin books he taught his pupils how to read.

Days pa.s.sed, and Brother Basil had not returned. The uneasiness among the monks was growing. It was said that the Abbot himself was as much in the dark as they were. Padraig had just made up his mind that he could endure it no longer, when the Abbot sent for him.

It had been decided, Padraig learned, that he, as Brother Basil's wonted companion on such excursions, would have the best chance of finding him now. All that any one knew was that he had gone out of the great gate one morning early, and no one had seen him since.

"n.o.body would," said Padraig, "if he went straight north into the hills.

No one lives near the old road through the forest."

It was in that direction that all the wolf-tracks had led from the sheep- fold, and the country was a wilderness of marsh and mountain. The Abbot looked at the boy keenly, kindly.

"Are you willing to go alone?" he asked.

"It is the best way," Padraig replied quickly. "One can get on faster,-- and there are not many here who can climb like him. I think he must have met with an accident far from any dwelling."

"He is well beloved by the people. If any one had found him we should have heard. And you have no fear?"

Padraig hesitated. "There are many frightful things in the world," he said slowly. "Long ago I knew that if I let myself fear, fear would be my master all the days of my life. But I am not like the others. I am his dog. I will find him if I live."

"Go, my son, and G.o.d be with you," said the Abbot solemnly. And Padraig went.

He took three days' provision in a leathern bag, and a pike such as the countrymen used, and headed straight toward the hills. He knew that copper was to be found in some parts of the range, but why Brother Basil should go there alone, particularly just at this time, Padraig could not see.

He trotted over the slopes of tilled land near the Abbey, forded the river, circled a pond, and crossed a bog by froglike leaps from ha.s.sock to ha.s.sock. In time he came to the base of a steep rocky height, almost a precipice. On the left was a black mud-hole; to the right were craggy ma.s.ses of rock. A long slanting break in the cliff led upward to the left.

He thrust his staff in this and began to climb.

Thus far there was no choice, for this was the only direction Brother Basil could have taken without some one having seen him on the way. From the height it might be possible to make observations.

Only a gossoon of the hills could have gone up the face of the rock as Padraig did, and he presently found himself on a ledge about twenty feet up, above the quagmire. It was less than a foot wide at first, but widened toward the left, and seedling trees had formed a growth which appeared to merge into the densely wooded hill beyond. He pushed his way along this insecure foothold until the trees began to thin as if there were an open s.p.a.ce beyond. Then directly in front of him sounded the unmistakable snarl of a wolf.

There was no time to think. He braced himself against the cliff, and grasping his pike, awaited the a.s.sault of the beast. Either he or the wolf, or both together, would be tumbled into the slough. But there followed only a guttural word of command in Irish. Then a voice that he knew called, "Padraig, my son, is that you?"

Nothing in heaven or earth could have stopped Padraig then. He broke through the thicket into the clearing, and halted, breathless and amazed.

Brother Basil, unharmed and serene, sat upon a rude wooden bench at the entrance of a cave, and around him were gathered wolves and wolf-like human beings clad in wolf-pelts. One, who seemed the leader, stood erect, broad-shouldered and muscular, in a mantle made of the hide of a giant wolf, the head shaped into a helmet to be drawn mask-like down over the face. A fire smoldered in the cave's black throat, and meat--mutton-bones- -roasted on a sharpened stake thrust into a crevice of the rock. An old woman, wasted and wrinkled, wrapped in a yellow-gray wolfskin lined with lamb's wool, lay on a pile of leaves near the fire, and savage heads emerging from the undergrowth might have been those of wolves, or of men in the guise of wolves.

In the craziest legends of the chronicles there was no such scene as this.